Gold and Bloodred Lichtenberg

Meeting A New Friend

Zenitsu had longed to be among people again; he had missed the sights and sounds a town, large or small could provide. Just being surrounded by people just seemed to say 'hey, you're not alone, you're welcome and safe'. Even if one seemed to blend in and was invisible, it was only natural to want to be among your own kind.

Now though, he was beginning to realize that this was probably a mistake. His hearing was good, that was no secret, but now he was hearing everything to an uncomfortable degree. It was all he could do to not put his hands up to his ears to block the sounds out; of course, he knew that wouldn't work. The smells of restaurants, concession stands, and the market swirled and filled his head also, to the point where it blended into one big stink. It was just too much, but one smell stood out even above that: the humans. He could smell everyone around him, hear them...almost taste them, it was overwhelming.

His head suddenly hurt that sent a whole ripple through his body, sharp enough to send his hands flying to his head. For the briefest moment, in his mind's eye, he saw someone he'd never seen before, or had he? He had to find a quiet spot just to compose himself. He was feeling overstimulated just from being in town. It was making him hallucinate! He looked around, hoping to find a back alleyway soon he could slip into or—then he heard it; the subtle yet unmistakable sound that sent him in near hysterics.

'Is that another demon?!' Zenitsu looked around frantically. He was aware that the demon was presently far from him, but the fact that he could hear it and it sounded like it was MOVING was enough to send him in a panic. He looked towards the direction he could hear it; it was so soft and quiet; it was amazing that he could even hear it over everything else. How was it moving? Was it just his overactive imagination? It must be, it had to be.

"Are you alright?" asked an older man who touched his back out of concern. He jumped and spun around quickly to look at who had touched him.

"Don't touch me!" he yelled out in a panic. Now this kind of behavior wasn't anything new from him whenever he was completely stressed or frightened. What was new though was the growling undertone that made his words sound more like a threat than a panicked statement. The man shrank back, along with several other people. He yelped and blindly ran, just ran in a direction. He had to push his way between people, trying not to completely bowl people over. He just had to get away, find a quiet spot to make everything stop. He did manage to find a back alleyway, ran down it until he ran into a dead end. At first, he leaned up on the wall with his arms, but then found himself scaling the tall wall. He crawled down the wall...like a damned lizard but it was safer to go down like that. He dropped down and kept going, eventually finding a quiet abandoned building and went inside.

As soon as he was deep enough inside the building and listened to make sure there wasn't anyone there, he took off the mask and hood, so he could breathe better. He sat down near a wall and held his head while his elbows rested on his knees. He was gasping, having a full-on panic attack. He'd never had one for just being in a town before. He began his usual mantra chant of 'I'm fine, everything's fine' when this sort of thing happened for no particular reason. It had been a long time since his last 'out of the blue' panic attack, he was too busy to wonder what caused it. It took a while but eventually, he didn't feel like he was completely out of control anymore. He closed his eyes when his breathing was finally under control and normal, but it gave him a chance to listen to his surroundings that caused new anxiety to flare up. He wasn't alone in the building anymore.

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