Disclaimer: The beautiful artwork of Natsume Yuujinchou belongs to Midorikawa-sensei.
Warning: English isn't my first language, there might be grammatical errors or words that out of context. Your typical episode of Natsume Yuujinchou with hints of NatsumexTaki.
It was a nice afternoon when Natsume, Tanuma, and Taki went back home together after school. They usually had to part ways at the intersection near the lotus flower field, but Natsume needed to run an errand for his foster mother to buy some manjuu at Nanatsujiya. That's why he decided to escort Taki to her home first before running the errand as they were taking the same route.
"See you tomorrow, Natsume, Taki," said the shaggy-haired boy, waving at them.
"Yeah, see you," replied Natsume, smiling. Taki waved back to Tanuma as he part ways.
"Sensei must be excited to have some snacks coming, Natsume-kun." Taki started a topic, chuckling at the idea of a super-cute cat stuffing manjuu at its cute face.
"You bet," Natsume agreed. "Nyanko-sensei really loves manjuu from Nanatsujiya. He even pesters me on daily basis to buy him snacks especially from Nanatsujiya."
Natsume was glad having Taki around. As much as he treasured Tanuma, Taki was just as precious and she was the first girl he trusted enough to learn his secret. The girls back in the old days were either scared of him or simply disgusted. Taki wasn't like that at all, nor was Tanuma. Natsume was glad his life took a better turn.
On the way, he would listen to Taki's stories about anything she was interested at. She would tell stories from her grandfather's books that she found interesting (or peculiar to Natsume). She would sometimes ask Natsume if he liked this food or that movie. She was careful enough not to ask anything sensitive about his past, but Natsume did admit that the conversation he had with her was just as fun as talking to Nishimura and Kitamoto. Talking to her make him more humane.
"Not that I'm a ghost or something," Natsume flashed a smile as the thought came to mind.
"Natsume-kun? Are you listening?" Taki woke him up from his daydream.
Natsume flinched, but managed to give her a smile. "Ah, sorry. I am—"
Natsume took a sudden turn. He put his arm in front of Taki, telling her to back off. Taki realised that instant and hid behind her friend's back. Natsume sensed a malicious presence and he had a very bad feeling about this. A big shadow loomed after them. The temperature around them dropped. Natsume took a step behind as a gigantic youkai with two hollow eyes came to sight. It carried around a big pot on his back. With its crooked legs, it walked slowly toward them. It whispered something that sounded like, "Give me the Book of Friends, give me the Book of Friends."
"Natsume," The youkai finally spoke, frightened the hell out of Natsume. "Give me the Book of Friends! Or I'll eat you."
"Taki," Natsume realised the grip around his back was Taki's. "Run as fast as you can!"
"Oh? Isn't he the one who used half-assed spell to exorcise me twenty years ago?" said the youkai, recognizing Taki. "What, so you're friends with him, Natsume? Great timing. I'll take him instead. If you can't find me and bring me the Book of Friends by twilight, I'll eat him for sure!"
"Wait! She's not the one who exorcised—" Natsume frantically retorted. Taki shrieked as the youkai took her custody. "Taki!"
"Natsume-kun! No!" Natsume could see the horror in Taki's face. He was even more shocked by the sight of his friend being shoved into a large pot the youkai brought.
"Bring me the Book of Friends, or I'll eat him!" The youkai warned him as it vanished in some crazy gust of wind.
o o o
Natsume ran into the wood. He shouted Taki's name and panted. He looked around and asked some youkai if they had seen the youkai who kidnapped Taki. He was hopelessly running around looking for a clue when suddenly a cat with a round face appeared among the bushes.
"I was waiting for Nanatsujiya's manjuu and here you are, Natsume! What on earth are you doing here, you big idiot?" said the cat with a voice like middle-old man.
"Nyanko-sensei!" There's a little bit of relief in his voice. He quickly told Nyanko-sensei what happened. "Help me out, Sensei. Taki might be in danger."
"Of course she is, you idiot," said the cat without a care. "A youkai that's not properly exorcised can be really furious. Moreover, looks like it broke the spell by itself after a period of time. Heaven knows how mad a youkai is when it can break away from binding spell by itself."
"That's not good at all. The sun is about to set, too," said Natsume. "Sensei, if I can't find it and bring the Book of Friends to it by twilight, Taki will— Taki will be…" Natsume found it hard to let out the words. He couldn't bare the guilt that haunted him if anything bad happened to Taki.
"Tch!" Nyanko-sensei puffed and transform into ayakashi form. "Let's go, Natsume."
o o o
After a few round of flights around the town, Natsume could finally sense the same malicious presence at an old storage house near the river. "Sensei, there! The youkai is somewhere around that storage house."
Nyanko-sensei landed in front of the storage house. "Be careful, Natsume. That mad youkai might attack you all of sudden."
"Oi, Youkai! Get out! Where's Taki?!" Natsume shouted as hard as he can, hoping that Taki could hear him too.
"Hooo… you finally come to me, human's child." A scary-yet-hollow voice responded. "Show me the Book of Friends first."
Natsume glanced to Nyanko-sensei before he took out the Book of Friends. Nyanko-sensei got ready to attack. Natsume, however, wasn't ready for this. This book held every promise he inherited from his grandmother. But, Taki was definitely not second to the Book of Friends. Tanuma, and even his foster parents, the Fujiwara couple, were not second to anything. Natsume held everyone dear evenly. That's when he realised that he had gained weaknesses by holding something dearly. "Did I get greedy? Just after I thought my life took a better turn," he thought.
"It's okay, Natsume. I'll eat him," said Nyanko-sensei. Strangely, that was very reassuring. Natsume made up his mind to take out the book.
The second Natsume took out the book, the youkai snatched it right away in a blink of an eye. "Sensei!" Natsume panicked.
"Don't be so arrogant!" Nyanko-sensei leaped and bit the youkai in the air. That youkai struggled and shouted in pain as its body shrunk a little after Nyanko-sensei bit it. But then, Nyanko-sensei released it and said, "You taste awful. Begone!"
A beam of blue light appeared from Nyanko-sensei's forehead, blinding everyone who saw it. The youkai was gone and the Book of Friends was safe on the ground. Natsume took it quickly. "Thank you, Sensei," he said gratefully.
Nyanko-sensei reverted to his fortune-cat vessel. "For crying out loud," the grumpy cat replied.
Natsume started looking for Taki around the storage house. In the corner of the storage house, he found the pot the youkai used to take Taki away. It was so big that Natsume needed to find a stool to climb up. He managed to climb and saw Taki was lying down in the pot. "Taki!" Natsume called her, feeling a bit of relief.
But the girl didn't respond.
Natsume carefully put his weight onto the pot and pull it forward so the pot could roll forward. He then got into the pot to pull Taki out. He could feel that the pot was so cold that he began to panic. A lot of "what ifs" surfaced on his mind. Taki's skin also felt chilly. He quickly pulled her out and carried her out.
Outside, there were mid-rank youkai coming out from the bushes. They rushed to find out what the commotion was about. "It is indeed Natsume-sama!" said the one-eyed youkai. The bull-like youkai echoed him.
"Oi, Chuukyuu! Could you get me some firewood? We need something to warm her up," said Natsume, putting down Taki. The mid-rank youkai agreed to help without further ado.
"Sensei, she's really cold. What should I do? What if—"
"Calm down, Natsume. She'll be fine after we warm her up," said the cat, yawning. "My guess is that youkai is a winter youkai."
"Winter youkai? Oh, so it's like Yukionna that we've met before?" Even though he felt embarrassed, he wrapped his arms around Taki while the chuukyuu made the campfire. "Then, why is it here even though it's not yet winter?"
The fortune-cat stopped in the middle of his grooming. "I told you, didn't I? When a youkai is mad, it can do practically anything even when it's supposed to be at its weakest state. Though most of winter youkai are fine in summer, they can only eat cold food. That's why this girl needs to be frozen first before it eats her."
Natsume tightened his embrace. Nyanko-sensei curled up in Taki's lap. And finally, the campfire lighted up in front of them. Natsume thanked the chuukyuu and they sat around the campfire, too. Natsume did all the thinking of what to say to Taki when she woke up. Should he cut ties with her? That was always the best way to protect anyone from unearthly world he's dealing with. But, cutting ties didn't erase the fact that some youkai might mistake her as her grandfather and took a revenge on her. Shouldn't he apologize first? What if she ended up hating him? He wouldn't want it. But what if hating him was for the best? He didn't want her to get involved in this again. She was the only person who knew him better and kept him sane because she was such an optimistic girl. She understood even though she couldn't see them and Natsume wanted it to stay like that forever.
"N-Natsume-kun…"
Natsume was glad to hear her voice before she buried her face in his chest, crying. Taki was trembling. Natsume didn't know which one caused it, the cold, the fear, or the relief. He awkwardly petted her head to comfort her. But after a few strokes, he felt embarrassed and stopped. Taki muffled something like "I'm glad" under her breath. Natsume felt a sweet pang in his heart, relieved that his friend didn't end up hating him but at the same time, he also worried about it.
After Taki calmed down and her pale skin turned better in color, Natsume started his blame-taking ritual. "Taki, I'm sorry I got you caught up in this mess. I kept recalling the face you made when that youkai took you away, and I'm—I can't help but blaming myself. It was the scariest nightmare coming true. I don't want it to happen ever again, so please, please stay away—"
Taki suddenly raised her hand to pat him softly. "This is how you're supposed to pet, Natsume-kun. Instead of tapping the head, you brush the hair softly with your fingers. Like this." Natsume's cheeks reddened. Taki was still smiling. "I'm fine, Natsume-kun. It wasn't your fault. It was the youkai's fault for mistaking me as my grandfather. And please don't shut me out. I'll report you to Tanuma-kun if you really do that."
"But you need to live normally." Natsume finally replied. That was the first time he saw Taki sulking.
"So do you, Natsume-kun," she said firmly. "You have the right to live normally, too. But, it can't be helped, right? Being able to see youkai makes you the Natsume-kun whom I talking to right now. And I quite like it."
Natsume froze at the word "like". The other youkai took a pause, too. Taki realised she had embarrassed herself and stuttered, "It's, I'm not… it's not like that." She took Nyanko-sensei on her lap to cover her face.
Natsume smiled fondly at her. This girl always succeeded to help him come back to his sense. "What was that? That was…"
"Cute."
"Eh?"
"My, my," Nyanko-sensei interrupted as they both blushed furiously. "Time to go home, you rascals. Natsume, don't you dare going home without Nanatsujiya's manjuu!"
o o o
"It's the second time you saved me, Natsume-kun. I don't know how to thank you enough. If it's Neko-chan, he will be glad after I buy him some manjuu, right, Neko-sensei?" Taki winked at Nyanko-sensei who was holding his share of manjuu that Taki bought for him. Only Nyanko-sensei welcomed her idea to buy him manjuu without a tiny bit of shame.
"It's okay, Taki. Just, the next time I tell you to run, quickly run, okay?" said Natsume.
In that instant, Taki gave him a peck on his cheek. "Thank you," she said, then rushed into her house, feeling embarrassed.
Natsume dropped Nyanko-sensei, astonished. He was eventually able to come back home before dinner, but Touko-san noticed that something had happened.
"Ara, Takashi-kun, why is your face turning red, I wonder?" asked Touko-san with a smile full of meaning. She was getting him a bowl of rice.
"Is it fever?" Shigeru-san guessed.
"No, he wouldn't be that giddy if it's a fever," said Touko-san, letting out a chuckle. Natsume just sat there and wondered why he couldn't deny it at that time.
Author's note: It's the first time writing fanfic after a long while. I have this plot on my mind after seeing how adorable Taki Tooru is. And Natsume Takashi is such a boyfriend material and BAM, I wrote it and had the courage to share it here. There are a lot more male characters in this series than female characters, so I can pretty much tell where this series swings according to the fans (I mean, if it's about romance), but I hope you won't hate this. Are the hints I gave too much? Do you think I portrayed Taki and Natsume well? Did I rush the plot? Hahaha, thanks for reading tho. Comments are loved!