*~(Note: Before you read let me first say thank you! Second. This is a collab story being written between Gaarasangel3 and myself we hope you enjoy it as the story progresses~♥ Let's see if you can tell where their part ends and mine begins!)~*
The stories about an old house, in a forest nearby your home, made you curious. You decide to get to the bottom of those rumors and travel in the middle of the night to that forest. The route to it is a bit off the normal, lighter route than that of the forest, you get your flashlight out of your backpack and go further, deeper inside the pitch black.
The wind blows gently through your (h/c) hair, as leaves fall down from the trees, it's autumn already. It was your favorite season, just every tree look good and colorful in that season, it isn't too cold, and not too hot, plus you could wear your favorite hoodie, too.
After a few minutes of walking through the forest you arrive at your destination. The old house of the stories is now in front of you, you feel a heavy weight on your chest, but still you feel attracted to it. The burden on your chest eases a bit as you open the door, you close your eyes for a moment because dust and leaves blow against you. Shivering lightly you get inside the house, closing the door behind you.
The furniture are made of wood mostly, they seem old, scratches, cracks and a thick layer of dust cover most of them. In the middle of the hall is a big staircase, that leads to the upper floor of the house and left to you is a big chimney. You check every corner of the house's ground floor, comparing the rooms with the photos on your phone.
"This really is the house, everyone is talking about... ", you mumble to yourself. "But I can't feel anything... Not a single spiritual power..."
You go cautiously upstairs, the stairs don't seem to be safe at all. As you get there you hear rain drops falling on the roof and the windows. "Great, now it starts raining, thank you weather forecast...", you bleat. "Seems I have to stay here, until it stops."
You sigh and go further, checking every corner of the upper floor you find a room that caught your attention. There is just a big cupboard inside, but what caught your attention is a window attached on the roof, you decide to sit under it. Hearing the sound of the raindrops that seem to form a lovely melody, watching them splashing on the window, it gives you the feeling of well-being and of completely satisfaction.
Several minutes pass by before a deep growl coming from outside, wakes you up from your comfy feeling, you cautiously got to the window, on your left side and peek outside. Then you saw it. An orange spirit, its shape is like a fox with two tails. A BIG fox, maybe with two to two and a half meters height and it slowly approaches the house.
"So that's the spirit haunting this building? It's quite huge. Is it an animal spirit or a deformed human spirit?", you wonder.
While falling into your thoughts you lost eyesight of the spirit, but you can feel it inside the house. The floor cracks quietly as you sneak to the stairs, controlling every corner with your eyes. The spirit you saw earlier, is now laying in front of the big chimney in the hall.
"Is it... sleeping?", you think. Again, a loud deep growl conquered the silence. You stand there in confusion and think: "I-It... Snores? Or perhaps... I-Its stomach is rumbling? Can spirits get h-hungry?" Again growling, now you are sure that this sound was coming from the fox's spirit's stomach.
You approach it cautiously, standing in a safe distance you stumble. "E... Ehm... Sorry... But... May...?" He doesn't seem to be scared or even uncomfortable as one eye of the fox spirit's opens, you see the color of it. It was red, like a shining ruby.
"Human... What do you want?", it asks with a nerved and deep voice. "Aren't you gonna ask why I can see you?", you give him a question instead of an answer. It holds his head a bit higher, a curious expression on his face. "I can smell your psychic vessel," it explains.
"But why can you understand me? I'm an animal spirit, normal psychics like you aren't capable of talking to me." You fold your arms, behind your head and answer with a big grin: "I'm not quite the common psychic. And you are not quite the common animal spirit... You're hungry aren't you? I never knew spirits can get hungry." The spirit looks a bit embarrassed, with a little deep orange blush it says: "Yeah, kind of..."
"Do you like dried beef? I think...", you start browsing your backpack, "I think I have a pack in there. Ah! Found it."
"I don't need your dried beef nor your kindness, huma-" Again growling, even louder than before. "You're sure?", you say with a little smirk on your face. The spirit starts mumbling something, you can't understand, but it doesn't bother you at all. As you opened the package the air was filled with a delicious smell, you can see in the corners of your eyes that the spirit looks at the package, nearly drooling. "If you don't want it, then I eat it.", you say and eat a piece. "Tch, I'll never give in, it's in my pride as a spi-", it can't finish it's sentence, because you throw a piece of dried beef inside its muzzle when it was wide open.
"Here you go.", you say with a sincere smile, "Sometimes you have to put your pride aside, don't you think? If you're hungry and I offer you something to eat, just accept it." You hold the rest of the package in front of its face. "I'm full, you can have the rest, if you like." Now the spirit looks a bit embarrassed and pissed at the same time, but it accepts your offer. "Th-Thank you... Human."
"You can call me (Y/N), nice to meet you.", you smile brightly towards the spirit, "Can I ask for your name?"
"I don't have a name, stupid human, and I won't call you by your name, I'd rather call you 'little pup', because you're that naive...", it laughs quietly.
"Okay, fine with me, than I just call you 'Foxy'."
"Wait?! What?! You can't just give me a name! Human! I dare you calling me like that!"
"Oh, come on, Foxy. It's a good name, it fits you." You say winking towards the spirit.
"Fine...", it sighs loudly a little nerved, but then smiles slightly, "Little pup..."
~~~~ Two weeks later ~~~~
"Hey, little pup, why are you hanging around here, sometimes even in the middle of the night, don't you have any friends?" You look up to face the fox spirit, it lays on the ground and you sat with your back to its side, cuddling with the spirit. One of its tails covers your legs, to warm you up a bit, the days got colder shortly. You two always sit at the same spot, on the upper floor in this room with the window attached to its roof. "Don't you like my presence, Foxy? Or why did you ask?"
"I was just wondering..."
"But you're right...", you smile sadly.
"I don't have any friends. Most of my classmates call me a creep because I talk to myself. I'm not mad at them, they can't see the things I see..." You sigh and add: "Sometimes it was terrifying. You already know that I'm not capable of exorcising spirits, but you still are nice to me. There were spirits that took advantage of it. Scared me a lot. That happened quite often when I was a child. I'm used to it..."
Foxy looks at you with a sad and worried expression on his face. "Little pup..." You look towards your spirit friend, grin brightly and say: "Don't look at me like that. I have you, Foxy. I'm happy to have a friend like you. Since my mother is always working very hard, and is sometimes even on night shifts, as well as my father leaving us when I was small, I've felt lonely most of the time... But not anymore, I really appreciate your existence Foxy." Foxy slides you nearer to him with the tail that already lays on your legs, making it even warmer and more comfortable for you. You two enjoy to cuddle, even so Foxy would never admit that.
Sadly your togetherness get interrupted by a cracking sound out of the hall. Foxy holds his head high quickly, you can see his ears moving to locate the sound, and hear him sniff a few times. "Hide in the cupboard, little pup, there are two other humans inside. I can't identify what they're up to... Just hide until I found it out." You nod quietly and do as you are told to. While closing the cupboard door, you hear footsteps approaching the room, you let a little gap between the doors of the cupboard so you can see what's happening.
An older man between 25 or 28 years old, with dark blonde hair and a grey suit enters the room, besides him a younger boy, 14 years old just like you, with dark bowl-shaped hair, wearing the Salt Middle School male Uniform. "You are quite big... Are you the spirit, everyone is talking about?" The older one asks.
"Tell me your intentions, humans..." But they can't understand him, unlike you, they just hear a deep snarl.
"I think that's a yes", the older one says. "Mob, he must be the one. You can do it, can't you?"
"Yes, Master. He's not that strong.", the younger one, Mob, says as he goes forward, approaching the spirit. He lifts his right arm and a blue gloomy light surrounds the boy.
"So I smelled that right, you are an esper, a powerful one, though. But I have a trump card up my sleeves, too..." Foxy says and chuckles a bit, an orange light surrounded it now, too, making the black haired boy flinching and stopping for a moment. Foxy gets even bigger, and starts to grow more tails, it has now nine altogether. The dust flows against the two, when Foxy starts growling loudly and deeply.
You get the chills by that, but then the growl becomes more like a whining, your spirit friend seems to be in a lot of pain. You held your breath as you see what's happening. "Foxy is going to be exorcised by that boy." That was the only thought in your mind.
"I have to stop them! He scared all the people because he wanted to protect me!" The doors fly open as you escape the cupboard, you start running towards the scene, standing between the boy and your friend. Facing the boy you stretched your arms to the side to be in a more protective pose. "Let him go! He never did anything bad! Stop!", you tried to scream but you just whispered quietly, you are not good in speaking up.
"Little pup! I told you to hide inside the cupboard what are you doing?!", Foxy shouts at you, but for everyone else he just growls louder.
"Get away, he'll attac-", the older one screams, but then he sees your sincere smile as you shake your head. "I'm sorry Foxy, but I can't just sit still when a friend of mine is in pain."
"Friend? Is he your friend?" Mob questions softly while slowly lowering his hand. This was very new to him as most people weren't friends with spirits.
You moved a little making sure to keep your arms out in a protective form not trusting these people. They were here to hurt your only friend, how could you just sit by and let this happen. Answer was you couldn't. "She's probably possessed by the evil spirit, Mob go on and exorcise it." The male in the grey suit waves his hand gesturing for the continuance.
Foxy growled at him startling the male. "She is NOT possessed! Only low scum spirits default to that tactic." Once again no one could hear his voice but you. The young boy raised his hand once more as a light surrounds it, "if she is possessed then it'll be fine after we exorcise the spirit."
"No! Please, I'm not possessed!" You plead feeling tears gather in your eyes knowing your voice wasn't coming out as much as you wished. Foxy glares at the humans while wrapping a tail around your smaller form as a way of protection.
As if by a miracle you see the young males hand lower. "Master, I don't sense any sort of possession." The one known as 'Master' rubs his chin thinking about it further not sure if its safe to just leave this all together.
"You girl, what's your name?" He decided to start with.
Worried still you hold onto Foxy's tail biting your lip hesitant. "(Y/N)....(Y/N) (L/N)."
"And what is your relationship with this spirit? Why are you here this late?" He continued to ask.
"He's...he's my friend. My only friend, and I'm here because I want to spend time with my friend." That's pretty much the basics of it all. No need to elaborate about your personal home settings when it isn't relevant here.
Foxy lowers his muzzle near you which puts the two men on guard assuming he was going to eat you. "You shouldn't have to explain yourself little pup." He huffed brushing his muzzle against you, that seemed to ease you into smiling. "See? He just likes to act tough but he's a big softy."
To that the large fox huffs. "Hey! I am tough!"
"Can you perhaps understand him (Y/N)-san?" Mob finally spoke up in what seems like forever. To that you simply nod giving them a confused look, "of course. You're a psychic right? Can't you hear his voice too?"
They both shook their heads no.
"Oh..well that explains a lot." You smiled glad that no one was making rash decisions. "I can explain everything if..if you'll just come inside."
*~(Timeskip)~*
You were back at your usual spot upstairs underneath the roof window. Foxy was laying back in his usual form, one tail draped around you protectively still not trusting these humans in his home. After your explanation of the events that led you here, you felt sort of uncomfortable since this is the most you've talked in a long time.
Most people don't really lend an ear to your voice.
"I've never heard of spirits befriending humans before." The one you now know as Regan spoke.
"I don't trust that small one." He spoke to you which sounds like a loud growl. You look at them and translate. "He says he doesn't trust you, Mob."
Said boy jumps at the mention of his name beginning to sweat wondering what he's done wrong. You look up at Foxy. "I think he's fine."
The spirit remains quiet and rests his head continuing to watch.
"It's getting late Mob we should head back. (Y/N), you should come along we can walk you home." Regan spoke as he stood dusting himself off of the dust that had collected in such a short time.
In all honesty, you didn't want to go. It's not like anyone was there, nor would your mother really notice when she got back cause in most cases you'd be off to school. "It's alright. I'll stay here tonight."
"Are you crazy! It's not at all safe here for a child, your parents will be worried!" He reached for you triggering Foxy to shift his tail pulling you closer. A deep growl rumbles out this throat. "Don't touch, little pup!"
"There's no one at home waiting, and I'm pretty safe here with Foxy." You turn on your side resting against the fur. "Have a safe trip back...please leave now." You were no good with people after all.
You heard footsteps and assumed they were on their way out. Great, there went your chance at actually making a connection with someone at least a little bit like you. "(Y/N)-san, would it be alright to visit again?" Mob's voice rang out politely his usual blank face on, but there was a hint of curiosity in his eyes.
(E/C) eyes glance back at him. "You...you want to come again? You actually want to talk with me again?"
"I-I uhh...if that's.....alright with you." He assumed that maybe it was a mistake to ask.
"Foxy can he come back?" You look up at the spirit not having much say in his home. It was obvious why you personally were allowed to come back again and again. "Hmph, I don't care. Don't cause a ruckus and annoy me."
With a small smile you nod and look back at Mob whom still seemed nervous. "Oh, he..he said it was okay for you to come back."
"What about me?" His master asks hopeful.
"......"
"..."
"He says to stay away."
.
.
.
.
.
With all things said and done you watch them leave glad that things ended as well as they did. "Little pup, why do I have the annoying feeling that things are going to get noisy soon?" His sharp eyes watch the door.
"I don't know." You yawned and lay back against him feeling exhaustion coming. "Rest, I'll be here tomorrow."
Without another word you fell into the darkness of sleep against your beloved friend. He would protectively watch over you through the night while lightly resting himself.