Princess Mononoke Fan Fiction / Spirited Away Fan Fiction ❯ A Thousand Fathoms ❯ Hercules ( Chapter 11 )

Author’sNotes: I would like to address the fact that I’ve let down my reviewers. I never intended to leave this fic as I did. As one reviewer stated the wonderful fiction fairy that gave me the idea had indeed flown away. Luckily, it came back from a sabbatical, and I am now trying to get back what I started. I don’t intend for the fic to go on hiatus again, but I can’t make promises. I tend to break those…

Extra long chapter for your reading pleasure.

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You all are going to hate me for this chapter…

HAKU WILL RETURN! Do not be discouraged, just a few more chapters. Hazaa!

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Disclaimer:I don’t own Spirited Away.

Rating:PG-13 (Ratings may change)

Summary:Seven years, one month, two weeks, four days, and two hours, but hey who’s counting? Never a dream. I would never let myself believe it was a dream. “Oh God, I’m actually going through with this!” I took a step.

A Thousand Fathoms

Chapter 11: Hercules I was never really one for Japanese mythology. Yes, blasphemy or whatever you want to call it. I mean, you’d think that spending time in the Spirit World would have had the opposite effect. However, I fell deeply in love with Greek mythology: the good, the bad, jealousy, lust, incest, blood, war, and infinite, unwavering love. It enticed me, enthralled me. Eighth grade English spoiled me for good.   My favorite myth of all time is Orpheus and Eurydice. I won’t go into it, though, because the point I’m trying to make reflects that of Hercules’s twelve labors.   In a fit of madness induced by Hercules’s stepmother, Hera, Hercules killed his family. As a penance for his crime, King Eurystheus gave him, originally, ten tasks. The King added two more tasks later in the sentence for what he called “cheating”, which, in reality, was a bout of cleverness.   Hercules’s fifth task: clean the Augean stables in one day.   The stables were occupied by immune-to-disease livestock (a divine gift) and, therefore, hadn’t been cleaned in years. There was no way Hercules could clean the stables in one day, let alone three (if he had been given the time), so Hercules, being the clever man that he is (or was), re-routed two rivers to flow through the stables, effectively cleaning them out in one day.   By the way, this task was one of the two reasons King Eurystheus added on extra tasks, because the rivers did the work for him.   Still, Hercules is a clever man.   Yes, boring information, I know.   The point I’m trying to make is the moment I stepped in the sties I felt like Hercules, faced with an impossible task and expected to complete it with absolutely no mistakes.   The sty was about as big as a football field (ironically, the sty was located right next to an extremely large field on the far end of Yubaba’s property). Anyway, that was—that was… stupid… a stupid thing to say… Not necessarily irony, now is it?   Anyway… I had never seen so much mess in my life, and coming from me that’s saying something.  The sty was used as unorganized, wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling, storage for stuff they had no need for. There was a bike with no wheels, an old worn car tire, an aluminum Christmas tree, and rusted metal, undistinguishable metal, that rose from the ground, and towered over my short-stature—menacing and cruel, like a gigantic sharp ugly monster bent on killing the whole world with tetanus. Shiver. As if organizing this junk wasn’t enough work, there was old moldy hay and manure blanketing the floor, and food rotting in the troughs.   Literally, I stood in the doorway of this gigantic monster too shocked to move. My whole body was protesting—twitching, aching, moaning—knowing that what I was to do today would send me to the morgue.   I had to out-Hercules Hercules…   No wonder Yubaba gave us this task, if Spawn and I didn’t kill each other first, the cleaning surely would. I wondered how many tasks she had for us. Were they all like this? Would I die cursing her name to heavens or Spawn’s, because, at this point, they were on the same bloody, loathing, level.   I tried think of many different ways to avoid this insane job. One of my favorites involved a flame-thrower and hypnotized bunnies… Alas, there was no way to get out of this. Period. Even if I crawled up to Yubaba broken, bloody, and dying of leprosy she’d still make me clean the damn sty. Worst of all, I had clean it with the Devil’s Spawn.   It was the happiest moment of my life. Ha! At least my sense of humor was still intact. I’d rather have humor than dignity… Haha, oh, humor!   “You’re late” Spawn oh-so-lovingly-sneered as I stepped inside, confident and graceful. Well, as confident and graceful as I could with a battered body.   Damn equilibrium.   Good morning, you-ass-hole-pig-for-brains-craptastic-fucking-wanker. If only I had the energy to physically make that comment… I glared at him instead, the narrow-eyed, I’m-going-to-castrate-you-in-your-sleep, ice glare that sends grown men crying for mommy. Spawn’s body twitched a little when his eyes met mine, and I could see a flash of fear in his features.   I scared him, for a split second, but I still scared him!  Whoo-hoo! Half a point to me.   Spawn: two   Chihiro: two and a half! Let the angels sing!   A frog walked in, one I wasn’t well acquainted with, probably one of the livestock handlers, took one look at the mess and laughed (very evilly, might I add). Did the whole world band together to make my life miserable? If not, it was certainly starting to look that way. The frog turned towards Spawn, self-satisfied smirk on his face, and then looked at me, his smirk faltered briefly on account of my black eye and still swollen lip.   “Will you be able to work, human?”   For a second it seemed he was actually concerned.   “Yes.” I was going to work my ass off in front of Mr. I-can-be-in-a-bloody-bone-breaking (because that’s what I did, I broke his arm)-fight-and-look-absolutely-flawless-three-days-later. I was going to work my ass off whether I was able to or not.   I am not weak. I am strong. I am Woman; hear me roar.   I snarled a little, baring my teeth in Spawn’s direction. For the second time that day, he twitched. Another half point!   The frog glanced at me strangely before speaking again.   “I’m Sawagi, here to keep the peace.”   I snorted. Oh irony, I love you.   Sawagi leaned forward, quite menacing for a three-foot tall frog, daring us to deny what he said. “I’m here to make sure you two don’t kill each other. I’m under strict orders to alert Yubaba the moment things get out of hand, and she won’t hesitate to turn you into pigs the next time around. Now, clean.”   Sawagi smirked as he pulled the tire and an old couch cushion from the mess, set them in the far corner and promptly sat down to watch us… watching him.    “Go on, get!” He waved his had in a shooing motion.   I looked at the mess again.   I’d much rather be a pig.   If I was a pig, though, Kohaku and I would be an even more impossible couple. Never mind the fact that he still hadn’t returned from his pointless mission. He said that he’d know if something happened to me. Well, something did happen, a big something, and he still showed not signs of coming home or checking to see if I was alright. Apparently, having his best friend beaten up by a slimy slug wasn’t enough for him to high-tail it out of wherever he was to make said best friend feel better. I would give anything to be sitting in his arms right now, to be safe, warm, well, and, above all, happy.   However, Kohaku was not here, wasn’t here to make my miserable life better. And I… I am anything but dependant on a man, the man of my dreams included. I was going to stand on my own two feet even if it killed me.    Mustering up my strength, I looked over the metal monster once more. The best bet would be to move everything out of the sty first, before deep cleaning. However, Spawn, as usual, had his own plans and had already started sweeping up the floor. He was purposefully leaving all the heavy stuff for me.   Useless miserable excuse for a man.   Less than pleased, I marched over to the pile of junk upon junk, my body slowly starting to warm up, but still in so much pain, and surveyed what would be the best way to start moving shit out. Tetanus, here I come!   As I climbed onto a precariously perched table in order to remove stuff from top to bottom, Sawagi yelled at Spawn to be more productive. Out of the corner of my eye, I witnessed Sawagi rip the broom from Spawn’s grasp and push him over to the bike. I would’ve smiled had I been more healthy and not worried about rust-causing disease. Gritting my teeth, I focused on my Herculean task.   Oh, this was the life.   0=   It took us five days—yes, five—to move all the junk out and finally start cleaning out the old hay and whatnot. Spawn and I never talked; it was something we didn’t even have to agree on. We worked together like oil and water. Under fed and over worked, we trudged around Hades trying to make it look nicer and fantastically failing. More than once, I found myself light-headed and seeing stars, but I refused to stop working for more than the allowed time off, in order to not anger Yubaba and to not show Spawn I was feeling less than par.   I came back to bed every night exhausted. Rebi would be waiting with a bowl of rice and a roasted newt (an acquired taste called hunger) from Kamajii. We’d sit in relative silence as I shoved mouthfuls of food into my open trap before she had to head off to her shift. There wasn’t much to say aside from the fact that I really needed a tetanus shot (I hadn’t cut myself yet, though, with my luck, it was bound to happen soon), and when I mentioned it once she looked at me confused and a little worried for my mental well being.   Damn spirits and their non-existent diseases.   I had just pulled myself out of bed on the morning of Torture: Day Number Six, when I saw stars again. I sat back down on the mat, with my head in my hands, willing my strength to pull me through until I made it to the sties. Sawagi had taken to giving us breakfast the moment we showed up. The sooner I ate the sooner the stars would go away.   Outside was hot, unbelievably hot, instant sweat and dehydration. Summer, you heat-whore! Even in my light uniform, I was soaked. I pulled off my akome, leaving my navy undershirt on; there was little temperature difference. Beads of sweat collected over my skin, as if I had just climbed out of a pool.   Mmm…pool…   The only solace I had (besides daydreaming about pools and a half-naked Kohaku) was that Spawn was in the same burning hell as me, cooking under the sun like me, and Yubaba held the communal baster.   I was the first one to make it to the sties, breakfast was set up for Spawn and I with a note saying that Sawagi wasn’t going to supervise today. He had “prior engagements” according to the note. There was no indication that there would be anyone watching over us either. It was as if they felt it necessary to leave Spawn and I alone in the same room for entertainment. We were an experiment! We were the mice in the maze hunting for cheese.   I started to hyperventilate the second time I read the letter.   Alone.   Alone with him.   Not a good thing.   I was going to be alone with him for the first time since we beat each other to pulp and the only thought running through my head was “not a good thing”.  A bruised knee is not a good thing. A bad haircut is not a good thing. Spending five hours in a dictator’s torture chamber with only the garrote as company, somehow seemed a bit more intense than “not a good thing”.   I actually started laughing hysterically at this point, laughing and crying all at the same time. By far the most absurd moment of my life…   Everything will be okay. Really, it will. I’ll just hide a rusty scrap of metal on my person, and if he comes within a ten foot radius I’ll give him tetanus.   I grabbed my breakfast—rice, rice, and, oh wait, more rice—and sat down on the old beat-up cushion Sawagi always claimed. Just my luck a small rusty piece of metal was lying on the floor next to me. All stealthy-like I stuck it in my pocket, ready for the fight to come.   Span walked in, more-like strutted in, looking all smug and—holy fuck!   My eyes hit the floor so fast, as if they had exploded out of a two-cylinder shotgun.   It was suddenly a whole lot warmer than it was before.   I took a moment to reconvene myself. Did I actually see what I thought I just saw? Honestly? And-and-and was I blushing?   Damn.   Hesitantly, I looked up…   …and looked right back down again.   Yup, yup, yup. He wasn’t wearing a shirt. No-no-no shirt. No piece of fabric to cover his chiseled chest, toned arms, and sleek back. When he moved to pick up the letter and his breakfast, his muscles rippled under his skin, smooth and powerful. His long hair, tied back at the base of his neck and in a simple braid, swept a little past the band of his pants. He was, for all accounts, aside from his awful,horrid personality, a god.   Oh my…                   ;