Chapter 2: The Meeting
She stepped off of the ferry as the ramp clanged down on the stone steps. The frog near the top was still spewing clear water. Chihiro dodged the frog's stream and ran up the stairs, arms folded: the breeze from the bay was much stronger now that she was off of the ferry.
No one else disembarked off the ferry with her and the colorful mass soon drifted off back to the train station once more.
Chihiro continued to run through the main street. The once happy and colorful buildings that lined the way looked sodden and depressed, their paint chipped and the windows broken. Chihiro looked through the alleyways to try to spot some spirits, but with no luck. The streets were completely bare except for her; the lanterns that lit it up weren't even on. Due to the lack of light, Chihiro tripped multiple times, and scraped her knees.
With blood trickling down her legs, Chihiro could feel the stinging sensation on her kneecaps, and she wished to take many bites from the fruit of the river spirit; the same fruit that healed Haku and No-Face the year before. Thinking about Haku made her smile and soon she was running through the streets once more, completely replenished by a good memory.
A scream filled the air with sheer fright, Chihiro stopped once again. A dragon, ripped from the pages of a book of legends, squirmed through the air with broken glass falling behind it. The white scales on the dragon were barely even visible as Chihiro peered up at it. A girl was riding on the back of the dragon and the girl was screaming with all her might. It swooped down like a fighter pilot, the girl screamed once more. Fire was spewing from its mouth, burning every building in sight. Chihiro was frightened, in her previous journey to the spirit world; she was never presented with such terror and fright such as death, only the fear of losing her parents and Haku, now she could lose her life.
She ducked into the nearest alleyway, a tight space that could fit only two people going in opposite directions. She quickly ran down the nearest alleyway in silence, she knew she had to get to the bathhouse, but then where from there? Her mind raced as she raced down the alleyway. The dragon was seen above and the girl still screaming. Chihiro slipped and fell once more, the dark still encompassing her vision. Her reaction was the indicator to the dragon, she screamed as she fell, ripping her wounded knees open once more. The dragon hurriedly squirmed back over to the location of Chihiro and attempted to fly down from above the alleyway, but to no avail. The rooflines above the alleyway made the space between them too small to be passed through, and the dragon was forced to find another way to get to Chihiro.
She kept running, she heard the dragon above her tearing tiles off of the roof with its claws and even felt the tiles hit the ground one by one, but she kept going. A door was about ten feet away from her and she knew she had to get to it to find salvation.
It seemed like the door was inching closer, like Chihiro's vision was so skewed that it seemed that she was barely making headway down the narrow alleyway, but it really was not the case. Like a swift runner, Chihiro got there faster than she expected and wrenched open the old wooden door.
The door creaked and dust puffed and pouted its way out of its slumber, spreading itself throughout the ground before Chihiro as she quickly raced inside of the building. She closed the door shut, her back against the smelly wood, and slouched down, her behind just delicately touching the dusty floor below her. Her hair rose up in the fashion that it always did when she was uncomfortable, and smoothly went back down, a deep breath passed her lips. Her legs splayed out in a 'V' pattern, Chihiro then opened her eyes and what she saw was anything but fun.
Large fish lined a pathway in front of her, scales shining and insides brewing in the late summer heat. Their eyes lifeless, the fish simply lay there with dead stares and open mouths. They were unmoving yet they were atrocious. Something so dead was so terrible to Chihiro's eyes, and her nose. She wanted to leave, she wanted to leave the Spirit World and never come back, her cons outweighing her pros. Her eyes reddened and her mouth pulsed with every breath, she tried to keep it in, but her immaturities at her young age forbid her to, she spilled her tears on the floor. A motion in the corner of her eye. A darkness moving past her pupil. An uneasy feeling taking over her body. Chihiro opened her tear filled eyes and peered into the distance, past the rotting fish bodies. A spirit was slowly walking towards her, the spirit soon turned into multiple spirits and soon she had a group of about fifteen spirits walking up to her.
"Stay back!" Chihiro yelped cautiously, not wanting them to hurt her.
Low mumbling was the response to the warning, and they kept advancing. The ominous spirits walked to Chihiro slowly, with their lumpy heads cocked to either side of their nonexistent shoulders, and one would expect an inquisitive glance upon their faces – if they had them.
"Get away!" Chihiro screamed, her frailty obviously showing, as her hands went to the side of her face and her knees bent to block the ghastly sight from her eyes, "I said stay away!"
Some more low mumbling chimed back at her, this time a bit louder, they were trying to send a message to her, but she wasn't having any of it. The spirits walked up to her and the evident leader of them pointed to a window, Chihiro made no response. Another spirit tried to grasp her focus by simply passing through her, which sent a shiver down her spine, but no response. Finally the spirits walked away from Chihiro, not trying to help the ignorant and spiteful little girl.
Chihiro's fright wasn't poorly based though; her last trip to the Spirit World was daunting: the spirits scared her to no end, until the actual end of her trip in which she was used to their slow walking and their lack of speaking, save for a couple mumbles and moans.
As they slowly walked and mumbled away from her location, she looked up, eyes wide and fearful. The lumpy beings slipped and slid into the distance. The message was lost once more, Chihiro had no plan of action after this, the meeting that convened really never took place, one party arrived and all was lost on Chihiro's part.
"Hey! Wait up!" Chihiro yelled again, in the needy tone that she yelled one year previously as her parents turned into pigs in front of her eyes. The spirits didn't turn around, they didn't stop, they kept moving, the silent gang passed through a wall and left, and Chihiro was alone once more.
