Right, and here we witness more updating failure. Though in all fairness I do have an excuse. Several.

Enjoy!

Watanuki's foot caught on a loose rock and for the umpteenth time that day he found himself lurching forward. He was only saved from a faceful of mud by Doumeki's unabating grip on his upper arm. He muttered something unintelligible about unpredictable terrain and where it could have been shoved, had terrain a humanoid anatomy, and very carefully did not think about how many times this had already happened. Here more than ever, Watanuki was suffering from his lack of depth perception.

His first impression of this place as a parched plain had been completely wrong. The ground was saturated, so much so that he had to struggle to keep from sinking in to his ankles with each step taken. It seemed far more likely now that the plantlife had merely rotted to death underground, and the trees by the river had been saved by the higher ground that they occupied. That still didn't explain the knarled, dying trees that dotted the floodplain, or the slightly acrid smell that had begun to collect at the back of his throat and the top of his nostrils.

Doumeki pulled back slightly, directing Watanuki around a previously unnoticed hollow. "Watch where you're going," he said.

"I am watching!" grumbled Watanuki. "I was thinking for a moment. Now I've forgotten where I was, thanks to you!" He sighed perhaps more audibly than was strictly necessary, steadfastly ignoring that he'd just been saved from another fall, and took a long step onto a mound of solid, partially dry earth. "And can I have my arm back?"

"No," replied Doumeki, following suit. "You'll fall again. And you said we don't have any time to lose. Another wash would lose us time."

In Watanuki's opinion, Doumeki had no business being right so often.

To make matters worse, they were there, lurking in his peripheral vision like vultures around a battlefield. The farther they walked, the more semi-transparent forms gathered around, shadows in the mist. They didn't approach, but they collected around the two travelers. Waiting. For what, Watanuki didn't know – but he had a feeling that he already knew the end result. And as they amassed he could feel them, a throbbing in his skull and a clenching in his stomach. Ghosts always caused him headaches with enough ill intent, and this was a mob of them.

He glanced at Doumeki from the corner of his eye. On one level, Watanuki wanted to explain his predicament, even to his insufferable, oft-monosyllabic companion. And it was only fair to let Doumeki know what lay in store for the both of them. But on the other hand… he didn't like to let any weaknesses show. Not to anyone. If Watanuki had learned one thing from his life so far, it was that unconditional trust was nothing more than an invitation for the abuse thereof.

He wanted to trust Doumeki. It seemed like it would be a good thing to trust the guy who had saved him twice from imminent death – maybe more – even if he was as infuriating as anyone might have feared. But it wasn't about what would be preferable. Some things simply could not, or should not, be disclosed.

Watanuki had learned this well. As a small child, he had at one point shared every single one of his dangerous secrets with his best friend and foster sister, an accident-prone young girl who had readily believed every tale of the supernatural. She had never harmed him – directly. But it was hardly her fault if she had happened to mention ghosts in the presence of officials from her father's employers, or if she had mentioned ever the illegally harboured foster brother. And maybe she had been mentally imbalanced, but it did seem a terribly convenient excuse to have her locked away in a mental institute where she couldn't tell people other secrets, secrets that more important people than Watanuki had not wished to be revealed. Secrets that she may not even have known of. And it had seemed an unlikely coincidence, in retrospect, when a circuit had somehow shorted in the main security system in their house, and caused a great fire that burned the structure to the ground.

Watanuki had not thought these things then, as a small boy grieving for his lost family and suddenly upturned state of existence. But he thought of them now. A little slip of the tongue – so easily prevented by merely keeping everything to himself. As Kyle had not been able to act on the information he had not known, as they had not been able to find Fuuma in time but Seishirou's men had – any information withheld could change the course of things in the favour of the one who knew.

So even when his only direct danger was a growing cloud of ghosts, and the only hope Watanuki had for his continued survival lay in the hope that Doumeki would not protest unexplained flight, he had no choice but to keep silent.

Doumeki probably would have had something to say about that.

Doumeki, Watanuki thought uncharitably, could get munched by ghosts, for all he cared. Then no one would have to tell anyone anything, and Watanuki could make better time and outrun the distracted ghosts. And then starve to death when no one reminds you to eat, said a treacherous mind-voice that sounded inconceivably like Doumeki himself. Watanuki ignored it. He could eat when he had reached safety.

Wherever safety was.

The thought made him feel guilty all over again, because here he was getting angry with someone who was following him to who-knew-where with only a vague idea of the risks they took. Who was going to all this trouble for Watanuki, a complete stranger not too long ago.

Not that this meant in any way, shape, or form that Doumeki didn't bring about everything he got. He definitely had. It was just that he'd also done a few useful things from time to time. This had to be worth something.

"Something wrong?" Doumeki asked in his typically austere manner, cutting through Watanuki's train of thought in a way that normally would have been quite annoying. Considering the current direction they were going, though, it was more like a relief – though said relief was largely overshadowed by the yet-growing reaction to the ghosts' presence and his own anxiety.

"Nothing's wrong!" snapped Watanuki in what may have been the biggest lie of his life. He could tell that Doumeki probably had a good idea of this, that he knew exactly how much to read from the statement.

"Is it the ghosts?" persisted the obliviously perceptive Doumeki.

"I said nothing's wrong!" His headache suddenly tripled in intensity, blasting at his temples, and he realised then how hard he was clenching his jaw. Forcibly Watanuki relaxed his facial muscles, but the ache did not ease up at all.

They had stopped moving forward. When had they stopped moving? Watanuki turned, locating the next solid hussock, but Doumeki had not let go of his arm and was not following, instead standing there looking more inscrutable than ever. Was he going to say something? That was probable but – this was Doumeki, after all…

But nothing could have led Watanuki to imagining what the other would say.

"I wish you'd trust me," Doumeki told him.

It was unfair, how much that reflected Watanuki's own thoughts. Unfair, how Doumeki the oft-silent was also so blunt. But the conclusions had already been drawn, decisions already made, and Watanuki could not afford to second-guess himself at this point. He jerked his arm loose and quickly stepped out of reach. "You could trust me," he said angrily – anger that was not feigned, merely redirected. "I said I was fine!"

Doumeki opened his mouth, perhaps to argue, perhaps to voice another unfairly honest statement, but whatever he meant to say was lost in the sudden great roar of the gathering ghostly mob. As one they ceased in their milling around and descended upon Watanuki, shrieking and howling and effectively cutting him off from the rest of the world. He fought – or that is, he flailed furiously against the cloud of ghosts that swooped and snapped at him. But there were not the sort of ghosts that held a form; his hands passed through with little resistance and a few tatters on the edge of their forms to show for it.

There was nothing for it. He braced himself and bolted, tearing through the unsuspecting spirits in front of him and nearly turning his ankle in the mud he could not see. For one blessed second he thought he saw daylight, but then the ghosts closed in again, cutting off both light and fresh air. They reeked, of death and ages spent in the same place and dust. And they scraped at him, clawing the skin of his face and beneath his jaw until he felt blood dripping down his cheeks and neck. But Watanuki continued to run, lacking any sensory aid, straining his ears to hear above the spirits' moaning the sound of running water.

What he heard instead was the hiss of an arrow passing centimeters from the back of his head.

And then suddenly the ghosts behind him simply disintegrated, clearing an escape. Without thinking much, blinking blood and cold sweat out of his eyes, he bolted through the opening in the cloud of ghosts. He ran almost directly into Doumeki, who steadied him with the hand not clutching a bow.

"How did you – what did you –" Watanuki gasped, staring at it.

"I shot an arrow."

"But it killed – I mean, it made the ghosts –"

Doumeki cut him off again, this time by grabbing his arm again and pulling him along. "I'm going to get the arrow," he explained. "Then we're going to run." They skirted the area where the ghosts still amassed, as if confused as to where their quarry had disappeared to, and then found the arrow where it lay in the mud. Doumeki wiped it clean on his pants, and restrung his bow. "Are they following?"

Looking back, Watanuki all but shrieked as he saw the swarm reforming, turning toward them. "Yes, they are!" he yelled.

"Run!" Doumeki urged, and then began running himself, leaving Watanuki no option but to follow suit – although he had not exactly intended to do anything else.

For a while they scrambled across the treacherous plain unhindered by anything but the landscape, but the ghosts were faster and eventually caught up. Watanuki gasped as a wave of biting cold shot through him, and then his shoulder was burning with a deeper, sharper pain than that of the wound on his face. In spite of himself he hissed with the pain of it, and Doumeki glanced over.

Eyes widening just the slightest, the archer swung his bow up and fired behind them, just missing the ghosts that scattered to avoid the arrow. "Don't break contact," Doumeki ordered, grabbing another arrow from his pack and swinging it like a knife.

"You missed," Watanuki informed him, ducking to avoid another swoop and wincing at the sharp pain in his shoulder.

"Tell me where they are," Doumeki said.

So Watanuki did. It wasn't particularly difficult, given the sheer number of ghosts surrounding them. Eventually they fell into a pattern, and Doumeki's usual frightening accuracy returned. It didn't reduce the ghosts by much, but it kept a clear path, and prevented a great deal of injuries that might have been sustained. The trouble was that every arrow shot had to be retrieved. They could not continue like this forever, although the time it did take seemed to stretch on into infinity. They could only continue on – there was nothing else they could do.

And then Watanuki heard a new sound, one that he had been listening for so intently that he did not believe it at first. But there it was: the rushing roar of water. Looking to his left, he spotted the source through the circling spirits – or rather, the line of trees and shrubbery that indicated where the river ran. Or a river, as this particular branch sounded a great deal bigger.

"That way!" he shouted over the noise, and yanked at his captive wrist. Doumeki did not ask questions, but ran in the indicated direction more rapidly than before. With strength that neither had expected to find, they sprinted for the river, and when they finally climbed up between the trees and to the side of the river they did not pause at all, but plunged in. The water was icy as before, but Watanuki knew enough about spirits to know that running water was one barrier they could not pass. And the pursuing swarm indeed could not follow them, but circled the trees and howled in protest.

The two humans climbed out of the river on the opposite side and collapsed on the sandy ground. At this moment, Watanuki could not have cared less about mud or grime or wet clothes – they were out of reach of the ghosts now. He almost could not believe it. "We made it," he said aloud, voice hollow and fatigued.

There was no reply. Beside him, Doumeki propped himself up on one arm, looking at Watanuki for a moment, and then quietly and without a fuss collapsed on the sand.