Araragi finds himself lost on his way back from a mid afternoon stroll to the convenience store to get a box container of special limited edition special spicy tonkatsu ramen. He was sure he was going this way, but now he is passing by this spot, and he seems to be going in another direction. He takes a pause to try to gain his word about him and as norm, trouble ensues. Why couldn't this be just your typical happy/everything-goes-right-slice-of-life anime story?
[This is a random story about a random point in life for Kouyomi Araragi sometime after the events of the first season of bakemono, to the point that he left for college(Whenever that might've been). Basically, this is a slightly anti-romance story, and Araragi is figmented to feel slightly different about people in the story than he does in the show. So if your expecting some typical lovey dovey stuff, you will be sorely disappointed. ]
[I did not make bakemonogatari, and i do not claim any of these characters or story concepts for my own! ]
Chapter 1: Lost
Chapter 1: Lost
Sneakers made a soft steady clunking noise on the grey pavement of the city sidewalks. *clunk clunk clunk*
/*I don't know where I am*/
A sudden pause. And then continued, *clunk clunk clunk* leading in another direction
/*I don't know where I am, I DON'T KNOW WHERE I AM!*/
*clunk clunk clunk clunk clunk* only a few moments later to pause and start in another direction.
/*Where am I!*/
Araragi was lost. Such confused movement was the only direction his mind was giving him as of the moment, and his feet were only doing what his mind told them to do. Shinobu followed silently besides him, matching his every step, in his shadow of course,
/but still silent as the grave./
The steps of her white sandaled feet made no audible sound, and she drifted obligingly with Kouyomi's meandering winds. Randomly Araragi came to a halt before the corner of another street, store bought ramen swinging by the thin plastic "handle" in his hands.
/ A sudden stop in the ceaseless wanderings /
"I could have sworn the street we just went down was going to lead us to cherry blossom lane. And now we are on wood way drive. Wood way drive is on a completely different area of town than cherry blossom lane". He turned about in a circle and put a hand to his chin considering his internal compass. "Where did I turn wrong?"
Shinobu clicked her tounge audibly and scowled,
"If you didn't spend so much of you time in your room digging your brains out with women's fashion magazines maybe you would know where we are", She folded her arms together and scowled hard up in the general direction of the sun. Araragi looked down to the scowling vampire and blew a sigh and rolled his eyes, "that has nothing to do with this".
/ what is she talking about? As if she knows where we are.. /
"It has everything to do with this" she retorted quickly, "when young boys like you fill their heads with false fantasies of things like that they start to become dead in the mind."
/ what are talking about? You are literally undead yourself? /
She fixed her sun hat on her head to a more comfortable position, shading herself as best she could. "Trust me pet, I've lived a lot longer than you, I've seen the same story a million times."
"I'm not like any of those other guys, master. I am 'the one'. He said, taking a step back with one leg, and then leaning his knee forward and putting up his forefinger dramatically presenting her the numerical value of one.
She gave a disgusted look, huffed and turned away. "You're the one who got us lost"
"Who's to say I got us lost? Whose to say you didn't get us lost… YOU'RE THE ONE who had us take that 20 minute detour to the donut shop that I told you was closed but you "OH" - "SO" - "needed" to go into."
Her eyes narrowed venomously,
/ probably in spite of him bringing back up her stinging failed attempt a soft sweet bites of paradise/
"We got back to the same street did we not?" She hissed.
"We might of got back to the same street, but I don't recognize the area, so we are basically a couple of fried fish out of luck".
/ fried fish sounds good right now, sudden switches in appetite always came at the wrong time /
Araragi looked at his watch which low budget but was fancy enough to support the date of the day. "It's already five o'clock and…." He paused staring longer at the watch. "Aaaaagh nooo!" He groaned. "I have that test tomorrow that I haven't studied for. And Sensei told me last Friday that I was only a few bad grades away from failing his class!"
"It's your own obsessions fault." She said snickering. "Today lost, tomorrow failed." She squeaked with her melodious little vampire voice.
Araragi threw her a questioning eyebrow under his depression's gloomy visage and then brought out his phone to check his gps. He cursed, No luck, the donut shop detour had just so happened to bring them in an area of town where the phone service was absolute shit. Another reason this was shinbuns fault, but to be the bigger vampire and prevent sparking another fire, he kept the point to himself.
The sun was about an hour away from setting and still considerably high in the sky, but around this time of the year that didn't mean anything. The sun would set within minutes of 6 o'clock and it was already 5:15. "My favorite anime has a new episode that coming out today at 7:00" he said glumly, "and if we don't get back soon, I won't have enough time to make this ramen before it starts"
"Lost, no anime, and no ramen. Tomorrow failed." She said in sing-song that sounded dangerously close to a depressing haiku. His eyebrow twitched in irritation. Fate was too cruel, and this little girl was the salt in an open wound. "*Nanda watashi*"
/*Why me* He thought to himself /
/and then../
/as if by invocation of thought itself/
A dark figure stepped out directly in front of him out from behind the confines of the corner of the wall that lined the street running perpendicular to the one they were on. The figure, moving relatively fast in speed, cast an agile glance in his direction as Araragi cast one in return.
/ The figure froze in shock, frozen in an unexpected point in time /
There, half standing half lurching over, as if midway to picking a shiny coin or something off the ground, half stood half lurched Senjougahara. She was dressed in the same clean cut black dress that she wore when they first went to have the crab demon exorcism performed by Oshino-sama. Araragi snorted an exhalation of breath through his nose through both surprise and slight elation. He had time, before anything else occurring, to think to himself *She looks good today*
/ As usual /
The girl's surprise must have melted away, because she slowly stepped back and straightened herself into a fully standing, and not half lurching posture. "Well if it isn't Araragi." She said in that deadly calm voice she used when speaking to just about anybody.
/ That slight elation melted away also, as fast as it had occurred /
"I knew it was going to be this kind've day, why am I not surprised?"
/ She was very clearly just surprised just a moment ago /
Eyes narrowing her voice became sharper, "What are you doing on this Sunday evening in this particular spot, nowhere close to where you live. On a corner I have never seen you on. Would you perchance be about to…" She put a finger to her chin and narrowed her eyes even further to dangerously suspicious points, "kidnap me and drag me to some horrible place where you would have you way with me for the rest of my life?"
/ where does this girl get her imagination? /
Araragi put on a face of complete and utter insult. "Naniiiiiii\" he gasped, taking several steps back lest she pull out one of her school razors and slash his eyes out. His anxious intuition told him that it would be better to skip a direct response to the insinuation and instead play dumb in spite of the accusation.
/ The ||tension|| was |||thick!||| /
"Ohhhhh, Senjougahara, what a surprise seeing you here! I never would have thought I would run into someone out here!" He exclaimed nervously loud. Throwing back a hand back behind his head he let off a round of some clearly false laughter.
She waited until he was completely done laughing before reasserting her interrogation. "So what is it? Why are you here?"
"For what reason are you here in this particular spot, in the middle of seemingly nowhere?"
/ The oncoming clamminess of sweat was beginning to occur in his skin pores /
He responded as casually as he could, "For no reason in particular really. We were just out getting some food for dinner" He held up the plastic grocery bag of ramen as proof, " -and we seemed to have gotten lost on the way back. We aren't here doing anything suspicious" he let off another nervous laugh, this one alittle more assured.
"We?"
/ Her eyes were impossibly narrowed at this point /
"I hope you don't mean you and your gang of ruffians that you have with you for means of kidnapping as before stated.."
Araragi took several more quick steps backwards putting now a great distance
/ at least, like, 5 feet /
between him and the corner of the street where Senjou vehemently stood. Waving his hands in front of him disarmingly,
"no no no nothing like that, I just meant me and my little cousin Shinobu." He said gesturing with his thumb over his shoulder at Shinobu who stood turned in a different direction obstinately with her arms folded and a scowl on her face. "You remember her right? You guys met awhile ago, that one time…" his voice trailed off.
Senjou's face changed from suspicion to that of complete complacency. "Oh," she said, "I see. No I don't remember her, but I guess you might be telling the truth". Araragi let off a noticeable sigh of relief.
/ At least that! /
She stared hard with a bit of distaste in her visage at Shinobu, and then turned back to Araragi. "Well, I guess it would be appropriate if I were to show you the way back to your house, being that I do know where we are, and I could tell you." She said Cooley, and then flipped out her phone and pressing on the screen a few times. "Moreover, I could just show you on my cellular device where exactly we are and how to get home, as I do have service still in this area"
Araragis eyes got as big and bright as his dreams of getting home and catching his show with a big bowl of delicious ramen in hand.
"But…" She clicked a button on the side of the phone and the phone screen immediately shut off…
/ Like all of his hopes for the evening /
"I unfortunately, do not have the time to." She said simply. And then turned to go.
"Mate'!" Araragi yelped like a small hurt dog. "What do you mean you don't have the time?" He fiendishly asked. "Where are you going? What do you have to do? What's the rush?"
Senjougahara looked quickly to the right of her, at the stretch of space beyond the corner of the street, from which she had came. "I am currently being pursued" she said in hushed and slightly rushed tone, not taking her eyes off of the space beyond the corner as if the person was going to appear any moment now. "I have been for the past two weeks been assailed by love letters from kanbaru-San. She seems determined to get my attention, and I have no interest in entertaining her wild passions".
She stared for a moment longer, and then flashed an impatient glance at Araragi, "I will be going now, it won't be long till she catches up to me, and both *you* and *her* have you're ways with me"
/ What is she talking about, really? /
Before he had the chance or heart to stop her, she lurched forward and quickly half walked half dashed away and was very soon out of sight beyond the sidewall of the buildings on the other side of the street.