Disclaimer: I do not own Spirited Away.
Brief summary: This story follows a class on a feild trip to Japan. They come upon the tunnel and decide to enter. What will happen next? Read and you will find out!
Author's note: The first part of the chapter basically introduces you to the class and the main female character in our story.
Chapter 1: The Tunnel
Melissa opened her eyes to the sound of an annoying noise. She lifted her head and noticed her cell phone dancing on the nightstand next to her. She groaned as she reached out to get it. She was still half-asleep and wished that she fully sleeping, but had to answer the phone or else annoy the person she was sharing her room with.
However, Kacey, her friend also heard the annoying sound and mumbled something about turning it off. Melissa grinned and answered the phone in a sleepy tone, "Hello?"
"Melissa?"
Melissa opened her eyes. She was now fully awake. "Mom!"
"Melissa, are you okay? You sound different? Is something going on?"
"No, no. Everything's okay," Melissa said as she slid out of bed, walking towards the bathroom.
"Okay. Well, I called because you didn't talk to Hilton last time and he now wants to talk to you."
"Mmm…okay," Melissa said in a tired tone.
"Okay, but before I let him talk… How's the trip?"
"Fine. It's going great. Really fun," Melissa wanted to add that her mom had just woken her up, but decided against it. She remembered that she had just gotten there two days ago so her mom had probably forgotten about the time zone difference.Melissa just figured that it was probably better to just let the conversation stay short.
"Well that's good. Okay…here's Hilton."
"Okay," Melissa said with a sigh. She heard her mom calling for her brother and was barely able to hear the soft footsteps that belonged to her younger brother.
"Melissa?" a little voice on the other line said.
"Hilton! How are you?" her voice changed as soon as her little four-year-old brother came to the phone.
"Good," there was a pause as if someone was trying to tell him something and then, "We miss you."
"I know and I miss you too," she said in reply. She couldn't help, but get the feeling that there was someone next to Hilton, telling him waht to say."Okay," Hilton said in reply. He seemed to not care about what she had just told him.There was another pause as if someone was telling him something.
"Bye," Hilton then said and hung-up.
Melissa sighed as she put her phone on the counter in the bathroom. She glanced at the clock in the bathroom and it read 7:05. Melissa widened her eyes. She and Kacey had only 25 minutes to get ready before breakfast. She ran outside of the bathroom and said, "Kacey, get up! We have only 25 minutes left before we have to get down for breakfast!"
"What?" Kacey shouted, sitting bolt up on the bed.
"25 minutes! Hurry up!"
Kacey and Melissa ran out of the elevator with only 2 minutes left before breakfast. They arrived just in time to see the rest of their class standing outside of the breakfast area. Melissa was on a class field trip with her friends Kacey and Cadie. They were in Japan to study the country on the inside instead of in a textbook. It was also a summer vacation trip and the trip seemed to be more like a vacation than an educational trip. Today, they were going to a local neighborhood because a local friend of one of the teachers was going to be there. They were to meet up at the neighborhood for a special tour of places that the normal tour guide wouldn't take a tourist to see.
Melissa noticed Cadie waving to both her and Kacey. She beckoned Kacey to come with her to see Cadie. Kacey nodded and they walked over to Cadie.
"Hey," Cadie said, happy to see her friends again.
"Hi," Melissa said in a tired voice.
"Hey!" Kacey said, not sounding as tired as Melissa sounded.
"Had a good sleep in?" Cadie joked after noticing that they were late.
"I guess," Melissa said.
"But thanks to Mel's mom, we woke up with 25 minutes left to get down here," said Kacey.
"Yea," Melissa nodded in agreement.
"Well I don't know about you, but I'm hungry," Cadie said walking into the breakfast area.
"Same here," Kacey said walking over to the buffet and handing Melissa and Cadie plates before she handed herself one.
Finally, everyone in the class was in the bus and on their way to meet their teacher's friend. Melissa was having a fun conversation with both Kasey and Cadie. They were looking at past pictures that they had taken so far in Japan and laughing at stories they had about each one of the pictures or about things. Suddenly, the bus hit something and started to swerve out of control. Some of the others girls in their class started to scream and Melissa felt like she was about to join them too. Finally, the bus came to a complete stop causing Melissa to hit her head on the window.
"Is everyone okay?" on of their teachers shouted, standing up to take a look at everyone in the class. Low mumbles stated that everyone was okay.
People started to get out of the bus talk between themselves about what just happened. Melissa followed Kasey and Cadie out of the bus, rubbing her head from when she had hit it on the window. When she got out, Melissa looked around the area. She noticed a small monkey-like statue on the ground in front of a tunnel. Her eyes lingered on the tunnel for bit before she moved them to where everyone was crowded.
Melissa heard the bus driver speak in Japanese and a teacher talking back to him in Japanese as well. From what she could see, their bus had a flat tire and she figured out that they didn't have a spare. She looked around to see one of her classmates, Dean, walk over to the monkey statue.
Melissa left everyone and went to where he was. As she walked closer to him, she felt the wind pick-up. "Hey," she said as she stopped next to him.
"Hey," Dean said lifting his head up to see who it was. "Is it just me or does this place seem familiar?"
Melissa looked at the statue and the tunnel. "I don't know," she said in reply, but started to feel as if she had recognized this place from some other time.
"Hmm…It kind of reminds me of that movie. What was it called? With that old guy with six arms and that old woman with the big nose?"
"Spirited Away," Melissa said immeadiately. It was one of her favorite movies so she would definitely know what that movie was.
"That's it! This tunnel reminds me of Spirited Away!"
"Now that I think about it," Melissa said, taking another look at the tunnel, "It does look like that tunnel that Chihiro walks through with her parents to get to the Spirit World."
"Oh good. So it isn't just me whose reminded of that movie," Dean said with a sigh of relief.
"What movie?" Josh asked, walking up behind them.
"Spirited Away," Melissa said, looking behind him to see Cadie walking up too.
"Good movie," Josh said, nodding his head.
"It looks like we'll be here for quite awhile," Cadie said in a sad voice.
"Bummer," Josh said. "I wonder if we could go exploring, you know, through the tunnel?"
"We could ask," said Dean, turning to Josh.
"Yeah!" Josh exclaimed heading back toward the rest of the class with Cadie following him.
"Come on," Dean said to Melissa, taking a few steps towards the group.
"I'm coming," she said, after taking another look at the tunnel. Melissa had a weird feeling about that tunnel, like as if she had been there before. However, she knew she hadn't because she had never been to Japan before, but there was just something about it. Melissa thoughts were interrupted by the sound of Josh's voice asking if they could go through the tunnel. Their teacher, Mrs. Karvel, had a look as if she didn't approve the idea, but was thinking it over. Finally, Mrs. Karvel said, "I don't see why you would want to go, but I suppose we could."
Mrs. Karvel looked at the other teachers, Mr. Jameson and Mrs. Renton, to see what they thought. Mr. Jameson nodded, but said, "I'll stay here and call you all when the bus comes here."
Mrs. Renton said, "I'll go with you."
Mrs. Karvel nodded and said to the students, "Anyone who wishes to go through the tunnel can come and those who want to stay can stay with Mr. Jameson."
Melissa turned to Kacey and Cadie. "Are you guys coming?" she asked them.
Cadie shook her head, "No, I'd rather not."
"I agree with Cadie," Kacey said. "I don't want to go either."
"We'll just hang here with Danyel and Trent," Cadie said.
Melissa sighed. She really wanted at least one of them to come with her. "Okay," she said. "I'll go and see what's on the other side."
Danyel and Trent came to where they were standing. "Are any of you going?" Danyel asked.
"I am," Melissa replied.
"Okay. Well, tell me what it's like okay?" Danyel said.
"Sure."
"Neat."
"See you guys then," Melissa said and heard "byes" from all of them. She started walking towards the group that was heading towards the tunnel. Melissa noticed that Matt was staying and grinned to herself because Matt and Kacey were going out so obviously he would stay with her. She walked faster to catch up with the group and started to walk next to Dean and Josh.
"It sure is dark in here," Melissa heard Adam, another classmate, say.
"Tell me about it," Adam's friend Jason said.
Melissa had to agree with them. It was really dark in the tunnel. At last, the tunnel started to get lighter and they found themselves in what looked like a waiting room at a train station.
"Oooo…. Pretty," Melissa heard Sally say. Again, she had to agree with her other classmates. This room was nice. Some stained glass windows gave off a colorful light onto the place where the light touched. Melissa was enchanted by the room itself and wanted to stay there for a bit to take in the beauty it gave off. However, they had to move on.
When they were out of the room, they came to an open plain. Melissa could hear a few gasps at the serene scenery. She too was amazed by how beautiful, yet simple, this plain was. She slowly followed her classmates over the slim covered rocks and up the hill.
"Do you smell that?" Adam asked, sniffing the air.
"It smells like food," Mrs. Renton said. She turned around to face the students and shouted, "Is anybody hungry?"
"Yes!" almost everybody shouted.
The class started to quickly walked towards where the smell of food was. When they arrived at the place where the food was, they was hundreds of different dishes that were warm and ready to eat. Some of the class had already seated themselves to the bar which held all the food. Mrs. Karvel was calling into the shop in order to find out if anyone was there. She shrugged and looked at the other teacher. "Maybe it's one of those places where you eat and then pay," she said. Mrs. Renton agreed and sat down next to her fellow teacher and started to grab food to put on her plate.
Melissa wouldn't sit down. She didn't like the idea of taking food from a place where you couldn't see who was supplying the food. She started to walk backwards and hit someone behind her. "Oops!" she said as she turned around. "I'm so sorry." She realized that she had backed up into Dean.
Dean didn't say anything, but glared at their fellow students who had seated themselves on the bar. "This isn't right," he muttered, loud enough for Melissa to hear, but no louder than that.
"I agree," she said, nodding her head in agreement.
He looked at her and his expression softened. "Do you…want to go somewhere else while waiting for them to finish?"
Melissa grinned and said, "Sure."
Dean started to walk away and was closely followed by Melissa. They went through the streets of the town and past all the buildings. They finally came onto a bridge where they stopped. Melissa walked over to the edge of the bridge and looked down. A train that was underwater passed through and into a tunnel. Melissa blinked a few times. 'A train?' she thought to herself, 'Underwater? Weird.' She felt a light tap on her shoulder and looked around to find herself face to face with Dean. She hadn't noticed what Dean looked like before, but now she was taking in all features. His grey eyes, brown hair, his lightly tanned skin. All of it seemed new to her, but it shouldn't have been. Melissa had known Dean since the fifth grade when he had moved from wherever he lived.
Dean grinned as he looked into her eyes, her deep green eyes. He moved his face closer to hers, closing the gap that rested between both of their faces. Melissa started to lift her head closer to his, feeling his breath wash over her face. Her eyes started to slowly close as the gap started to lessen. Their faces were only millimeters apart now. Suddenly, they both heard a squawk from overhead. Melissa looked up to see a bird overhead land on the edge of a balcony connected to what looked like a bath house. The panic she felt over her body lessened at the sight of the bird. After all, it was just a bird.
She turned back to Dean who said, "We should probably get back."
She nodded reluctantly and went with him down the bridge and down to where their class was. Melissa started to wish that the bird hadn't squawked. If it had only waited a few more seconds, then it might have been okay. She suddenly widened her eyes. Did she just think that? Did she really want to…kiss Dean?
Dean turned to look at her. He noticed that her eyes were wide. "Is something wrong?" he asked with a hint of a worried tone in his voice.
"What? No. It's nothing," Melissa said in reply.
Dean shrugged and continued walking with her back to the class. When they got there, Melissa let out a gasp of what she saw.
Yes! The first chapter is complete! Didn't realize how long it was...oh well. Please reveiw!
