#i'm aware that hanabusa is typically a male name

[auberginesdonthavelimbs]

Phanniemay Day 16: Animals

Word count: 1953

TW for discussion of a minor lingering injury

Hanabusa’s day had started … if not particularly well, then at least fairly normally. She got out of work late, which meant that she had missed her usual bus. The next bus would come in forty minutes, but walking would take only thirty minutes. It was cold, but not raining, and, anyway, she could use the fresh air after a long day inside. She started walking.

Along the way, Hanabusa noticed the Axiom Labs building. She would have just kept walking, like any other day, but for the sound. Yelling, coming from inside. She stopped, listening. Should she see what was happening? Call 911? She hadn’t been deliberating long when the first ghost flew out of the building. Hanabusa didn’t recognize him, but, then, she made a point of avoiding ghosts, usually. He was big, and his hair was, as far as she could tell, actually green fire. She noted idly that he looked rather more like a robot than a ghost. She did not notice the vial of liquid in his hand.

Less than a second later, a second ghost followed. This one she did recognize - the town hero, Danny Phantom. Well, she thought, if he’s here, then the situation is more or less in-hand. Eager to get away from the ghost fight, Hanabusa started walking again, her pace nearing a jog. She tried to ignore the sounds of blasts and shouts coming from just above her head. Maybe, she would think later, if she’d been paying attention, she could have avoided the glass vial that landed directly on her head.

There was a brief moment of silence as Hanabusa and the ghosts all tried to process what had just happened. Hanabusa was standing absolutely still. There was a sharp pain at the crown of her head, and she could feel something dripping down through her hair. Slowly, she raised her hand and touched the liquid. She saw, when she pulled back her hand, what she expected to see - blood. But there was something else, too. A glowing green liquid that she couldn’t begin to identify but was absolutely certain was a bad thing.  

“What did you do!” Hanabusa looked up. Danny Phantom was yelling at the other ghost.

“What did I do? You shot it out of my hand. This one is all you, whelp. And since you just destroyed the one thing I came here for, I think I’ll just leave you to clean up your mess.” The robot ghost turned to fly off, but then he paused and looked down ant Hanabusa, who was still staring at him with a frozen expression. The ghost smirked. “I hope you like animals, human.” Then he flew off, leaving Hanabusa alone with her thoughts.

“Shit, are you ok? You’re bleeding.” Oh, right. Her thoughts and Danny Phantom. Hanabusa turned to find that he had landed next to her. He looked scared. “I think the cut is just superficial, but there’s broken glass and … I don’t know what, so I’d feel better if you let me take you to a hospital.” It took Hanabusa a second to realize that that was a question. She nodded.

Unfortunately, her time at the hospital was about as eventful and elucidating as the trip over. Which is to say, not. Danny Phantom had no idea what the green liquid was, except, ‘ectoplasm, I guess.’ He said that it was certainly a ghostly substance of some kind, but he didn’t know what, or how it would affect her. The doctor said much the same thing, only longer and worse. He did also take the broken glass out of her head and then sew her skin back together, though, so she couldn’t complain too much.

After taking some ibuprofen, Hanabusa’s headache was starting to fade, but she still felt a little woozy. After weighing the options, she decided to cover the half-mile between the hospital and her apartment by bus. It would do no good to hurt herself further by fainting during the walk back.

While she sat at the bus stop, she heard a chittering sound behind her. It wouldn’t have been so unusual on a nicer day, but it seemed a bit late in the year for chipmunks and the like. Hanabusa turned. There was a slight rustle of bushes, but she didn’t see anything. She turned back around, shrugging. The activity of the local rodents wasn’t really her concern. By the time she got on the bus, the incident was entirely forgotten.

The rest of the evening was pretty boring. Hanabusa had leftovers for dinner, checked her emails but didn’t respond to any, and did laundry. Then she watched Netflix for long enough that it asked her whether she was still watching, and she said no, because she probably shouldn’t be at this hour. She sighed because she knew she had to get up for work tomorrow, took another ibuprofen, and went to sleep.

It was raining when she woke up. Cool. The incessant patter of raindrops against the window was bringing her headache to the fore, and she briefly considered just calling in. But she only had so many sick days and, really, it wasn’t all that bad.

More than the headache, Hanabusa was somewhat concerned by the tingling feeling that covered her entire body. She’d felt it yesterday, too, only much less pronounced. Whatever that ectoplasm stuff was doing, it seemed like it might be getting stronger. But there wasn’t exactly anything that Hanabusa could do about it, so she got dressed, ate a quick breakfast, and headed out. Huddled under her umbrella, she didn’t notice the bird that followed her, watching her until she got on the bus.

She thought that she might go the whole day without having to talk about yesterday’s unpleasantness. But, just before lunch, one of her coworkers, Penny, decided to stick her head over the cubicle wall.

“Hey, Hana, have you seen … what the fuck happened to your head?” Hanabusa rolled her eyes.

“Nothing serious, I’m okay. What did you need?” Penny just stared for a second.

“... I was going to ask whether you’d seen Ty. He’s not at his desk.”

“No, I don’t think so, sorry.” Hanabusa went back to what she was doing, but she could still feel Penny’s eyes on her. “Was there anything else?”

“You have stitches! You can’t just say it’s nothing, so what happened?”

“There was a ghost fight, and I got hit by some debris, that’s all.”

“A ghost fight? Is that why you’re glowing?” Hanabusa’s eyes snapped up to meet Penny’s.

“Is that why I’m what?” Penny gestured vaguely.

“Glowing, sort of. I don’t know. You just look … brighter than what’s around you.”

Hanabusa looked at her hand. Penny had a point; her skin was in sharp contrast to the cubicle wall behind it, and to the shirt covering it. She looked like a bad photoshop, where the model was in totally different lighting from the environment. Now that she was seeing it, she wondered how she could have missed it before.

“I … yes, I suppose that’s why I’m … glowing. I got hit with some ectoplasm, apparently, and I guess it makes people glow.” Hanabusa thought back to the moments just after the fight. That robot ghost had said something to her. Was it something about her skin glowing? … No, she recalled. It was about animals. ‘I hope you like animals.’ What did that have to do with anything?

“Hey, maybe you should take the rest of the day off.” Penny looked genuinely concerned, but Hanabusa shook her head.

“No, no, I’m fine. I already went to the hospital, and there’s nothing wrong with me.” She looked at her hand again. “But it’s basically lunch time, so maybe I’ll head out now. Go for a walk, get some air.” Penny nodded.

“Yeah, you do that. And if you need some extra time, I’ll cover for you.” Hanabusa was about to say that she didn’t need to do that, but then thought better of it. Instead, she nodded gratefully, grabbed her purse and umbrella, and went outside.

As it happened, it wasn’t raining anymore, so she shoved the umbrella into her purse. She wasn’t exactly sure where she was going. She’d left her lunch in the break room fridge, and wasn’t inclined to buy food. She supposed she really did just need a walk. Luckily, her building was close to a park. Well, not that close, but Penny did say she would cover for her.

It was a nice park, the kind with actual trees and such, instead of just manicured lawn. Hanabusa didn’t have much of a green thumb, but she did find it calming to be surrounded by nature. At least, she always had before.

For one thing, the gloom caused by the combination of the overcast sky and the tree cover made the glow of her skin all the more obvious. For another, the tingling sensation that she had managed to ignore for most of the day felt stronger out here. Hanabusa rubbed her arms, simultaneously trying to warm herself up and to somehow dispel the odd sensation. She was unsuccessful in both endeavors; her skin continued to prickle, and she only seemed to be getting colder.

Hanabusa’s eyes were suddenly drawn to movement in the trees, but whatever had been there was gone before her eyes could focus. She felt like she was being paranoid, but she decided that now wasn’t a good time to be ignoring her instincts. She turned and started walking back out of the wooded area, moving at a brisk pace. There was movement in the trees again. And again. Hanabusa kept her eyes down, but her peripheral vision caught flashes of something - or things - that seemed to be glowing. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck.

Hanabusa’s own skin seemed to be getting brighter, too, as though it were powered by adrenaline. She supposed that was possible, for all she knew about what was happening. What she did know what that there were things on either side of her, now, that were following her, and those things seemed to be ghosts. Giving up on dignity, Hanabusa broke into a run to clear the last twenty yards of the forest. She felt intuitively that she would be safer in the open.

Despite her fear and the throbbing pain in her head, Hanabusa found that she actually still had some dignity, after all, when she passed the tree line and found herself back in the sparsely occupied park. She slowed to a jog, and then a leisurely walk as she tried to catch her breath. After she had gotten her heart rate down to only three-quarters of a mile a minute, Hanabusa steeled herself, and then casually glanced behind her.

She was greeted by the sight of two squirrels, a bird, and a cat, all following at a respectful distance, all green, and all glowing. She wasn’t able to stop herself from screaming, but, even as she did so, she had to admit that the group wasn’t exactly intimidating. They, or she, did manage to scare off the other few people in the park, though. Hanabusa was left alone, staring at the small assemblage of ghost animals. As she did, another glowing green bird from who-knows-where flew down to join the concourse.

The robot ghost’s words echoed in her mind again. I hope you like animals, human. Hanabusa cocked her head, then smiled. She walked over to the little group and knelt beside the ghost cat. She raised her hand cautiously. The cat leaned into it and meow’d pleasantly.

“You know what?” she said to no one in particular, “I do.”