Spider Lily

Chapter One

Feeling scared today; Doctors tell me to write down "I am okay" one hundred times.

I am okay.

I am okay.

I'm not okay

Two years later…

"Shion, you babbling idiot, Shion that's not how you plant flowers!" Currently Shion and Inukashi were out in the remains of what was left of the West Block, planting flowers on one of the many hillsides. "S-Sorry!" of course that was his immediate reply, since he saw where his mistake was and he was doing his best to fix it.

Since Shion was a very clumsy person when put under pressure, he accidently cut off the roots to a bulb with the hand-plow he was using. Inukashi saw the action and merely sighed, pulling herself off the ground just enough for her to move closer to Shion. She took another bulb out of the crate that was set between the two of them. Shion watched her closely with a curious, yet frightened gaze. She had a knack for hitting him in hopes of getting him to learn.

But she didn't hit or throw the bulb at him. Instead, she took his hand that had the plow in it and began to motion his hand into the soft earth, digging a small hole. "Like this, dofus," Well, so much for a sweet and sentimental moment between the two of them, "You were plowing too much at once, and you were flinging dirt everywhere," She showed him how to put the dirt into a small pile that could easily be pushed over the hole once the bulb was in it.

After she removed her hand from his after a few more times of digging into the earth, placing the bulb and covering it up, she got up from the ground to watch him. He was doing it right as far as she could tell. "Congrats knucklehead, you have successfully planted half of the bulbs," She was giving him all the praise, even though she was the one that did most of it since he didn't have a clue as to what he was doing until she finally showed him several hours later.

She continued to stand there for a minute, watching his every move. He was doing alright as far as she was concerned, and she turned to leave. "I'd love to stay, but I have business elsewhere," She put up her hand, giving a half-assed wave instead of bothering to wipe the dirt from her pants. It always found a way back onto her anyway, so it wasn't like it really mattered, Shion supposed. However, dust was all over Shion's face and he was not a dirty person if he chose to be.

"Do you care if Shi-Shi stays another night?" He called out, just before she was out of ear-shot. Inukashi stilled for just a moment before turning her head just enough for Shoin to see her smile. "Sure, I don't mind. Just have him back by mid-afternoon," She then started to walk again until she couldn't be seen anymore.

"Shi-Shi" was Shion's younger brother, so to speak. They shared the same name, but he had his nickname and it was because of Shi-Shi that he was on this very hillside, doing something that he would have never thought of doing. The things he would do for his "brother."

One day, Shi-Shi was playing in the small garden that Shion's mother had set up not too long after the wall had been torn down (Unfortunately for them, the No. 6 officials were making plans to rebuild it.) and he simply wanted to "expand" the small garden. It started with neighbors homes then it became this: Planting bulbs to flowers he didn't even know the names of.

But Shi-Shi did. Only three years old and he already knew how to read and make simple sentences. Maybe his mother was a lot like Shion, someone who was accepted into the gifted course, but never really made it in. Or maybe Shi-Shi's real dad was part of it, and his genes were passed down to him.

It was them, amidst all the dirt and grime and heated air that a painful yet beautiful memory came to mind: If it hadn't of been for him getting into the gifted program, he would have never lived in Chronos and he would have never met Nezumi. He sighed at all the memories that they had together. There was nothing he could do about it, however.

He finally stood up after all the long hours of sitting in the same position on the ground, only moving to a new spot to plant bulbs. He still had several more bulbs to plant, but it was nearing noon and he had been out there since before dawn. Plus it was the end of summer didn't help the slightest bit. Which was strange, really, since he had always known that plants were to be planted in the early start of Spring.

No matter, they might survive through the winter, if not, that was okay. Because they could always do it over again if it came down to it.

But Shion was curious. He didn't even know what kind of flowers the bulbs would become. (If they would even live, that is.) No matter, he needed to rest and get food, and really, the rest of the planting could be put off until later. It didn't really matter at the moment.

With that in his mind, he started to walk down the hill, making his way back to Lost Town to see his mother and his dear brother. Maybe he would get lucky today and get some of the extra pie his mother made...

Nezumi was hot as hell, and his clothes were sticking to him uncomfortably. This was not how he planned to spend his afternoon. He should have been at the river, lounging around and reading his only book for the millionth time in a row. But no. Some kind of animal had to get into his food sulply that was supposed to last him for another month and eat it all. All of it.

He was pissed, to put it simply. He had gathered all that food for several days, using so much time and energy, only to have something crawl right under his nose and take it.

He was too used to that for comfort, honestly.

So there he was, deep in the forest, miles away from his current campsite, setting traps for wild animals and looking for berries or wild vegetables or anything with some sort of nutrition. He could have stayed at the river where fish were at, but he didn't think of that till he was already several miles away.

It seemed that even after three years, the old goof-bag was still hanging on tight to him. Goof-bag being Shion, of course. His forgetfulness and nativity had rubbed off on him long ago, and he was yet to be cleansed of it. No one could dare blame him, however. That was how things were when one was in love. Unrequited love, that is.

Fuck fuck fuck.

He tried to stop remembering every little thing about him, but it seemed that he couldn't. It was in that moment that he tripped whist trying to forget about the white-haired boy… Perhaps it was a good thing for him to keep his face in his mind, at least while trying to concentrate.

It wouldn't stop being annoying, however.

At the moment he was tying several ropes around a few trees in a clearing, making a make-shift camp for at least three days. If he couldn't find food in that time, he would go back to the river and stay there till it was time to move out again... Chances were that he wouldn't be moving out again until he could replenish his food source, though. It wasn't exactly easy traveling in the middle of nowhere when there wasn't a town around.

He sometimes imagined what it would be like if he had lived forty or fifty years earlier, before the big war had all but destroyed the entire earth. In his travels, he had found ruins of what he assumed where old towns and cities that were much more homey looking than No. 6. He could simply walk down a street and tell what the people where like.

Is that what history meant? He had seen the word in his books, but he had never fully grasped the meaning of the word. He didn't know anything about the world except for what his parents told him at a very young age, and the old books that he collected. How he missed them.

He raised the ropes over his head, securing them in place on the tall poles that he had placed in the ground only minutes before hand. That was what he would use as his shelter: A tarp over his head that did nothing to keep him warm at night, just a bit drier than what he normally would be.

He would have to stop working before too long, or else he would tire out and it would be too late to find food to eat. It wasn't like there was much around anyway. Most animals wouldn't start being active until the fall, when they needed to prepare for the long, cold winter.

He knew all of this, of course, but he chose to ignore it since he had determined that a herd of deer were coming through this area.

How he thanked himself for keeping maps and journals of animal movement patterns. If it wasn't for that, there was just no way that he could possibly still be alive in this moment. Well, no, that was a lie. If it wasn't for Shion conducting two surgeries on him, he wouldn't be alive.

He hadn't thought of the white-haired boy in months, which was strange because honestly, Shion was a hard person to forget. He was too naïveté for his own good, he wasn't afraid to do anything, and he was a kind, gentle person. It was also everything that he could remember about his mother, even though she was long dead and he couldn't even remember what she looked like besides her smile.

Pushing forward on his pace, he tied down the tarp to the ground, making sure that it wouldn't come even the slightest bit loose. He had made sure that the ground that was below him was nice and hard, making it difficult for anyone or anything to dig through it. It had been a challenge for him to get the stakes in, but after an hour, it was in.

By the time he was done with his make-shift tent, the temperature was steadily dropping. Nezumi could feel it on his skin. The fact that he had broke into a sweat long ago didn't help, so he shivered. He would have to make do with just the tarp for now and go find something to eat so he could have enough energy to set signal traps to know when the herd was moving through.

He sighed, continuing on, full force.

A/N: Oh look guys, chapter one. C:

Thank you to a certain reviewer for telling me the babies name, and I've tried to get him… accurately into the story (But keeping the same plot) But as also Inukashi's son. I hope that no one will be confused by this, since baby Shion is Shion's "brother." To avoid confusion, I've used "Shi-Shi," as you can tell. ._. Sorry if that's lame.

And thank you everyone else that reviewed and alerted the story :D It all means so much to me. It really does.

The song at the top is "Electro-Shock Blues" by Eels. It's a really good song. Go listen!

I'll update soon C: