Something About Spiders

bori-chan

Summary: Davis has been deathly afraid of spiders since his close encounter with spider-type Digimon eating his face. The fact that Arukenimon was a creepy spider lady who attempted to rule the world didn't help either. Now, several months into his new noodle cart business, Davis starts seeing spiders absolutely everywhere. He ends up seeking comfort not from his close friend DemiVeemon, but from someone else… Davis/Yolei

Author's Note/Disclaimer: Digimon is the property of Toei Animation. I am merely borrowing its characters for non-commercial purposes. This particular series is intended mainly to give myself something light to pursue, since I usually tend to write darker fics. As usual, this will be written in past tense, like a history textbook or a fairytale.

And yes, I know I should be working on All World…but I couldn't help myself. This idea for a fic was burning at my insides.

one

"Davis, are you really sure about this?" DemiVeemon looked at his best friend with a skeptical look on his face, which was understandable—Davis had blown off the first day of his junior year of high school in order to work.

"Of course I'm sure," Davis assured him, reinforcing a nail on the side of the cart. It was finally perfect. During the summer and part of Davis's sophomore year, he had spent all of his time and energy on his childhood dream. He had also spent a few afternoons here and there selling noodles, and he was pretty successful so far. Now, he was planning on not attending school altogether, seeing how he found it rather pointless to begin with. "I'm always sure." He winked at a dark-haired college girl as she passed. She barely glanced his way.

DemiVeemon laughed as he saw Davis's dejected face and stared at the girl's retreating back. "She's kind of ugly-looking anyway," DemiVeemon consoled him. "On a scale of one to ten…well, she doesn't even rate." Davis cheered up considerably.

"Yeah, you're right," he said. "Kari's better looking."

"Whatever." DemiVeemon rolled his eyes. "She's also better at ignoring you."

Davis laughed and pushed his friend playfully. "What about you and Gatomon, eh? Notice how she's been spending a little too much time with Patamon lately? What do you think, pal?"

DemiVeemon shook his head fervently. "Gatomon would never fall for that overgrown pot roast."

"Would never, or already has?" DemiVeemon shoved Davis, but couldn't hide the look of worry on his face.

Davis, noticing his friend's discomfort, cuffed him on the shoulder and spoke soothingly. "Hey, I was just kidding." DemiVeemon still looked pretty bummed, so he kept talking. "You're much cooler than Patamon, anyway."

"Thanks. You're much cooler than TK, mostly because you don't wear that ridiculous hat." Davis chuckled, and the two sat down on the sidewalk.

"Yeah, well, we're just a pair of regular Romeos, aren't we," Davis mused, looking into the sky.

"Show me what you added to the cart yesterday."

"Alright. Check this out, DemiVeemon, if you can handle it," he said excitedly. "I pull from the front, and you get to ride here in the back, acting like the perfect mascot."

DemiVeemon looked confused. "What do I do?"

"Juggle, sing, freak dance—it's up to you."

"Huh?"

"Just look cool."

DemiVeemon nodded and grinned. "I can do that." He jumped onto the back of the cart and began flexing his muscles (which weren't that amazing, anyway). Davis finally pulled DemiVeemon down and laughed, telling him to stop scaring away potential customers.

"Come on, let's get this party started." Davis began pulling his noodle cart slowly down the side of the road. DemiVeemon gladly jumped on the back of the cart and smiled at everyone. It had only been a few years since all the Digiworld was delivered from evil, and not everyone knew about Digimon just yet. DemiVeemon certainly attracted a lot of attention as he jumped up and down in enthusiasm.

"Mommy, look at that silly doll!" A little girl pulled her mother to where Davis was and snuck a quick peek at DemiVeemon. "He's cute."

"Yeah, I guess he is," admitted Davis, smiling broadly. "Can I help you?"

"We are kind of hungry," said the mother. "Tokara, what do you want?"

"Hm, I don't know," Tokara said, beaming up at Davis. She pointed to him. "You can pick."

Davis smiled and decided to fix her something extra special. He just remembered that he needed something that was located in one of the storage compartments he had installed, and excused himself in order to retrieve it.

Then they came. An entire army of them. Not customers, but spiders—hundreds, maybe thousands of small black creatures climbed all over Davis's newly renovated noodle cart, infecting it with their wiry legs and all-together grossness. The teenager screamed, and grabbing a metal spatula (he kept one in his back pocket ever since some drunk kid jumped him at a party...long story), he began attacking the noodle cart for all it was worth.

(My paranoia speaks through destruction)

If anything, that only made things worse. The spiders seemed to thrive on destruction: for every spider that was squashed beneath Davis's cooking utensil, ten more materialized in its place. They crawled all over Davis's arms and legs, and some of them slowly made them way across his face. The rest of them migrated from one end of the cart to the other, trying to escape from Davis's spatula. Davis just kept swatting, not noticing that his noodle cart was also suffering from his blows.

Davis choked as a persistent group of spiders slipped down his throat. He clawed at the sky with one hand, and smashed any other spiders with his weapon. But the spiders wouldn't go away. It wasn't until DemiVeemon finally got his attention that he paused.

"Davis," began DemiVeemon, pulling on Davis's blue vest, "what the hell are you doing?"

"What the hell are you doing just standing there, you bloody beast," spat Davis. "Why aren't you helping me?"

"Helping you do what, destroy your hard work? What's wrong, Davis?"

"The spiders, you idiot, you know I hate spiders—Goddamn it, I don't have time for this…" Davis turned back to attack his enemies. "Hey, where'd they go?"

"Where did what go?" asked DemiVeemon quietly, looking at Davis with a million more questions on his face.

"The…spiders." Davis looked all around him, but they were all gone; not one trace of a spider remained at all. Not even a bloodied carcass of a single insect was found. The only thing that showed was Davis's noodle cart, bearing the effects of the metal spatula. It was rather depressing to see just how much harm a simple kitchen utensil could do. Davis just looked at his demolished cart, which had taken endless weeks to build and perfect. It was beyond repair now. "What…what happened to the spiders?"

"Davis, I don't think there were any."

"That's impossible. I saw them with my own eyes."Davis bit his lip as he tried not to stare at his smashed cart.

"I didn't see anything," said DemiVeemon, scratching his head.

"There were spiders, I swear to you."

"…Okay, I believe you," DemiVeemon assured his friend. Davis nodded, deep in thought.

"You believe me, huh?" He seemed skeptical. "You just said you didn't see any spiders, but they were right there…"

"Maybe I—uh, missed them or something…"

"Unlikely." Davis buried his face in his hands and shook his head. "I don't understand. They felt so real…" He shuddered.

"Maybe you drank too much soymilk last night," DemiVeemon whispered quietly.

"Um…" At the sound of the voice, Davis looked down and saw the young girl standing there, still clutching her confused mother's hand. She had but one question. "Does this mean I don't get my noodles?"