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Chapter 5 - Nigihayami Kohaku Nushi
Chihiro's footsteps echoed the spiral staircases leading up the tower. Her thighs burned, face hot and sweat pooled down her back. The staircase was unending. But she couldn't stop. She had to get to the top of the tower and find herself a white dragon. But as her vision started to fade, she finally stopped and sat down on the stairs taking a break. No was following her, but she didn't know how long it would be until she was discovered. Looking-up at the slit glassless windows, she could see the sun had moved and she had maybe an hour or so until sunset.
Shit.
Why was it that everything fell apart? She was alone in the Tower of the West, Lin might have been captured, if what those guards said had been true, and she and No-Face had gotten separated minutes after No-Face had gotten them both into the Tower.
No-Face. He was a complete mystery to Chihiro. His powers were frightening. She was very glad that he was on her side. After both of them had avoided detection from Tower guards. No-Face, elected himself team leader and with his normal silence, shoved Chihiro completely inside of him and took off towards the Tower from the treetops once they had learned Lin may have been captured.
The Tower was situated in a valley, no trees or cover was available. For a moment or two, No-Face seemed to contemplate his options from the last treetop. Once he had decided upon a strategy, the creature bounded from the their perch on the tree towards the Tower. Flying through the air. Chihiro could feel rather than see an extension from No-Face reach down to the earth below push off and keep the majority of them airborne.
They seemed to be aiming towards a mid level tower window.
Again as they started losing altitude, another limb/ extension of No-Face stretched down and propelled them forward and onward still aiming towards a specific slit like window in the Tower.
"No freakin way!" Chihiro screamed inside of No-face as he took them directly toward the open window that had to be less than half a foot a cross and maybe three feet tall. "We are not going to fit!" She cringed and closed her eyes expecting a great deal of pain. When it didn't come, Chihiro opened her eyes.
They had made it into the Tower. Gray stone walls with limited light and airflow streamed inside from several narrow openings leading up the to the top of the Tower which Chihiro could just barely make out. Then she made the mistake of looking down while still being inside of No-Face….the strange vertigo sensation sent Chihiro into a fetal position to keep her from losing her lunch. Too soon for her to regain her equilibrium, No-Face started moving again.
He bounded up the stairs, and then opened one of the doors leading off the stair well. Once No-Face was satisfied that they were they only ones in the room, he shut the door. Chihiro remained silent inside of No-Face the whole time. After getting crap in her mouth from screaming, she decided that it was best to keep her mouth shut and not mistakenly ingesting anything more that was No-Face.
No-Face reached inside himself and pulled Chihiro out. Chihiro didn't question what had happened…. Nor could she even squeak out a protest to how she had been treated. She was in too much shock. She couldn't move. She couldn't even blink or open her mouth.
No-Face made an exasperated motion as Chihiro failed to follow him out of the room. Instead of waiting for her, No-Face rolled his eyes..or as much as he could wearing a mask and not really having eyes, signaled for Chihiro to stay still now and he went to leave the room. With a final glance, he quietly shut the door behind him.
Chihiro was left alone and she couldn't even blink.
Minutes passed and still Chihiro was paralyzed. But she wasn't convinced it was from fear. Something was wrong with her and hopefully it wasn't permanent.
After several more minutes Chihiro felt the paralization leave her. She once again had control of her body. Somehow her body had been infected by something from being inside of No-Face. And if his reaction was anything to go by, No-Face had not realized that she would have that sort of reaction after being placed inside of him either.
Cautiously Chihiro tested out her body making sure that she once again had full control of her faculties. When everything seemed to be in working order, Chihiro went to the door and opened it. With any luck she would be able to catch up with No-Face and together they would be able to rescue Lin and then the dragon….
Except that when Chihiro opened the door, She couldn't find No-Face. Instead she learned that the Tower was built around the central windy staircase and only certain levels appeared to have doors leading to rooms. The Tower spread up and if she squinted she could just make out the top of the stair case…..and if she looked down… Bad idea. Chihiro grabbed her face to keep from vomiting. Once again felt vertigo take hold of her. Strange, she didn't think that she was afraid of heights.
Deciding that it was best not too rush, Chihiro took another moment to close her eyes, and see if she could hear any footsteps or familiar grunting that would let he know the direction No-Face had traveled in. No such luck. She had no idea where he was... The stone staircases of uneven steps leading a thousand steps up and a thousand steps down did not give her any clues as to where No-Face was.
Faced with this information, Chihiro had decided to run up the tower stairs to get to the upper levels. She didn't trust herself to look down without puking, so up it was. She would worry about how she would leave the Tower later.
Hesitating, Chihiro thought through Lin's first assessment that the white dragon was being kept in the top of the tower. It made sense to her especially if it was true that everyone, including the Western Lord, was expecting Kohaku to escape, in theory he would cause less damage to the tower by escaping from the top than from anywhere else in the tower. Yes, Lin's instincts were correct. The dragon she was looking for was being kept in the upper levels of the tower. Luckily, her decision to run up the stairs, seemed to mean that less guards were around…
Chihiro continued running up the stairs trying her best not to trip on the uneven stones. After running up multiple levels without stopping, she was wishing that she was wearing running shorts instead of her jeans. The tower was hot and getting hotter as she continued to climbed up. Stupid hot air and its rising. Her jeans were sticking to her skin and the chafing was rubbing her inner thighs raw. But she couldn't stop yet; she still had several levels up to go!
Ignoring her inner ranting and complaining, Chihiro focused on her breath. This helped her keep her pace steady as she continued to run. This way she would be able to keep running at this pace... Just how much longer until she reached the top?
After another 20 or so steps, Chihiro finally stopped running and gave herself a moment to catch her breath. Her legs were once again quivering, a sensation she was becoming more accustomed to. At least no tower guards seemed to be around.
Scratch that. The sound of voices and footsteps started echoing around her. It seemed like there were a couple early risers checking on the status quo. Chihiro felt herself freeze. She didn't know what to do.
The problem with being in a stone tower was that there was nothing to absorb sound. It just echoed off of everything making it impossible to determine where the sounds were originating from. To make matters worse, her pounding heart and ragged breathing made it more difficult to for her to hear.
Not knowing what to do, Chihiro decided to stayed very still…. With nerves of steel that she didn't know she possessed, she forced herself not to panic and charge up or down the stairs. If she could determine that the sounds of...footsteps? Yes they sounded like multiple footsteps; and could it be? Was she that lucky? The footsteps sounded like they were actually moving down away from her! I'm safe! She thought until a pair of black boots came into her focus from several steps ahead of her.
"Well, what do we have here?"
With dread Chihiro looked up as she brought her body into an upright position. Muscle tense and adrenaline pumping.
When her eyes locked into brilliant ice blue eyes with a playful cocked silver eyebrow, Chihiro knew that she was in trouble. She could feel the power coming off of this guard. White fox ears on top of his head twitched as Chihiro instinctively positioned herself with her body weight being held equally on the balls of her feet. In this position she could instantly react in whatever direction she needed to depending on how this guard would attack. But if she shift slightly more weight to her back leg and crunched her core...
The guard looked at her stance and laughed. "Do you really think-"
Before he could finish Chihiro charged at him. She aimed her shoulder for his knees and with a clumsy jiu jitsu grab and gravity, she was able to knock him off balance, flip him over her shoulder and send him crashing down the stairs behind her. Or at least that was the theory.
The guard however, recovered from her surprise attack and was able to collect himself mid-air… shit!
With a glance under her shoulder, while Chihiro was in full motion running back up the stairs, Chihiro knew that the guard was still a threat. Using her powerful legs she charged up the stairs to get away from him.
"Not so fast human!" he yelled at her. She could tell that he was gaining ground on her.
She felt him swipe at her feet. Tripping, but still able to avoid his grasp, Chihiro lifter her legs higher and faster. She fought against her jeans to open up her range of motion. She might have felt them rip, but she was more focused on running to care.
Onward she charged taking the stairs two at a time trying to keep the gap between her and her pursuer.
Finally she reached the top of the tower. The stairs ended leading directly to a final wooden door. Chihiro raced towards it.
Please be open. Please be open. She chanted
Her fingers reached out griping the door knob. Almost expecting it to be locked, Chihiro was pleasantly surprised that the door knob turned easily in her hand. She Opened the door. Running inside she slammed the door shut behind her turning the lock. She knew the door wouldn't hold. Cautiously she backed away wanting to face the guard, who in any moment, would come crashing through the door.
Her fears were actualized when the door splinted open from a blast of power. Chihiro slowly lowered her hands that had protected her face from the blast. There stood the guard dressed in his forest green uniform. Two stars were embroidered on his collar. Some type of ranking system Chihiro wondered. Gingerly stepping over the decimated door, the guard entered the top tower room and raise himself to his full height. He must have stood over 6' 5". He towered over Chihiro's 5' 6" frame.
He sent Chihiro a wicked smile. He knew he had her. Chihiro felt her mouth run dry. Her fighting instincts took over. She made sure to stay light on her feet as she backed away from him.
"Come now, little human, let's play."
Then he drew his weapons. Two viciously looking long swords.
Shit. Chihiro thought. Her basic self-defense classes has not covered what to do when faced with a swordsman. Especially a freakishly tall swordsman with not one but two swords!
Taking a few more shuffling steps backwards to stay out of his reach Chihiro's mind raced through what might work to keep herself safe.
A slow attack came at her, which she was easily able to dodge. Instead of taking comfort in that, she became more nervous. It was obvious to her that he was just testing her. It is dangerous to go into battle when you know nothing of your foe. Chihiro kept one eye focused on the fox spirit's torso, hoping that in sword fighting, like in kickboxing, the torso would telegraph his moves. At the same time she used her peripheral vision to glance around the room looking for anything she could use as a weapon.
She found the equivalent of a 2x4 blank of splintered wood about 3 feet long. She dove to grab it, rolled back up and faced the guard. The guard again raised his eyebrow at her antics. She was getting really sick of that smirk on his face. She wasn't as helpless as she appeared.
Mind racing a thousand miles a minute, she decided to move.
With her left foot, she quickly spun out dragging her right foot around her kicking up the dust around her. The low afternoon sunlight reflected off the dust particles while the allergens in the dust seemed to affect the guard's sensitive nose. While he was distracted coughing, she charged with her wooden plank towards his groin.
Contact! She had actually made a direct hit! And it hurt if his groan was anything to go by...
The murderous look in his blue eyes made her regret her earlier decision. He wasn't going to "play" with her anymore.
The guard recovered and his next attack was swift and ruthless. Using both of his swords, he struck her plank slicing at her makeshift weapon until it was just wood shaving in her hands. Seeing her now weaponless, he swiped at her face.
Jumping out of the way, Chihiro barely avoided being decapitated.
The guard brought his word to his mouth that had a thin strip of red on it. As he licked the blood off, Chihiro became aware of a thin slit on her neck. He had drawn first blood.
"Yum. The taste of human woman...but wait there is something else…" He licked the sword again. "What are you exactly?" Curious blue eyes held her in suspicion.
What the hell was he talking about?!
Chihiro felt rather than saw something move out of the corner of her eye. Thats right, they weren't alone in here. What was better, the enemy you sort of knew, or the stranger you didn't?
Too bad Chihiro spent too much time contemplating giving the guard another chance to attack.
Chihiro found herself once again dodging.
Too Slow! She felt him take another swipe at her as her right arm now burned from his thin slice on her arm. Damn that hurt!
Blood trickled down her arm. The wound was deeper than she had first thought, but as she curled her fingers.. No ligaments or tendons had been cut so she could still use her arm to fight.
Pushing his advantage, he struck again with his left sword, Chihiro jumped way and he was there with his right sword swiping at her. Chihiro lost her footing and fell to the floor. Looking up she saw the guard standing right above her reading his finishing blow.
"Well, this is disappointing, I was expecting better from-"
Before he could finish No-Face charged through the splintered door and swallowed him whole.
Not sure what had happened. Chihiro stayed on the floor and looked up at No-Face.
He appeared larger and when he turned to Chihiro he seemed to have a swarmy smile and instead of grunting he spoke.
"Well that takes care of him. How are you doing, Sen?"
Chihiro tried not to lose it when she heard the guard's voice and personality emanated from No-Face.
"I'm okay." she answered carefully while not taking her eyes off of No-Face. What the hell was going on!
If No-Face noticed her hesitation, he did not say anything. Instead he turned towards the darkness of the tower room. "He is here."
Before Chihiro could question what he meant, the room shook and she remembered who they had set out to find. The white dragon Kohaku. He was here in this room.
In the Disney movie Aladdin, Chihiro remembered a scene against the villain Jafar who had turned into a giant snake and circled one of the main protagonist.
That was exactly what was happening to them right now. Though she couldn't see it, she could feel that her and No-Face were being surrounded. The waning sunlight that filtered in through the cracks in the Tower roof reflected of a shiny white...scales? Nose come from behind her cause Chihiro to whip around and she found her feet staring into the most gorgeous intelligent light green eyes.
She had found the white dragon, and if she had anything to go by, the look on on his face showing the curl of lips and his very pointy sharp teeth, he was not happy to see her.