Short Stories!

[Anime Geek7]

Guild is quite dead. Thought I might post up this. Used it for a contest at the library. .__." Won nothing from it. But here ya go.

The wind whistled and howled, rushing through the small cave that was being used as a shelter. Yume stood there and watched as leaves fluttered down when the gusts slowed. Pulling the cloak closer to himself, he leaned against the cold stone wall. A small cat-like creature rubbed itself against his legs. He gave it a quick glance and then picked it up, causing it to chirp happily.

This little creature was the only companion he had. Yume didn’t have the slightest clue what it was. It had just wandered up to him one day, looking rather sickly and starved. Feeling bad for the creature, he had decided to take care of it. From then on it never left his side. It was nice to have someone to travel with, even if you couldn’t exactly communicate with it.

Rain started to pound down onto the earth, drenching everything within its reach. Yume moved to the back of his little refuge. He didn’t live anywhere, instead preferring to just go about freely as he pleased. Sometimes he had stopped to ponder about possibly just living in some small, peaceful little village, but then he would remember what the purpose of all this was. Few people had ever heard what his motives were for going on this journey. When people asked him where he was from, he would just tell them he was merely a traveler. They would usually try to pry more information out of him. His tactic of giving succinct, vague answers to their inquiries typically was enough to ward them off. However, there were always the stubborn few that insisted on pestering him, which he escaped by making up some excuse.

…

Yume woke up the next morning extremely stiff, achy, and hungry. He had fallen asleep on the hard stone floor and hadn’t had much more than some bread since the morning before. This was actually how his mornings usually went, or something similar, but he could never seem to grow accustomed to it.

He sighed and stood up. It was time to move on to the next town they would pass on their way. The creature hopped onto a rock and then onto Yume’s shoulder, it’s favorite spot to be whenever they started to continue on. Its fluffy tail swished excitedly. It knew there were going to be mud puddles to play in.

And so they trekked through the forest. Occasionally the creature would see a particularly good puddle to play in and have to stop to roll around, splash, and generally make a muddy mess. As you would probably guess, Yume didn’t allow it back on his shoulder after it had gotten itself so dirty and wet. It was peaceful as it customarily was. They hardly saw anyone else going down the dirt road other than the occasional animal. Light filtered through gaps in the large, moss covered trees. It was nothing particularly special to Yume, after all, he saw it nearly every day, but to one who didn’t go out into the woods often, it would have been quite a relaxing and amazing sight. The large, green leaves rustled in the slight breeze, unlike the night before where the wind was blowing so hard that they scattered from their homes and fell to the ground.

They had been walking for a good few hours when they came to a small town. The buildings, which were arranged in rather crooked rows, were very old. Shops and houses were mixed together and looked very similar. If it weren’t for the signs, Yume probably wouldn’t have been able to figure out which was a business and which was someone’s home. Some of the buildings where both; a shop on the first floor and a home on the next.

After getting a room at the inn, Yume plopped his large backpack onto the bed. It was full of mostly maps. He had been to many countries during his journeys and always kept the map he obtained at each one. He located the one for the country he was currently in quite easily, as it was the one that was the least beat up and tattered. Spreading it out on the floor, Yume wondered where he should go next. There was a larger city to the North, while there was a string of smaller towns to the west. Not only did he take into consideration which was closest, but also which would be more likely to have information on what he was looking for.

Both of the nearest towns on the map weren’t very near at all, or at least they weren’t when one was traveling by foot. Yume groaned, getting frustrated. Why am I doing this? He thought. He stared at the ceiling before muttering, “So I can finally find what I’m looking for.” Of course, Yume understood very well that even if he continued looking for this thing his whole life there was a chance that he would never find it.

Taking a break from this, Yume decided to go down and get something to eat. He wasn’t able to get much, but it was better than nothing. The only way he was ever able to get money was to do odd jobs around the towns that he stopped at.

A young boy, probably the son of the owners of the inn, walked over to Yume. “I haven’t seen you before,” he said, his voice tainted with curiosity. “Where are you from?”

This question was expected. The only places he really didn’t hear this question were large cities, where they expected to see people they didn’t recognize. “I’m a traveler,” he responded quietly.

“Why did you become a traveler?” the kid inquired. Children always asked too many questions.

Yume gave his typical answer to this type of question. “I’m looking for something.” He was used to answering questions in a way that lacked details that he remembered too late that children tended to ask more questions when they didn’t get the answer they wanted.

“Well…,” the boy started, staring straight at Yume. “What are you looking for?”

Yume stared back. He thought about it for a minute before looking out of the nearby window and told the boy, “Something... Nothing… Everything.”