Here's chapter 2 of An Angel Appears
And I don't own Eyeshield 21
-o-
Their coach stepped to see what the commotion is all about and was stunned to see a girl surrounded by huge bags.
Sakuraba gently patted her shoulder to wake her up. She rubbed her eyes and yawned. Takami and Sakuraba thought that she was cute. Ayumi blinked and paused at the sight of Oujou players around her,
"Er… Sorry, I must have fallen asleep" she smiled, brought her huge bag and walked away from everyone. She stopped after a few moments and looked around, then looked back at them,
"Where are the buses?"
"Eeeeeeeeh!!!" The others except for Shin reacted,
"Ah, Hiruma-san, actually, you have slept on our bus. We didn't notice you were there so we just… so we arrived here with you" Takami explained as gentle as possible,
"Oh. Where is this place?" she asked calmly,
(A/N: the places mentioned below are SO not real. I'm a bit too lazy—oh, very… to look up places, gomen, ya-ha!)
"Mizushin" Takami answered, amazed at how calm she is,
"Mizushin… Nii-sama said we were going to Aokiji, how far is it from this place?"
Takami pulled out a map, "This is Mizushin" he pointed, he ran his finger to another point, "This is where the bus station is located" he ran his finger away from it to almost the opposite side of Mizushin, "This is Aokiji"
"Ah… That's pretty far from here" she said, still calm,
"Ok, I'll just wait for a taxi here, thank you" she bowed and then sat on her bag and stared at the road.
"Hi-Hiruma-san, actually… Taxis don't pass here" he informed her,
"I'll wait for a bus then"
"Buses—don't come here either"
"Oh, where does it pass then, I'll just go and wait there"
"It's about a hundred kilometers from here"
"A hundred kilometers, that's far"
She pulled her cell phone from her pocket and flipped it open, there were 100 missed calls from her brother and a lot of messages,"I forgot to turn the vibrating alert or my ringing tone on" She exited the missed calls and went to the main menu, "Huh, my phone's not getting any signal. Excuse me, "she looked at Takami, "May I borrow your phone for a moment, I'll just call my brother to have someone drive here. My phone's not picking up any signal, it could be broken or something, my brother's been calling me non stop it could have made it broken"
Takami pulled out his phone and flipped it open, "My phone's not picking up any signal too" he showed his phone to her,
Sakuraba also picked his phone from his pocket and checked it, "Mine too"
"Cell phone signals don't reach this place" Their coach informed them,
"I see" she said, she stopped for a while and thought about something to do. Her shoulders stiffened and her phone fell from her hand,
"You mean to say…" a certain realization came to her,
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO" she screamed. Her calmness has disappeared and she was now looking troubled,
"Your bus! is it coming back here?" she asked with certain anxiousness in her voice,
"Next week, after our training" Their coach answered,
"Why???" she cried,
"Hiruma-san, please calm down" Sakuraba told her,
"Jou-chan" Their coach spoke, "Why don't you stay with us for the week. There's no way to contact anyone through cell phone from here. A hundred kilometers is also very far for walking and it's dangerous to stay here by yourself.:
"Thank you so much" she cried gratifyingly
They introduced themselves to her and she did the same to them,
"Seems you're going to be staying with us for a while" Sakuraba welcomed,
"We're all guys and you're probably not used to this company, but just bear with us." Takami smiled,
She nodded her head, "Thank you so much, and I'm sorry for the intrusion" she bowed,
"We should get going" their coach commanded,
"I'll be bringing your bag then" Ootawara offered,
"Oh, no… it's –"
He pulled the bag easily from her,
"Th-Thank you so much" she shyly thanked him
Ootawara and the rest ran ahead, leaving Sakuraba and Takami with her,
"Umm… Will he be all right with my bag, it's pretty heavy" she asked,
"Don't worry about that" Sakuraba assured her,
"The weight of that bag is nothing to him" Takami added, "Let's go"
They all ran up the hill.
A few moments later, their coach told them to speed up,
"Hiruma-san, are you ok?" Sakuraba asked,
"Yeah" she panted, "Er, you should go on ahead, this is your training camp after all"
"What about you?" Takami inquired,
"I'll be fine, I'll just have to follow this trail right?"
"Yeah, you sure?"
She nodded her head,
"See you at the top then" Takami told her,
"Be careful" Sakuraba said,
A moment later, the two of them were no longer on sight. She stopped and tried to catch her breath. She stared at the track and at the sky and decided to walk up. She was already tired, she wondered how they were able to run at that distance and be all right.
-o-
About thirty minutes later, they all reached the top of the hill and found a cozy looking house and a neat football field a short distance from it.
"Huh? The girl is not yet here" Ootawara noticed,
"She should be here soon. She told us she'll catch up" Takami spoke,
They waited for about twenty minutes but there was still no sign of her.
"Coach, I think we should check on her" Takami suggested,
"Nah, she's probably running happily" deducted Ootawara,
"That's called not worrying enough" Takami and Sakuraba said together,
"Shin" their coach called, "Find her and bring her here" he handed him a flashlight,
"Hai" he replied and ran downhill."
-o-
Ayumi was slowly walking. She's a bit more exhausted now. She decided to stop and sat down on a rock near her. She stared at the sky and observed that it was getting pretty dim. She looked up the trail and knew that she was far from their goal. She stood up and started walking again, a few steps later she found something moving the bushes she backed of and a squirrel came out. She was amused at it and moved forward to stare at it closer.
"You're so cute" she whispered,
She reached out her hand and the squirrel gently sniffed at it, after a few moments it crawled to her and stayed on her shoulder. She was now walking cheerfully every step with the squirrel with her.
"Hey, you want to be my pet?" she asked,
The squirrel just squeaked but it did not leave her side,
"Ok, then I'll call you… Luppi. Just so you know, my brother has a pet dog, named Cerberos, and he has a pet pig. Cerberos might look a bit scary at first but he's really really cute and he's a good dog. I think you'll get along well."
-o-
About ten minutes has passed and the sky has turned darker, Ayumi was feeling scared now. Every sound freaked her. Then she bumped on a tree branch and let out a loud scream. Luppi ran away and she tried to get him back. She ran to catch him but she tripped on a rock and fell on the ground.
"Luppi ran away" she thought,
She tried to stand up but she winced at the pain on her ankle. She seemed to have sprained it. She looked around and found that she was alone and it was already dark. She felt like crying but knew that it would do her no good so she prevented her tears from falling. She sat there hugging her knees and hiding her face on it.
"Hiruma-san" A voice called out.
Later on she saw light from somewhere. To her relief, it was Shin,
She almost cried at the sight of him,
"Are you ok?" he asked,
She nodded her head. Shin helped her up but she grimaced on the pain
Shin noticed it and glanced at her foot. He lowered down telling her to ride on his back. Ayumi hesitated for a moment but had no choice since she could not walk right in her present condition.
"I'm sorry" she apologized, "I'm too troublesome"
"Don't worry about it" he replied in his usual stoical tone,
There was a short silence and Ayumi decided to break it,
"Do you often train this much?"
"Yeah"
"Must be pretty cool"
"You think so?"
"Yeah… I found a squirrel this afternoon" she yawned,
"Squirrel?"
"Yup, and a very cute one, he came from the bush and surprised me a little. Then it rode on my shoulder. I asked him if he could become my pet. It didn't go away so it should mean that it agreed"
"That means an agreement?"
"I think so. I named him Luppi. He still did not make a fuss. And then I hit a tree branch or something. I--" she yawned again, "staggered and I screamed unintentionally, and Luppi ran away. He probably got scared of the scream,
"Was that how you got your ankle sprained?"
"Nope, I stumbled on something" She tightened her hold on Shin's neck and felt her eyelids getting heavy. She closed her eyes and slept on his back.
-o-
They reached the house ten minutes later. He laid her on the long sofa of the living room and took her shoes off. He checked her ankle,
"Shin, what happened?" Takami asked,
"She found a squirrel, made it her pet, named it Luppi, lost it and stumbled on something"
"Er… huh?" they wondered, clueless of what Shin was talking about.
He stood up and asked for the whereabouts of the kitchen and the bandages headed to their direction and went back to the living room with an ice pack and some bandages. He leaned on the sofa and tapped the ice bag as gently as he could on Ayumi's ankle. She woke up the instant the cold bag touched her skin. Everyone was smiling at her and she saw Shin mending her sprain.
"Sh-Shin-san, thank you for bringing me here, sorry for" she stopped and recalled the number of times she apologized on that day
"Don't mention it" he responded, eyes fixed on her ankle, "Are you feeling all right?"
"Yes, umm… I could do that" she suggested in embarrassment,
Shin looked at her and then decided to hand her the ice pack
The rest found something odd with the event but kept their thoughts to themselves.
"Ok, everyone, let's go help in the kitchen" Takami told the rest.
"I'll help" she volunteered,
"It's ok Hiruma-san, you should rest your foot" he smiled,
"Ah, ok… umm… I know it's a bit weird but could you guys perhaps address me by my given name, Ayumi? You see, Hiruma-san is usually used by most people to address my brother."
"Well… Sure, Ayumi-chan"
They immediately followed his orders. Shin was about to go when Takami stopped him,
"Shin, stay with her, you also need to rest from running" he insisted,
Shin thought of discarding his retort and sat on a couch near Ayumi.
"You guys are really nice people" she smiled, "I'm very grateful" She tapped the pack on her foot,
"That's not right" Shin uttered,
"Huh, w-what?",
He took the ice bag from her hand and placed it on her ankle, "The way you're doing it is wrong"
Ayumi blushed at his words,
After some more taps, he placed the bag on the low table and picked the bandages he brought. Shin started to unroll the cloth on her ankle, tightening it as required.
"That should hold it" he told her,
She observed her foot.
"You should avoid running or long walks. Don't put too much pressure on your foot until it recovers."
"Ok. Thanks again"
"Shin, Ayumi-chan, dinner's ready" Takami called out,
Shin helped Ayumi up and they walked to the dining area, Ayumi was limping a bit so he guided her, making sure she doesn't fall.
-o-