The Promise

Kannaduki no Miko's official website: http://www.kannaduki.net

The website above has a synopsis for all 12 episodes of the TV series.

This work follows on after the final scene in episode 12. Readers are free to post the story elsewhere without prior permission.
p/s: For the benefit of readers who have not yet watched the anime, the link below is a collection of KnM pictures featuring Himeko and Chikane. Please click on http://blog.roodo.com/cclian/archives/57851.html

前世之約 --(一)似幻似真之月
The Promise


Chapter I - The Illusive Moon


*Brrrrriiiiing... Brriiiing...* The alarm? A hand reached out - subconsciously - to turn the alarm off and the owner dozed off again.

*Brrrrriiiiing... Brriiiing...* The ringing continued, and yet again the hand appeared from beneath the covers and hit the alarm clock with alot more force.

*Brrrrriiiiing... Brriiiing...* Suddenly realising it was the phone, she turned over in the bed and picked up the receiver.

"Himeko! Getupgetupgetupgetup! This is the Mako-brand alarm service! It is now 8:04 am in the morning GMT!"

I didn't even have a chance to say anything before Mako-Chan started analysing my achievements at staying in bed.

"This is the tenth time I've woken you up, um... called to wake you up this month and nowadays it takes at least 5 minutes of continuous ringing before you have any reaction at all. Honestly, if this was a fire alarm, I really don't know if you'd be able to escape?!"

Mako-Chan was of course absolutely right. Ever since I started boarding during highschool I could never get out of the habit of staying in bed, although it was usually because I was on a romantic date in the dream, and didn't want to wake up early. Actually the dream was more like a nightmare because we were always split apart, and I could always remember trying to grab hold of this golden silhouette. The more I wanted to see it clearly, the more the light blurred their features; the closer I wanted to get, the further away it flew. When I could only call out after the disappearing figure "I won't forget.." or "I'll definitely find you!" my heart felt as though it were being torn to pieces, and I couldn't stop myself crying. Sometimes I would realise that I was in a dream, but still have a demented desire to find that shadow, and would struggle to wake up from this tragic dream. Whatever the case, even if Mako-Chan insisted that the dream was just my excuse, she took on the responsibility during highschool of being my personal 'humanoid' alarm clock. Despite the fact we were now both 30, and worked in different cities, she was still my most treasured 'morning angel'.

Usually I would only have this dream once or twice each week, but for some unkown reason it had started appearing more frequently. I was afraid it would affect my work schedule so I always had to trouble Mako-chan to give me a wakeup call in the every morning. It was the 10th time already this month on the 15th day - I felt embarrassed just thinking about it!

"It's only 8:04 am, so its only been ringing for 4 minutes really... sorry!" I tried to offer up some form of apologetic defence while rubbing the sleep from my eyes.

"Ooooh... did you really think you had improved a little today? Who was it who said that she had a very important interview this morning and begged to be woken up before 8am? I started ringing you at 7:50!"

I had completely forgotten about the interview, suddenly I was completely wide awake.

"I have to rush off soon to do a piece on some sporting event outside of town, so you'd better make sure you really are up this time! Bye"

I didn't even have time to say thanks before Mako-Chan hung up. Such a pro-active and busy reporter having to waste time waking me up... I felt really sorry for her.

Jumping hurriedly off the bed and going through the usual wash-up routine, then ensuring I had packed my mobile, voice recorder, camera, and not forgetting to adjust my shell necklace, I leapt into the lift with superhuman agility just as the doors banged shut and it began its descent. It was only when we arrived on the ground floor that I realised I was in my slippers so I had to rush all the way back up to change. By the time I reached the exit of the apartment block, rush hour had reached its peak. The usual taxi method only resulted in far more waiting in the traffic, so I had to switch to the mono-rail system. The destination was only a few streets away from the exit of the station, but time was running out, and it was ticking very closely towards that 9am interview time. The piece of paper with the contact details of my interviewer had gone missing, so there was no way of getting in touch with them - I could only pray that they hadn't left...

"Please god, don't let the editor yell at me, next time I will definitely turn over a new leaf and forget about ANY romantic lover in ANY dream!"

As the time ruthlessly slid past 9am, I was again, stuck behind a redlight, this being the story at every single junction. I really didn't know how l was able to think such ludicrously silly thoughts during a crisis - should I praise myself for being so calm, or should I berate myself for being so stubborn?

After eons, the light finally turned green and I was swept along with the crowd when suddenly, a familiar figure appeared in front of me, and confusion reigned...

It was as though I was back in the dream again, but this time the figure was becoming more focused- it was a delicately-featured girl bathed in the golden sunlight with an elegant figure that seemed to emit a gentle moon-like aura. She had long, waist length hair that billowed freely in the wind. And on her neck, like me, she was also wearing a shell necklace - the shell seemed to be no different from mine. I couldn't take my eyes off this figure, and at the same time, my body wrenched itself out of my control and I ran forwards towards the girl and embraced her.

TBC


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Disclaimer:
Originally found at: http://blog.roodo.com/cclian/

This work was originally written by cclian. She has kindly given me permission to translate her work. I have tried to keep the narration as close to the original as possible but some parts will differ.