Author's Note: Look, I remembered this story! It hasn't been placed on permanent hiatus!
Vladimir: Even if it may seem like that most of the time. She sucks compared to other authors.
Me: Yeah... I'll never be one of those authors that updates every few days. I have school and other responsibilities. And I'm incredibly lazy. But hey, I've been trying. Now, enjoy this chapter. Thoroughly.
Disclaimer: Insert witty remark involving me not owning shit here.
/OO/
The first thing I heard when I woke up was a growl. In fact, I'm pretty sure it was what roused me from my dreams. My eyes flew open, and I quickly rolled away from the direction the growl had come from. I pushed myself up from the ground with one hand, leaning on it while vigorously rubbing the sleep from my eyes. The growl I heard sounded again just ahead of me, causing me to stand and get a good look at the source of the noise.
Nothing was there. Nothing but Ness, that is. I blinked a few times in confusion, then rubbed my eyes again to make sure I was seeing things right. Ness lay curled up on his side, his back facing me, and appeared to be completely asleep. I tilted my head slightly to one side, then cautiously walked around to the left of Ness, keeping my eyes on him as I did. Once I was in front of him, I crouched down, examining his face.
Unlike the last time I'd gotten a good look at Ness, his eyes were completely shut. Though the sun had risen, he didn't seem to show any signs of waking up. There was a peaceful expression on his face: every muscle was relaxed, his mouth was parted slightly, and his hat had come off during the night, revealing messy black hair.
I smiled while watching Ness. "Looks like he was able to sleep soundly after all that stargazing," I muttered under my breath. I was about to stand up again, but the growl I'd been hearing once again made itself known. Since my eyes were on Ness, I was able to see exactly where the sound had come from, and the realization of what it was had me covering my mouth with my hands to muffle a few giggles.
It was Ness's stomach. The growling sound had been his stomach crying out for food. "Looks like someone's hungry," I said quietly to myself, lowering my hands and smiling at the sleeping capped psychic. I looked down and stuck both hands in my front pockets, coming up empty. "Too bad I've got nothing." My smile was quickly replaced with a frown, and I moved my gaze from my empty pockets to the land surrounding us.
There wasn't much to work with. Way, way in the distance, a few mountains could be seen. They'd likely take days, if not weeks, to reach on foot. Back the way we'd come from, the tree I'd fallen from could be seen. 'Wait a minute,' I thought. 'Birds live in trees. Birds lay eggs. Eggs... Eggs are breakfast!' Though I'd never had eggs from anything other than a chicken before, there couldn't be that much of a difference other than size, right?
A particularly loud growl from the belly of the sleeping psychic behind me was all the encouragement I needed to head towards the tree. 'Don't you worry, Ness,' I thought, striding purposefully toward my destination. 'I'll come back with enough eggs to feed the both of us.'
I reached the base of the tree before long. Ness hadn't moved us very far from it after I'd fallen, so I didn't have to walk much. Looking up at it in the daylight, I was able to see a few nests safely nestled among the branches. I smiled at the sight of the little twig constructions. Knowing where they were would make this a lot easier for me. Without any further hesitation, I reached my hands out and began climbing up the trunk of the tree I'd scaled the night before with my new-found friend.
While moving up in the tree, I noticed something new. All the nests I could see didn't appear to have any birds in them. 'Maybe they're all out trying to find food,' I thought. 'Lucky break for me.' After swiftly pulling myself up through the first few branches, I began heading towards the nest lowest to the ground. I had to lower myself onto my stomach and carefully drag myself along a branch extending toward the horizon to get close to it. As soon as I was close enough to peer inside the nest, I felt my heart sink a little. Empty. 'Oh well,' I told myself, 'maybe the next nest will have something.'
After scooting backwards along the branch and turning myself to face the tree trunk, I started to climb up to where the second nest I'd spotted was. While I did, I began remembering my fall out of the very thing I was now depending on for food. Specifically, what had caused the fall in the first place: Ness mentioning that Porky used to be his best friend. My hands gripped the branch I crawled along with unnecessary force, and the light smile that had been on my face morphed into a frown. It was impossible for me to imagine someone as nice as Ness ever being friends with Porky. "Ness..." I muttered, looking down to see a nest of three small, pale blue and speckled eggs. "Just what is your story?"
A bird's cry broke me out of my thoughts, and I quickly looked up in the direction it'd come from. The branches of the tree obscured my view though, so instead of trying to see what I'd heard, I snatched up the eggs and slipped them into my front pocket before getting away from the nest as fast as I could.
Not five seconds after I'd moved on to a higher up branch, a pale blue bird flew in through the branches of the tree. I watched as it landed on the edge of its nest and peered inside, a confused chirp leaving its beak. I felt a twinge of guilt in my heart, but I turned my head away and did my best to ignore it. 'Sorry mother bird,' I thought, 'but we have to eat.'
/OO/
The eggs I'd gathered felt like heavy stones in my pocket, though I knew I was only imagining the weight. I honestly thought it was silly of me to feel so bad about taking eggs from a bird, despite the need to do so, but I couldn't help. I'd taken her kids from her. I was a kidnapper. Or... A birdnapper. Though they haven't been born yet, so I guess eggnapper would be more fitting.
As I approached the spot where Ness still lay, asleep as deeply as before, a smile began growing on my face. The guilt was still there, but it was fading in favor of the simple happiness brought about at the thought of surprising my new friend with breakfast. 'I hope he likes eggs,' I thought, taking a seat not too far from where Ness was. I set to work preparing a spot for a fire, and as my hands began tearing up the grass, I realized a fatal flaw in my plan to cook: I had absolutely nothing to put the eggs on. My hands trembled a bit, then one flew up and smacked my forehead. "Darn it!" I yelled. "I'm so stupid!"
Rustling came from behind me, but I ignored it in favor of repeatedly hitting my forehead. 'Stupid, stupid, stupid! Without anything to make these eggs on, they may as well not even exist! I can't believe I didn't think about this sooner! Oh man, Ness is never gonna have any need for some idiot like me that can't even think ahead and see such simple problems! He's gonna get annoyed with me and then he's gonna leave me here and I'm gonna be all alone and-'
A hand on my shoulder interrupted my thoughts. 'Hey.' Ness' voice sounded in my head. 'What's this about you being stupid?'
My breath caught in my throat, and I turned my head over my shoulder to see a still very sleepy-looking but awake psychic behind me. "N-Ness," I said, my surprise made clear by my stutter. "Wha- how did you do that?"
'Do what?' Ness asked. 'Wake up? I kinda did it when I heard you yell about being-'
'Not that!' I interrupted, involuntarily responding with my thoughts instead of spoken words. 'This! How are you talking to me in my head? Is it one of your powers?"
Ness smiled and nodded his head, then looked pointedly at his hand on my shoulder. 'Sorta. I can only do it when I'm touching someone. Now, why exactly are you stupid?'
I frowned and looked down at my pocket, carefully sticking my hand inside and pulling out a few bird eggs. 'I heard your stomach growling in your sleep,' I explained. 'So I thought I would bring you something to eat. I got these bird eggs, and I can make a fire no problem, but...' I sighed. 'I don't have anything to cook the eggs on.'
Ness stared at me for a few moments, then pulled his hand away to try and muffle sudden laughter that poured forth. I turned away, my face burning in embarrassment. For a few moments, I was afraid that I'd been right. Ness was mocking me. He thought I was stupid. He was gonna abandon me. But then I heard Ness clap his hands together, and the earth in front of me rose up. Three disks formed, floating in the air. A cry of "PK Fire!" came from behind me, causing me to throw myself on the ground in a way so that the pocket holding the eggs didn't touch the ground, resulting in an awkward position of me halfway on my hands and knees.
When I looked up, I saw the disks of earth had hardened, almost looking shiny now. They floated for a few moments, then gently fell to the ground. "Problem solved," Ness said in a proud tone of voice. "Can we eat now?"
I reached out the hand not holding the eggs and lightly ran a finger over the surface of the disks, staring at them for a few moments before I let out a soft chuckle. 'This boy is definitely more than I thought he was,' I thought fondly. "Yeah, Ness," I said. "I'll get the fire going. Then... We can eat."
"Woo-hoo!"
/OO/
Author's Note: Nothing like staying up past midnight to write fanfiction, huh? Took me a few hours, but I got it done. Next chapter should be... Pretty entertaining for you guys. At least, if you ship these two together. If you don't, then why are you even here? :P
Special thanks to: PK-FreezerBurn, Aekay, emssik-la, Apprentice Writer, pyschobubbles, and Amethyst-RoseBlood for reviewing the previous chapter/following this fic/favoriting this fic. Your support means the world to me. I love knowing when you guys are enjoying what I write, and what it is that you like about it, so don't forget to drop a review on your way out. Until next time, my lovelies!