Chapter 2

She wakes from her dream with a start, body shaking uncontrollably and slick with sweat. Her breaths come out hard and ragged while she clutches fistfuls of her red and white comforter tightly, knuckles turning white from her grip. Her eyes, already naturally large, are stretched wide open as she wildly takes in her surroundings and struggles to calm herself down. It was that stupid dream again! The one where she's running through Wolf Forest looking for something that doesn't want to be found. It always ends with her yelling at the sky, but the freaky thing is that she got an answer this time. And the answer that she got was what made her wake up like she did.

'You're too late.'

Those three words were enought to throw her mind into a panic and scare her to her very core. They etched themselves into her brain in a way that made it impossible to forget. She shivers as they repeat in her head once again with startling vividness and immediately scowls, hating how much they got to her, how much the dreams bothered her. She doesn't even know who or what this mystery object in her dream is and yet she's hung up on it like some type of obsessed fool! Something whispers to her in the back of her head though that it's a who. It's a who, not a what, to which she grumbles out loud as she trudges to her bathroom to wash herself off, arms crossed in useless defiance as the voice returns, "Like I care."

Yes you do.

"Do not."

Do too.

"Go away."

It's a man.

She stops in her tracks. "What?" She asks before cringing at how eager she sounded.

I said, the voice says slowly, tone laced with amusement, the 'who' is a man.

"Why are you even telling me this?"

Because I can. Responds the voice smugly.

The blond sighs at the smugness. "I really hate it when you do this to me, Kusukusu."

What? It asks with mock innocents.

"Get me all curious about who it is that's in my dreams. Besides, aren't men supposed to chase the women, not the other way around?"

Dunno.

"That makes two of us." Washing her face off, she leaves her bedroom and walks straight into the kitchen space which is also part of the living and dining room area. Always nice to have everything in one place is her philosophy. Making some tea, she stretches as she waits and lets out a yawn as she toys with the thought of her arguing with her conscience who she named Kusukusu just to make it more interesting.

I'm not your conscience though.

"Yes you are."

No, I am not.

"Then what are you?" Kusukusu's response is cut off by the cry of the blond's teapot. Pouring the hot water into a cup, she takes out a tea bag from its packet and puts it in, not even sparing a glance at its name as she does so. As long as it wasn't a Sleepytime tea bag, she would be fine. Another yawn escapes her mouth and as she's about to take a sip of her beverage, her doorbell rings. She groans and ignores the sound while making a mental note to disable it later. It's rung again. Dutifully blocking the noise out, she tries to take her first sip once more only for a knocking pattern to stop her. Knock-knock-knockety-knock-knock-knock-knock-WHAM! She waits for the encore just to make sure it's who she thinks it is. SMACK-BANG-THUMP! and... expletives are shouted from behind her closed doorway and then some. She listens in, whistling quietly at her friend's impressive word use in curses and even raises an eyebrow at one or two creative swears before opening her red barrier that kept her safe from the outside world. Keeping her eyebrow raised as she greets the taller girl, she says "Never heard some of those words before."

Hopping up and down on her good foot while simontaniously cradling her bad one, the other girl looks up and says, "Nice to see you too, Rima and do we really need the kick in there?"

"Yup. Ice is on the counter if you go inside and get it yourself."

Amu rolls her eyes, but doesn't comment. "Before that though,"

"Hm?" Turning around, Rima sees the pinkette step to the side and reveal to her a huge animal with beautiful brown eyes and black hair that comes up to her neck in height. Yeah, the thing was abnormally big and her abnormally short height didn't help any. Eyes growing large, she quickly yanks Amu inside her house and slams the door shut, locking it before whipping around to face the other girl and say in a panic, "Holy crap! There's a grizzly bear outside of my door! Why would you bring an animal that's bigger than me to my house?!"

"N-no, Rima!-"

"And I am unarmed too! You know that! Wait! Where's my shotgun?"

"Please listen-"

"Ok yeah, that's right! I sold it on Ebay after being unable to figure it out how to turn the safety off. I couldn't even find it on the stupid thing!"

"You were too stubborn to ask for help as well." Chimes in Amu. Rima just grumbles and looks at her. "Now that I got your attention Rima, please listen."

"What?" She snaps, still aware of what's outside her door.

"That wasn't a grizzly bear, but a dog."

"No. I'm pretty sure I would know what a dog would look like, and let me tell you, that wasn't it. Too big."

"Just look again."

"No way!"

"Yes." Taking the petite blond by the shoulders, Amu spins her around, unlocks the door while ignoring her loud protests and flings it open. The animal is still there and waiting patiently, sitting with its head cocked slightly to one side as if to question the blond's sanity.

"What are you looking at?" She growls. The dog says nothing. (Duh).

"Be nice."

"Why? It's a bear."

"Dog."

"Bear."

"Dog."

"Be-"

"Woof!" Looks like it decided to join in. Fun.

"Dog."

"Grizzly bear that can bark."

"Rima."

"Fine. Dog." She agrees begrudgingly as she examins... it. A dog named 'It', that fits. "What's is its name?"

"I was hoping you would do the honors."

"Ok. It's name is It."

"Huh? You can't name it that!"

"You just called it It therefore making the name official."

"No. Choose again."

"No! Then it would mean I'm its caretaker!"

"That's the whole point!"

"No."

"Rima, this dog just saved my life from a flippin' robber. You are going to name it- the dog again whether you want to or not."

"Fine." She turns around and opens her door wide for both of them to come in. "I'll make a list."