Thirsty. By the spirits she was thirsty. Her lips felt so dry and her throat as raw as it had ever been. Her stomach grumbled noisily as it demanded something to fill it. Of course she lacked the ability to so much as move; let along feed her aching stomach anything. She groaned as her weary eyes blinked open, sleep still heavy upon them. Her plush white mattress was at least comfortable she supposed. It made it a little too easy for her to wish to just drift off back to sleep.

Rika swallowed, wincing as the gesture only served to agitate her scratchy throat. When she inhaled through her nose there was the ever prominent scent of feet wafting up from her prison of fabric. It was a rather awful way to wake up. She was alive though. That she supposed as amazing in and of itself. With all the walking the woman had done and the kneeling she had expected to be splattered or crushed at some point yesterday. Yet she was alive. Alive to live another day as a speck of dirt on the goddess' tabi.

She suddenly was aware that she felt no one gripping her hand and her heartrate spiked. "Asami-san! Asami-san!" She cried, turned her head and groping around with her hand. If she was left alone like this she was certain she would go mad.

She felt a hand capture her own. "Shhh, I'm here Rika-san. I'm still here." The other woman croaked, her own thirst quite evident.

Rika sighed in relief. Asami was still there. She was still right next to her. They were still lying on top of the pile of clothing the woman had left out last night and in the distance Rika could still see her form curled up in her futon. She supposed it was a small blessing they had been discarded for her slumber. At least that way they had slept peacefully. It was only a matter of time of course until she awoke and they would be worn once again. After all, she reflected bitterly, they were just another part of her tabi now. Just another layer in the fabric of the white sock.

Asami squeezed her hand. "Hey. Are you afraid?"

Rika turned her head and slowly nodded. No point in denying her fear. She dreaded the moment when Momo awoke and cheerfully slipped them on to go about her day. She had thought the first few moments had been hell but as the day had gone on she had learned what hell truly was. The constant rough wind battering against her face, thump that she could feel in her very bones when her foot touched the ground and the sheer terror and fear for the knowledge that anything could end her. It all contributed to a torment. A horror, an ordeal that she knew in the back of her mind she would endure until death be it through starvation or being crushed.

"Yeah. Me too." The older woman said.

Silence again until Asami spoke. "What do you think she is?"

Rika considered the question. In many ways she and Rika physically looked quite similar; both were petit and well-formed and had a pale sort of beauty about them. They even looked about the same age. However Rika's hair was brown as opposed to Momo's dark hair and was kept fairly short. Even still, despite their similarities it was impossible for her to see her as just another woman. Just like the tabi that now made up Rika's world was not just a sock. She was too massive to be just another woman.

"I don't know." Rika responded.

"I think maybe she is some kind of goddess."

"If that is the case, why did she destroy our home?"

Asami paused at that. "Perhaps... perhaps she just couldn't see us? Compared to her we are pretty tiny after all."

"Then she can't be a goddess. If she was she would know what she was doing. She would be able to see us." Rika said.

"Well... then maybe she's a woman then."

That explanation sat worse than the goddess theory with Rika. If Momo was indeed just a woman than that made her people, every one of them, less than nothing. They were indeed just specks of dirt in that case for all they mattered to this woman and others like her. How many like here were there then? Dozens? Hundreds? Thousands? Was there an entire civilization of such people across the endless expanse of the sea? If that was true it meant that in the grand scheme of things that all of their accomplishments and their civilization were pointless.

Rika weakly wriggled against her bindings for what seemed like the hundredth time. She hated being stuck like this. Her home, her family, her everything had been destroyed by the pair of women. Uncaringly wiped away like it never mattered and to them it likely never had existed. Their town had been around for at least a hundred years and had possessed great power in the region, all of that ended under the feet of two women. It just wasn't fair. There was nothing about this that was remotely fair!

She stopped struggling and felt tears leak at her eyes again as she continued to breathe in Momo's scent. This was her life now. Stuck to a sock, breathing in tainted air, peeling off and discarded in the evening only to be slipped on in the morning. In that moment she cursed every single one of the spirits. She hated them. She hated the heavens, she hated the universe for doing this to her. Why even give her life if they were just going to do this to her? Why make it look like she even had a chance?

"Rika... please, stop crying. Shhh... it's going to be fine." Asami said, her voice soothing.

"No its not! Don't you get it Asami-san, this is it! This is all we ever amounted to. Dirt. Dust. Nothing to her."

"I don't care about her, I care about you. I don't care if we aren't anything to her. We can't change that, Rika-san. That is just something we have to accept." Asami said forcefully.

Rika swallowed hard, wincing once again. She had never known Asami very well in the town. She'd met her a few times and gotten along with the older woman before but she had always come off as a tad... uptight. Now she was one of the only things keeping her sane. The whole time yesterday she had held her hand tightly. When she had cried she had soothed her. She regretted not getting to know her when she had the chance. She regretted that this was how they had to have extended conversations with each other.

As for accepting... that was hard. How was she supposed to accept this? That she was nothing in the grand scheme of thing? That her life meant absolutely zero in the eyes of the universe? Asami was asking her to accept the fact that she was going to die. That this place was going to be where her life was extinguished. Upon a white field of fabric. It wasn't exactly an easy thing, accepting that.

In the distance she saw a shifting of movement and her attention was immediately turned upon the stirring form of Momo. With a mighty and thunderous yawn she rose from her futon, her arms stretching skyward and her dark hair spilling about her head loosely. She truly did look like just a woman in that way. Rika doubted that a goddess would even have to sleep or would ever have to deal with a mess of hair.

She started hyperventilating as Momo stood up to her full massive height, stretching up as high as she could and getting up on the tips of her toes. Rika started to weep softly against at the sight of the naked woman. They were going to be worn again. She was just going to smile and slip them right back on and condemn them to hell once more. Asami made soothing noises to try and calm her down and it worked to some degree. However instead of moving directly towards them the frightened women watched her head towards a pack lying in the corner of the tent.

She opened it up and slipped on a fresh and much cleaner looking pair of tabi. Rika felt her heart swell. They weren't going to be worn. She'd take being stuffed away like dirty clothing but they weren't going to be worn at least. Momo set a rather plain looking red kimono on and slipped on her sandals, stepping outside for a time. When she returned a few minutes later her twin braids were set in her much cleaner looking hair and her eyes turned to the neat pile of clothes Rika and Asami were a part of.

She hummed lightly, a thunderous rumbling noise to both of them and picked up her clothes. She deposited them near the edge of the lake where there was a basin filled with water. It was then that Rika's happiness turned to ashes and her eyes widened as she realized what was about to occur. They were set down beside the basin and Rika watched in horror as Momo took up the other tabi and started scrubbing it in the water, humming all the while. Rika immediately started crying once again.

"No! No, no, no! Not like this!" She cried.

Asami's fingers gripped hers tightly. "Rika-san! Look at me!"

Hesitantly Rika did so, tears still spilling down her cheeks. "Your bindings look like they loosened when she was carrying us. Try to move!"

Rika blinked but did as she was told. She was right. They were looser now! Seized by this bit of hope, Rika struggled for all she was worth. She twisted and wriggled and worked her limbs in awkward ways she never had before. Adrenaline was pouring through her veins as a way out was presented to her and the sounds of Momo's dutiful scrubbing filled her ears. First she managed to get and arm free. Then a leg. Then another arm. Rika gritted her teeth, so close. Her sandals fell off in the struggle and her obi was loosened but she hardly noticed.

Finally her leg was freed and so was she. Her attention immediately turned to Asami, who was very much still stuck. She started with her arm, tugging and pulling at the strands that imprisoned it and pulled them away. She worked with a wild and almost crazed fervor They were going to get out of this. They were going to live through this! Her existential crisis was far from her mind at this point as she worked, frantically trying to free Asami from her bindings.

Suddenly everything lurched and gravity shifted, Rika desperately grabbing onto Asami's hand to keep from tumbling away. It was there turn from the looks of it. Time had run out. Momo moved them over the basin and Rika met Asami's eyes. She could see there was real fear in them, fear that stabbed at her heart for having failed the older woman. There was something else behind them though. Something strange, almost detached in some ways.

"Let go, Rika-san. It's okay."

Rika felt Asami pull away from her grip and her eyes widened as open air met her. "No! Asami-san!"

She screamed the whole way down to the water, watching in horror as Momo's fingers got to work scrubbing away at the dirt and filth upon her tabi. Dirt and filth that included Asami among their number. Rika splashed into the water below, rising immediately as she was left coughing and sputtering. The water was filled with grime and dirt and old debris from homes crushed under her tabi. She stared upwards, her entire world being shifted and shaken as Momo cleaned at her set of clothes.

The water was swirled about and more than once Rika went under, forced under by the powerful currents created by Momo's tireless cleaning. Dust and dirt were purged from her tabi, polluting the water even further. It tasted revolting and it was made worse by the knowledge that Asami was mixed in with the filth. She struggled and she swam, trying to keep from drowning. No matter how many times she was pulled under the revolting water she rose up, gasping for air. No matter how hard the current was she swam until her arms screamed for a release from the physical activity.

Momo eventually removed her tabi from the basin and started cleaning her kimono, which was no easier a task to survive. The number of times Rika almost ended up drawn too close to Momo's working fingers and squished against wet fabric were uncountable. She kept on fighting though, continuing to struggle and swim and thrash her way through the dirty water. Rika never gave up, determined to fight despite how hopeless this looked. If there was even the slightest chance she could survive this she would take it, it would keep her going until she was killed or died of exhaustion.

Finally Momo stood and turned to collect more clothes to wash, however as she did she knocked the basin into the edge of the lake. It tipped over onto its side and water rushed out into the lake. Rika swam with the current this time as freedom was in sight. She plummeted down into the cleaner waters of the lake below, close to the shore of the lake. It was a shock of more cold water, almost stealing the breath from her lungs.

Eventually she surfaced to find Momo had refilled the basin with fresh water and had wandered off to get more clothes. Rika swam for the nearest bit of shore, dragging herself onto actual solid land before promptly collapsing. She was alive. Despite everything, despite all the odds she had survived! She wasn't stuck to Momo's tabi and she hadn't been scrubbed away like dirt, she was alive!

She was, but it had come at a cost. A cost that slammed home in her memory as she laid panting and gasping on the shore. Asami. She was gone; she had no doubt about that. She had let go, she had given Rika a chance at life at the cost of her own. The young woman promptly slammed her fist against the ground as tears rose in her eyes. A raw ache formed in her heart, a feeling of loss tearing its way out of her in the form of a sob, which was followed by another. Eventually Rika was left a crying mess upon the ground.

She was gone forever and she hadn't deserved it! She hadn't deserved to die like that. That woman... she would never know what she had done, she would never know the life she had scrubbed out so carelessly was worth ten of hers. Rika felt something else well in her following the feeling of loss. Hatred. It bubbled and blackened and churned in her gut as she saw Momo reemerge from her tent. She hated her. She hated her with all of her being. She hated her more than anything or anyone. Even through her hatred however, one thing remained true.

She was alive.