Sleeping next to the girls… I’m left without a nightmare. As if it were pulled from my mind before it could terrorize me with memories better left forgotten.

  Yet, the call of consciousness pulls me…

  My ears… they twitch a bit, hearing an odd sound. Like… cloth, being dragged against some fur…

  Slowly, I open my eyes, feeling nothing but relaxed as I look around the fort. And as I turn to the source of the noise…

  There I see it. With eight legs, several beady eyes looking at me, a little pair of mandibles on its face, and a big abdomen… all covered by a black fuzz, with a lighter color to it on the back in the shape of a dream catcher, and the tips of its fuzzy feet matching the color.

  A giant silver and black spider, the size of a large cat… big enough that if I stuffed it in a backpack, its head and arms would stick out.

  ‘What is that doing here? And why do I feel so calm about it…’ Studying it, I see it slowly threading webs… webs that originate from the girl’s shadows. Wait… ‘Is it weaving our dreams? Is that why we’ve been sleeping well lately?’

  Silently observing it for a few beats, I calmly close my eyes again. ‘I think I’ve seen it before… in the Soul Weaver’s realm… but it seems to be a very young one.’ Yawning, my tail curls back up around my leg.

  ‘I think it’s safe. Or even helping… these calm nights have been amazing for our souls to heal, so I think it’s good to be around. A little… soul weaver? Or is it a dream weaver?’ Yawning again, sleep overcoming me, I just decide it’s safe enough. I can figure it out in the morning.

  …

  ***

  “Lumi… you’re warm…”

  “I love you.”

  “Me too…”

  ***

  Waking up from a good dream, I stretch with my arms above my head, and my tail sticking up with them, a long “nyaaah~” coming from me.

  The other two don’t even bat an eye as they wake with me, Yuna doing the same motion after me.

  Chuckling, I wave morning before getting up and starting on some simple stretches. I’ve done them since I’ve gotten here, since even if I’m mostly healed, I don’t want to risk hurting myself again for no reason.

  ‘Such a weird dream, I think. I can barely remember it, just remember feeling warm and complete. Wonder if it was that spider’s doing? I’ll need to feed it some snacks if I see it again.’

  As I begin stretching, Yuna smiles and joins me, helping me with a few motions before realizing I can do it fine. So instead, she stretches alongside me, her body quite nice to see doing that. I almost wish I could see Lumi doing so as well, though she is just getting herself something to drink instead.

  It’s silent, all of us are too tired to speak just yet. And that’s fine with me, a calm morning with these two is nice.

  Smiling, I wonder what I’ll do today. Maybe just see if I can’t learn a few more recipes to help them in the kitchen, or something.

  “Sleep good, Sal?” Looking over, Yuna’s speaking quietly but content. “I had a nice dream.”

  Feeling the weight in my chest, I nod a bit. “You too? I can’t remember mine, but it was warm. My soul feels… good, today.”

  Lumi yawns as she walks out. “Same. Think you two could clean up? I need a bath.”

  Nodding, I start cleaning up the pillow fort, Yuna joining me. “Hm… why’d you start doing this, anyways? Sleepovers, I mean.”

  Her tail sways in a staccato rhythm… I think that’s what it’s called. Swaying one way, pausing, then swaying the other way. “Well… I used to think sleepovers would be cool, but nobody would want to do one with a clumsy cat like me. Sis heard some girls making fun of me for it… and she decided to invite me to a sleepover. Since then… well, we do it once in a while.”

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  Smiling at that, I nod. “That’s nice of her. A caring sister she is, huh?”

  “Yeah, even if she’d always complain about things I do wrong, it’s always in good heart.”

  Chuckling, my tail matches hers in rhythm. “Well… yeah. Older siblings always do that. I was the same with my brother.”

  “Was he like me?”

  After a missed beat, I nod. “Yeah. Not nearly as cute, or strong, but yes. He was a giant crybaby.”

  Pouting, she turns to look at me. “You bully.”

  I laugh a bit-”AHHHH!”

  Both of us drop what we’re doing and race to the bathroom, Yuna even hitting the wall in her haste to get to Lumi.

  Swinging open the door to the bathroom, I look around in a hurry-

  Lumi’s in her underwear, and in the tub is the dream weaver from last night, looking confused.

  “Sis, are you okay?!” As Yuna reaches the door, she stares confused, before staring at the creature, not nearly as terrified as I’d expect. She’s always surprising with her calmness involving the arcane. “A… spider?”

  Lumi grabs a brush and goes to throw it at the creature, before I grab her hand. “What- let me go!”

  Slowly, the spider steps a bit out from the corner, and I walk over between it and Lumi. “It’s friendly.”

  Her jaw clenches as she gives me a glare. “What?! Are you serious?!”

  Nodding, I turn and crouch down to the thing, offering it my hand. “There you go little guy, c’mon.”

  It looks at me with eight slow blinks, before it slowly places a foot on my hand. Upon seeing my lack of reaction, it slowly climbs up and into my arms, where I hold it to my chest and turn back to the others. “It’s not even that heavy, and it’s really fluffy. Wanna pet it?”

  Lumi looks at me disgusted, her hand twitching a bit. “Ew, no! And why do you even like the thing?! It’s huge and probably some monster that’ll eat us!”

  “Actually, it’s a baby.” I can’t help the grin on my face at her reaction… and thinking of this as karma for being upset about my ears.

  ‘What can I say? I’m a petty woman.’ “They’re called soul weavers when fully grown… but this one would likely be a couple weeks old or so, if I had to guess. So it’s just a dream weaver.”

  Yuna slowly steps forward, her eyes watching the spider cautiously as she slowly reaches a hand out and touches its body… which it just makes a quiet clicking sound. “...okay it is sorta cute, in a terrifying kind of way.”

  Looking appalled, Lumi gives both of us a look like we’re insane. “So they get huge then?! Like, how big? And why are you so confident it won’t eat us?!”

  Yuna gives it a curious look, inspecting its body, but I ignore it as I answer Lumi. “For a few reasons. First… I know it’s a baby because it would need to have been born and eaten dreams right away, and we’ve been sleeping peacefully these past few weeks. Likely born from a seed implanted in me, fueled by all of us having nightmares to finally hatch.”

  Adjusting my grip on the spider, my tail moves up and wraps around one of its legs protectively. “Secondly, it’s even been giving us good dreams, making me think it wants to help us, seeing us as sorta family or parents.” My grin grows as they both look at me. “...and as for how big? Well, the largest I ever saw… its leg was as big as the house.”

  I swear, Lumi looks like she’s about to faint, and even Yuna looks pale.

  Ignoring them, I step out of the bathroom with the spider. “So… needless to say, we’re keeping it.”

  “What?!” ‘Well that snapped her out of her stupor alright.’ “Are you insane?! It’s huge!”

  Giving her a serious look, and hiding my amusement, I sternly talk down to her… literally, she’s shorter than me. “It’s our child and I will not accept anything but helping this cute thing. Besides… it only understands what we teach it, and it’ll be as smart as, or smarter than us one day. So I want to take care of it.”

  They stare at me like I’ve grown a second head, but I just smile and pet the spider, earning more little clicks. “Besides, if it wanted to hurt us, it would’ve done so last night. I mean, it was in the fort with us while we were all asleep.”

  Both of them pale, as I smirk and walk away.

  ‘Though… honestly, I think the real reason I want to keep it, beyond what I already said… is because it reminds me of me. Forlorn and forgotten by its own group, but trying to help even despite that.’

  Sitting it down on the counter, I get to work on breakfast for everyone. ‘Besides, I think it’s cute. And I’m sure Lumi will be just as focused on that I saw her in her underwear in a moment, to the point she’ll let it slide that I want to keep a spider pet.’

  “...huh, you need a name, don’t you?”

  It looks up at me, cocking its head a little.

  From the bathroom, I hear Lumi griping to Yuna. “We are not living with that thing!”

  Putting on some music, I swat away a cobweb and get to cooking. “Hm… Weaver… Orb weaver… Oro… Orax… Oraxia? What about that? Like it?”

  Oraxia chitters and claps with two legs, making me smile and nod. “Oraxia it is~”

  ‘Ah, today is a good day.’

  “It watches us in our sleep!”

  Laughing to myself, I pat Oraxia. “No touching the stove or oven, by the way, or you’ll get burned.”

  She- I believe Oraxia is a she, I’ll check later- just cocks her head confused and cutely.