Author Topic: Songs of the Illusionary Veil  (Read 8176 times)

Songs of the Illusionary Veil
« on: August 13, 2012, 03:20:40 AM »
I'll be posting most of my one-shots here, just to keep my topic spam under control...


Prodigal

Disclaimer: I am playing fast and loose with histories, cultures, and backgrounds not my own for the sake of storytelling. Please forgive my intentional errors and mistakes.

***

Lady Mokou Fujiwara crept low, hiding in the shadow of the scarlet cloth wall. Much about the ornate tents nearby struck her as odd. Few outside Gensokyo would make buildings out of silk, fewer inside Gensokyo could afford to. And anyone profligate enough to build a small village out of finery would easily disturb the fragile peace.

The last thing Keine Kamishirasawa wanted as the protector of the humans in the Village was to see her friends and her charges hunted throughout the land. She had asked Mokou to find out who owned the tabernacle as well as their intentions. At least that way, she could prepare.

The immortal duchess padded softly along the wall of red. Of everything her father had done, Mokou appreciated only the time spent teaching her woodcraft. Chasing after Kaguya had proven to be as disastrous as betrothing her to a long gone saint. What considerable ability she had learned from her wastrel of a dad, her longstanding feud with Kaguya had honed into near supernatural skill. Not only could she slip through the forest without a sound, she instinctively knew where any animal, youkai, or human was in relation to her.

Silk parted behind her. Mokou spun around as an arm snaked across her waist. She threw elbows, but caught only air. A hand covered her mouth, muffling her screams.

"You're good. Look over there, though," a feminine voice hissed. Mokou's captor wrenched her neck until the immortal could see a shadow shrouded figure hop towards her. Squirming, she screamed again as she saw the death pallor clinging to the figure. "None of that now, or my darling jiang shi over there starts eating. I can sense your essence. She'll feed off of you for ages." Mokou froze, letting her unseen captor lead her through the hole in the silk wall.

***

"I apologize," Lady Seiga Kaku said, sitting behind a scholar's desk. The blue-clad missionary brushed characters onto a sheet of paper. "This is not the Way of hospitality, but then, you did not come to us as a guest."

Mokou sat upright and still on a wooden chair in the center of the blue tent. Behind her, the jiang shi cooed sweet nothings into her ear. The duchess longed to burn away the vampiric zombie's fetid breath from off her skin, if only to silence the monster's constant mutterings about how delicious Mokou would be. But anyone who could command a jiang shi would likely have worse waiting.

"You may go now, Yoshida," Seiga said, setting down her brush. She pulled out a bundle of cloth, untying it.

The zombie ceased her whispers. "Who will protect you, Lady Seiga?"

"I'm only thinking of you, my dear," the Daoist said with a smile. She made shooing motions with her hands. "You know what the Classic of Change can do to your kind. Besides, Futo will step in if she needs to."

"Vile book," Yoshida muttered, shrinking away from the desk. The jiang shi hopped outside the tent.

"I prefer the Way to Virtue, but there are things that only the Classic of Change can tell us," the ageless missionary said. She unwrapped the cloth, revealing a battered leather tome.

"What do you think you're going to do me?" Mokou asked, smiling through clenched teeth.

"I just want you to answer a few questions. The Classic of Change here will tell me if you're telling the truth." The Chinese noble held up six coins, three between the fingers of each hand. The coin toss would be used to generate a hexagram, and the diviner would consult the Classic of Change for the hexagram's meaning.

Mokou laughed deeply and freely, clutching her sides. "Go ahead, try."

Seiga frowned at the phoenix girl. Tossing the coins into one hand, she asked," What are you doing here?" Her free hand swept towards the tents and the tabernacle walls.

"I'm coming home from Grandma's," Mokou said, leaning back in the chair and smirking. "There was this wolf and a lumberjack-"

Seiga shook her head. "I don't need divination to tell me you're lying. Please, don't make me get Futo to help... refine your answers." As she spoke the noblewoman's name, lamps throughout the tent flared higher, hotter, and brighter.

"Fine," Mokou said with a sigh. "I thought I'd check out the new neighbors."

Seiga threw the coins on the desk. They rolled across the wood, coming to a stop. She gasped; all six coins stood upright on the narrow edge, neither heads nor tails.

"You weren't expecting that," Mokou said. Mirth filled the phoenix girl's voice.

The missionary snarled, throwing the coins again. Once again, the coins stood on edge. She thumbed through the leather-bound book, consulting the commentaries towards the end. "You're immortal," she hissed.

Mokou nodded, her smile widening. "It does tend to wreck divination."

"Futo!" Seiga bellowed, closing the book. She wrapped it in its cloth. "Get Lady Miko."

"I was listening," a calm regal voice rang out. A young woman in Imperial purple and white stepped through the divided silk door. A short straight sword centuries out of fashion hung from her belt.

Mokou gasped, she had see that sword and scabbard long ago, when she was still a girl. "That's the Seven Star Sword."

"A family heirloom, I assure you," the woman winced as she drew near. "I am Lady Miko Toyosatomimi."

"Pardon me if I don't get up," Mokou said, covering her eyes. Looking at Miko was like looking through a cloud. Something made the details all fuzzy.

"Are you unwell?" Miko said, kneeling next to the immortal.

"I'll be fine." The phoenix girl's vision swam as though she looked through tears.

The Lady of the tabernacle made a moue of concern. "Please, we can prepare a bed for you."

"Don't worry about me," Mokou said, inching away from Miko. She'd prove herself stronger than the delicate pampered ladies her father had pawed whenever her mother turned her gaze.

"Nonsense. A young woman of your stature deserves proper treatment. Would I be correct in assuming you are of the Fujiwara? You have something of their look about you."

Mokou nodded, the color running from her face. "Most people think I am of the Konoe."

Miko shook her head. "You remind me of the early Fujisawa from before the clan split into septs." She coughed into her hand. "I mean, of paintings I've seen of the clan founder."

"She's acting frail because she got caught," Seiga said, planting her fists on her hips. "I did catch her sneaking outside our walls."

"She's still a guest," Miko said, turning towards her retainer. "The Way of the Enlightened One insists on hospitality.

Mokou froze. "You follow the Eightfold Path?" she asked without thinking. Something deep within her memory welled up.

"I take shelter in the Enlightened One, his teachings, and his community."

Half-remembered lessons learned during her childhood at the feet of a saint flooded back. She looked again at the Lady of the tabernacle, at the veil obscuring her from clear sight. "Maya," Mokou breathed. The Veil of Illusion, or the part of nature that masked reality. That saint had said that once you were aware of it, you could pierce it to see what it covered. She reached out, her fingers brushing against Miko's vest...

...the Veil of Illusion parted...

In the place of the young woman, a mature, broad-shouldered man knelt next to her. Broad-shouldered, clear-eyed, and handsome, he froze at her touch. Ignored by both the immortal lady and the lord, Seiga gasped.

"I know you," Mokou whispered, staring at the familiar face. "I saw you all the time as a child. You used to teach me." Her eyes snapped wide open, and red flooded her cheeks. "You're Prince Shotoku, the hidden Emperor!" She fell to the ground, prostrating herself before him.

"Please, rise, there's no need for this," the prince said, standing up.

Mokou sat back on her heels and turned her head away. Tears welled in her eyes. "Why?" Ancient promises filled her mind, including the one duty her father had groomed her for, forgotten by all when the lout first chased Kaguya.

Shotoku sighed, folding his arms across his chest. "I had to hide my form, lest the world see me as an abomination. I could only advise the Emperor from the sidelines as my health faded, and then my influence. Your forefather, Duke Fuhito Fujiwara, sheltered me as best he could, but he couldn't prevent the last of the Soga from sealing me and the last of my court away."

Mokou blinked away her tears. "My father failed in many things. I will not." She stood up and reared her hand back. Shotoku's head snapped back as she slapped him. "I am Lady Mokou Fujiwara, the last living child of Duke Fuhito Fujiwara." The immortal held the prince's head in her hands. Standing on her toes, she whispered, "I was promised to you by my father long ago, and unlike him, I will fulfill my duty." The phoenix girl gave him a short, chaste kiss.

Seiga grabbed the phoenix girl by her shoulders and threw her to the ground. A knife appeared, pressed against Mokou's throat. "Say the word, my lord. She may be immortal, but she will learn to regret-"

Prince Shotoku help up a hand. "No harm is to come to her."

"Why?" the missionary said, quivering. She dropped the knife.

"She's my bride."

***

Author's notes:

"What if" is such a dangerous thing, especially if you have four hours to indulge it.

I tried to bring some of what I am learning from a Great Minds of Eastern Thought course into this. Of course, being an outsider, I made a complete mess of it.
« Last Edit: August 13, 2012, 03:23:59 AM by Achariyth »

Re: Songs of the Illusionary Veil
« Reply #1 on: September 06, 2012, 01:49:23 AM »
Favor

Idly swirling a too sweet German white wine, Ran Yakumo sat in the corner of Miko Toyosatomimi's bar, slumped over the table. Around her, a line of empty glasses lay like fallen soldiers. Blotting at her eyes, she drained the last of the glass in her hand.

A shadow fell across the fox. She looked up, her cheeks slick, into the stern eyes of a tall fairy waitress. The vixen flashed three fingers.

"If I had my way, I'd cut you off now," the fairy said. A distant cousin of Lily, she placed the empty glasses onto her serving tray. Ran flashed a set of needle-like teeth. "And for that, I should just run you straight out of here. Be glad that Miko said you could stay."

The vixen flashed three fingers once more as the waitress shook her head and walked off. Cradling her head in the crook of her arm, Ran took off her cap and covered her face. The damp cloth muffled her faint sobs.

"Ms. Yakumo," the waitress said, returning with three glasses of a chilled Yamanashi red wine. Setting two glasses on the heavy oak, she said, "Your kit called. She wants to know when you're coming home."

Ran's free arm swept across the table, showering the fairy in spilled wine. The waitress shrieked with the cold and again as she looked down at her newly red dress. Sliding the last glass onto the tabletop, she ran, disappearing into the women's restroom.

Three clawed fingers tapped against the table. The red wine sat undisturbed.

"What's your poison?"

"I'm surprised Miko let you through the door," Ran said, opening a bloodshot eye. She stared up at Mamizou Futatsuiwa for a moment before covering her face with her cap.

The trickster tanuki picked up the wineglass and sniffed it. "At least you don't scrimp on the good stuff."

The vixen's ears twitched. "Don't you have a shrinemaiden to bother?"

Mamizou snatched the white cloth from Ran's face. The vixen flinched from the sudden light. "Nue said that you needed help. And as much as I'd love to see a fox drink herself to death, I still owe her a favor or two."

"Lucky me," Ran deadpanned before a sigh.

Mamizou's smiled grew as she slid into the chair opposite to Ran. "Quite. She was going to ask Kasen."

Ran groaned and the color drained from her cheeks. She threw back the wineglass, emptying it with one gulp. "Where's that waitress?" she said, wiping her wine-stained lips with a cloth napkin.

"Let's keep it to tea," the tanuki said, placing the empty glass out of reach. "That is the traditional drink between enemies, is it not?"

The vixen pointed towards the door. "Go ask the shrinemaiden."

"She's not a fan of my impression of her," Mamizou said with a shrug. The tanuki had dressed as Reimu during a spellcard duel. "There's no accounting for taste out here. For instance, you know better than to drink pop-skull by the tub, even if it's higher quality than a mere art student will see in her lifetime. What're you trying to forget?"

Ran sat up, leveling a cold stare at her rival. "You're serious."

"Nue says that sorrow shared is sorrow divided," Mamizou said. She rested her chin on her hands. "I think she's spent too much time at that temple, personally."

Ran sighed and picked up the empty glass, watching the light play through the crystal. "To desire is to suffer."

Mamizou waved at another of Lily's cousins. "So you go to the same temple as well."

The vixen sighed, setting the glass upside down on the table. "I'm acting like some newly besotted kit."

"So, pretty little fox-maiden, who holds your heart?" The tanuki ordered two cups of tea as a fairy passed.

Ran sighed, closing her eyes. "A human male," she said. Rose flooded her cheeks. " I should have known better. My sisters warned me long ago."

"What's the big deal?"

"There's countless tales of fox-maidens falling in love with human men. None of them end well for the fox." She slumped over the table. "I was so certain this time would be different."

"I meant about human males. Where's the tail?" Mamizou said, taking a tea cup from the waitress. "No tail, no date, at least in tanuki circles."

"The flame that burns briefest..." Ran said, wistfully. She shook her head. "Forget it, it's a fox thing. You tanuki wouldn't understand." She sipped at her tea and made a face. Setting the cup down, she stirred a pair of sugar cubes into the drink.

"So, what went wrong this time?"

"That damned cuddle-bunny floozy," Ran snarled. Her fist slammed against the table. "He had his arms around her. That useless, no-good bunny-" the vixen trailed off, muttering coarsely under her breath.

Mamizou's eyes widened. "You lost to prey?"

"You know, I don't need your help to feel miserable," Ran said, baring her teeth.

"You do have quite the pity party going on," Mamizou said, sipping at her cup. "Forget about him. You should find a nice fox, settle down, and as much as it pains me, have kits."

"Forget it. Not as long as Yukari is my mistress," Ran said with a cold laugh. "Watching over her and Chen is bad enough. Do you really want me to bring kits into that?"

The tanuki added raw honey to her cup. "Not really. One of you is bad enough. I don't want to be around when mini-Ran goes into her first 'I found my true love' funk."

Like clockwork, the bar descended into a periodic awkward silence. For a minute, both the tanuki and the fox found their drinks more interesting than conversation.

"What does she have that I don't?" Ran said with a sigh. She leaned back and slid the teacup and saucer away.

"Well, I can say that Little Bunny Fufu doesn't have your glorious tails," Mamizou said, settling her chin on her hands and smiling. "Honey, you'd make a wonderful fur coat."

"And you'd make a wonderful cap on a hunter's head," Ran said. The vixen laughed freely and loudly. "Thanks."

Mamizou waved the compliment away. "Don't mention it. Seriously. Don't. I have my reputation among the tanuki to consider. I don't want your wanton ways rubbing off on me."

"You couldn't catch a man even if he fell into your arms," Ran said, smirking.

"Nice to see you're in a better mood," the tanuki said. "But I think I might strike a blow for predators everywhere and steal your boyfriend from Reisen."

"Have the two-timer."

"Does Prince Charming have a name?"

"Hikaru."

Mamizou's eyes widened as she whistled. "As in the same one Lord Hieda caught sniffing around his daughter? The guy who managed to court Alice, Patchouli, and Marisa all at the same time? No thanks. Let the bunny floozy keep him if she can. He's probably making a pass at Kaguya as we speak."

"Then he's in for a surprise," Ran said, shaking her head. "How could I have been so foolish?"

"Well, you do work for Yukari. Face it, if you fell for his tricks, your taste in men sucks."

"It's not like you have suitors lining up outside your door."

"Nue scares them away. It amuses her," the tanuki said. "Besides, you did say that most human-fox relationships ended in tragedy."

"I guess even a tanuki can get something right. Will wonders ever cease?" Ran said, feigning surprise.

"Just giving you an outsider's perspective," Mamizou said with a shrug.

"I'll have you know I can stop loving humans whenever I want," Ran said. She froze, a sly smile lighting up her face. Behind her, nine tails beat against her chair. "Just not tonight."

Mamizou looked over her shoulder. Sure, the new guy chatting with the fairy hostess was handsome, in a tall, dark sort of way, but the lack of a tail killed any interest the tanuki might have. Ran, however, glided away from the table, her form already shifting away from the tear and wine-stained wretch to the glamorous fox maiden she normally was. "Don't come crying to me when this falls apart," the tanuki said, shaking her head. She drained the last of her tea. "Nue had only one favor."

***

Author's Notes:

Folklore is full of fox-maidens falling in love with humans. I couldn't help but play with the idea, especially since it gave Ran something else to do besides be obsessed with Chen.

Nihilanth

  • Nyaa~ like no tomorrow.
Re: Songs of the Illusionary Veil
« Reply #2 on: September 06, 2012, 03:19:20 PM »
Hehe, I remember reading these on FF before. They're pretty cool ideas. How'd you get inspired to write them?  :)

Re: Songs of the Illusionary Veil
« Reply #3 on: September 07, 2012, 12:45:13 AM »
"What if" and "wouldn't it be cool" are usually reliable sources of inspiration.

Prodigal: I've always played with the idea of Mokou and the Ten Desires crew being contemporary.  Miko's identity came from research into the Fujiwara clan origins.

Favor:  There was a WWC challenge on combining music and story.  I missed the deadline.  I intended to place these songs by the Asylum Street Spankers into it,
"DRINK"  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hy6NMbfFP30,
"It's a Sin to Tell a Lie" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A19hdUO2vuY,
and finishing with "Monkey Rag" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6lOJgsJBcg&list=UUMEixvInUOkzc_5c55sD4Jg&index=1&feature=plcp
Combining the melancholy, the alcohol, and fox folklore together gave birth to the idea.

For What We Receive: (to be added soon) I'm a kappa fan, so to find out in WaHH #13 that there was a second clan of kappa stoked the creative processes.   Unfortunately, Reimu's a bit too quick to talk of extermination in the series, so I wanted to confront that.  The hard part was coming up with something where Tomasu didn't steamroll over Reimu (or the other way around) and it couldn't be too preachy.  (I only hope I succeeded.)

Re: Songs of the Illusionary Veil
« Reply #4 on: October 21, 2012, 12:54:54 AM »
Fairy Tales - To See the Ocean's Shore

***

Cirno hated the salt spray that stung her eyes. It made her job more difficult. The ice fairy wiped her eyes with her sleeve. "There's too much. I can't do it." Her lower lip quivered as she stared at the white breakers crashing against the shore.

Daiyousei hated the salt as well. And she wasn't much fonder of Mamizou Futatsuiwa, either. She wrapped an arm around her friend's waist, taking care not to ruffle the girl's ice crystal wings.

"I don't see what the big deal about this place is," Cirno said, her bravado rising like the waves on the beach. Then, as quickly as her confidence gathered, it ebbed away. "I can't make an ice cube here."

Daiyousei cringed at her friend's whisper. "But now you've done something that Reimu never has."

Cirno's smile failed to reach her eyes. "You know that I'm better than any silly shrinemaiden." She snapped her fingers and a thin sliver of frost hung in the air, melting away into steam. "Stupid raccoon girl."

"Silly girls, you haven't even seen the ocean's shore." Mamizou's taunt haunted Daiyousei's memory. Didn't that ring-tailed trickster know that her words had issued a challenge to the strongest fairy?

The journey itself had been simple. The Hakurei Barrier might not have existed for the two mischievous fairies. Children always knew the myriad ways out past their backyard fence. After that, a short flight took them to where the iron horses passed by. Mamizou had called them trains when she awed little and not so little girls with tales of the outside world.

Yet, neither fairy could help but feel lonely. Millions of Reimu's kind bustled about on the outside, but Daiyousei and Cirno had yet to see any of their sisters flying around. If being lonely in a crowd of people was what it was like to be human, the humans could keep it.

"I think it's beautiful," the fairy queen said with a shy smile. She led her friend across the sandy beach down towards the water. "There's nothing like this in Gensokyo. Mamizou's stories never said it would be anywhere this big." Deep blue water roiled against honeyed sands as far as the eye could see. Blues, whites, greens, all the colors danced vibrantly, livelier than even the most magical hideaways inside the magical land of Gensokyo.

"It is," Cirno whispered. She drew in a breath as she stepped into the last ebb of a chill wave retreating from the beach. "But I can't do anything to it. My power isn't enough."

Daiyousei sighed. "Then you'll have to get stronger. Show the world just what a fairy can do."

Cirno's smile lit up her eyes. She slipped out of her friend's hug and splashed through the water before spinning around. "Of course I will. I am the strongest, after all." A wall of water crashed into her, leaving the ice fairy shivering and sputtering.

"Let's play," Daiyousei said, mirth lighting up her eyes. She held her hands out before her and pushed forward. Another wave surged into Cirno, knocking her off her feet.

"Don't think you'll get away with that," Cirno said, spitting salt water. She spread her arms wide on the water's surface and clapped her hands, drenching Daiyousei in the ocean's tide.

The air grew thick with the laughter of fairies. For those fortunate enough to visit the beach that day, the ocean surged with a life seldom seen. And if the vibrant and joyful winds and waves danced mischievously about, showering the unwary, it only added to the magic of that perfect day.

"Let's go back," Cirno said, after a few hours of play left the two fairies lounging in the warm sun. "I want to show Reimu and that bossy raccoon girl what we can do."

A week later, during the hottest months of summer, the surface of the Misty Lake froze over for the first time in living memory.

Re: Songs of the Illusionary Veil
« Reply #5 on: November 05, 2012, 07:15:58 AM »
Southern Cross

***

There are traditions to tales like mine. Traditions, that, like the laws of the sea, men avoid to their peril. As this is a sea story, let's begin with the proper invocation.

So there I was, no shit, at the Tsukishima pier...

***

Thirty years ago, a young aerospace engineer could look forward to a long career in Houston or Florida's Space Coast. These days, everyone says, "Go West, young man." As in so far west, it becomes east once more. With the advent of the commercial space race, every little Micronesian island chain is busy courting space companies to come and build launch sites. Oh, and incidentally, provide numerous jobs for people who have little in the way of natural resources or industry. The companies, such as SpaceX and my own, are just as eager; Micronesia is in a perfect spot for space launches.

Why, you ask? Look, pal, this is a sea story, not an aerospace class. Just push the "I Believe" button and let's move on.

Anyway, I got swept up in this Micronesian space race not long after leaving the Army. Five years of tax-free pay without anyone shooting at me? Sign me right up! It's satisfying work, but the headhunter forgot a few details in the process.

It's boring out here. Look, Tsukishima is a tropical paradise, but not the cute girls in bikinis type. More like the old men escaping the evil ex-wife type. (No wonder I fit in so well.) There really is only so much beer to drink, snorkeling to do, and diving before island fever sets in. Sometimes you just have to get away. Unfortunately, Hawaii, Australia, and Thailand are just too far away. And expensive as well.

So, thank God for the boat rentals. For eighty bucks a day, I can take a small boat out into the atoll for a time of peace, quiet, and all the fishing and diving that I might feel the need to do.

As I said, so there I was, on the pier of Tsukishima, readying my boat for the day's trip. I wasn't planning on doing anything but taking my boat out to St. Vincent. I'm sure the islanders have their own name for the island, but if you went into the local Rumrunners bar, none of the English-speaking locals would recognize it. Not that I needed the name to anchor off the island and work on my sunburn as well as reading through the local "bestseller".

Okay, that's a bit generous. One of my co-workers found some lurid little thriller that took place on Tsukishima. Some little B-movie monster hunter schlock, but whoever wrote it had to have lived on the island. She had gotten too many of the details right. Well, except for the gremlin and the transforming into monsters part. Still, reading it was a rite of passage for people on the island, and it would be a perfect way to kill a lazy morning. My hands moved mechanically through the tasks of seamanship as I dreamed about open seas.

"Hey, mister, that's a big boat you've got."

There are fewer pleasant ways to awoke from a reverie than the purring of a young woman's voice. I looked up towards the dock. Two girls stood on the causeway One, tall and willowy, rolled her eyes as she carried a small Igloo cooler. Her friend, a petite and dark-haired munchkin, winked at me. Both girls wore light-blue sundresses and wide-brimmed straw hats. Willowy would have made a great fashion model, but by the way her friend moved, I could tell she'd be a handful.

Now before you think this tale will take a dark turn towards the territory of Penthouse Letters or late-night Cinemax, let me be perfectly clear. Even though the saucy munchkin purred a seductive game, both of them were boat bunnies. That meant hands off.

Boat bunnies were young women that loved sun, sea, and boats. Sure, many of them traded on their looks to get a lift from one island to the next, but not many wanted to get kissed by anything other than the sun. Still, many men picked them up for the pleasure of a young woman's company (and the eye candy). Those few who let their hands wander could ruin the deal for everyone. Boat bunnies fled the islands where those animals lived. That meant no more eye candy, which tended to make everyone really upset.

"Where are you ladies heading?" I asked.

"Rumrunners," the tall one said. She set her Igloo down to tuck her long pale hair under her hat.

I pursed my lips in thought. I wasn't planning on heading out there, but Rumrunners on Matamoros wasn't that far from St. Vincent. And they did make a decent cheeseburger. Jimmy Buffet was right, there's nothing like a cheeseburger in paradise. (He's wrong about Heinz's 57, though.) And it had been a while since I talked to anyone besides engineers. "I'm heading that way. You girls in a hurry?"

"If we were, we'd be at the heliport instead," Willowy said.

"Hop in," I said, beckoning the girls with a wave. They stepped into the boat with the practiced ease of ladies familiar with the water. Sunlight glinted off of a carrot necklace that the munchkin wore.

Willowy shook her head, but her hands quickly untied the mooring line. Planting a foot against the dock, she pushed the boat away from the pier. The girl looked like she had more experience with small craft than I did.

I grinned as I stepped behind the wheel. "Ladies, please stow your hats." I shrank back from the frosty glares. "I can't really open up the throttle otherwise"

"Mister, we did say that we weren't in a hurry," Carrot Girl said, sitting on the boat's bow.

"Suit yourself." I shrugged, nudging the throttle just enough so that the boat leisurely pulled away from the dock and into the open ocean.

***

It took a while for the shore of Tsukishima to recede across the horizon, especially at the snail's pace the girls insisted I take. But it was long enough for the three of us to work our way through the usual pleasantries. Willowy's real name was Reisen, and that carrot girl cousin of hers went by Tewi. Both of them claimed to be on summer break from college, but I doubted either of them had graced a campus in over a year. Tsukishima is just too remote for the average boat bunny to just stumble upon by accident.

"So, what are you girls doing out here?" I asked, keeping a firm hand on the wheel and the throttle.

"An art student friend of ours recommended the atoll," Reisen said. She held her hat firmly against her head.

"She wouldn't shut up about it," Tewi growled. She sipped on a box drink. "As if we weren't real women if we hadn't seen the ocean."

"There's more to the world than just the sea," I said. For a moment, I was caught up in the mountains of Afghanistan, kicking in doors. "But not many of them are as pleasant."

"Are we far enough away?" Reisen said, wincing as she craned her neck towards the vanishing shore.

Warning bells went off in my head. It never happened to me, but enough guys in my unit had been out on a pleasant night that turned into a wild ride and a missing wallet right after the girl they were with went all secretive. If either of them tried anything, I'd pitch them over the side and come back in an hour and fish them out. A good long swim far from shore tended to adjust attitudes

I glanced back, just to make sure no one was about to do something stupid. Tewi slid off of her perch on the bow and ran to the stern. Cupping her hands around her eyes, she looked back to where we had come. Behind her, the barest edge of Tsukishima peeked out from the horizon. "Should be good enough. Hey, mister, look at Reisen." She pointed towards her friend.

Despite myself, I turned around. For the first time since stepping aboard my craft, the ash-haired beauty met my eyes. She had pretty pink eyes like an albino, but no albino that I knew of had eyes that glowed.

Reisen stood up and took off her straw hat. I shit you not, two snowy white rabbit ears sprung free. I glanced back on a hunch. Tewi's hat was gone as well. Unlike her cousin, Tewi's bunny ears huddled tight against her raven dark hair like, well, a mini-lop's.

I'll be damned. I had two honest to God bunny girls on my boat. Hugh Heffner would be jealous, if he wasn't into the factory-made identical blondes he so loved. And from the way Reisen eyed me with that glowing stare of hers, I would be damned, literally, if I said the wrong thing.

"Do we have a problem?" Reisen said. Her tone commanded a level of respect that I hadn't heard since the Army. As she spoke, my thoughts turned fluid, jumbling together like some thick stew.

"Not at all. You girls seem nice enough," I said, shaking my head. The confusion cleared from my head as I spoke.

Reisen's eyes faded to normal. She sighed as she wrung out one long white ear. "I hate wearing that hat, it wrinkles my ears."

I wanted to touch her ears. They seemed like they'd be softer than Angora. However, the First Rule of Boat Bunnies still held sway. "Are those real-"

"Call us cosplay enthusiasts," Tewi purred. She flashed a lot of teeth at me in what I hoped was a smile.

"Do you really expect me to believe that?" I said, pointing to Reisen. The tall bunny girl's long ears twitched.

"Believe, no. Leave it as, yes," Tewi said. "You are going to leave it, yes?"

Need to know. Got it. I'm no stranger to secrets. "Suit yourself," I said, with a shrug.

***

Fortunately for the bunnies, St. Vincent was one of many small islands around the atoll that was unoccupied. I cut the engine and anchored off the shore. Or what was left of it. Coconut palms and zebra wood shrubs covered the island with dark green leaves, leaving little room for surf and sand.

"Hey, Long Ears," Tewi shouted. The short girl in a racing suit teetered on the edge of the boat. "Aren't you going to come in?"

Reisen lifted her head just long enough to shake her head. She had traded her sundress for a modest pink bikini and a fluffy beach towel. Both bunny and towel lay sprawled out on the bow, soaking up the sunlight.

And, yes, before you ask, cottontails. Both of them. And more lifelike than any "cosplay enthusiast" could buy.

"Spoilsport," Tewi said, plunging in the water. I saw a flash of blue and green among the crystal blue water and she surfaced, spitting water.

"It takes forever to get that algae smell out of my ears," Reisen said, wrinkling her nose. "Have fun among the sharks."

"I can't help it if they like me," Tewi said, treading water. She looked up at me. "Don't tell me that I'm swimming alone."

What can you say to an invitation like that? Stopping just long enough to grab a mask and snorkel, I dove over the side.

***

The smooth sea held from St. Vincent to Rumrunners. That let me open wide the throttles, and the small boat, a clunker by most standards, sliced across the water like the flying fish that leaped from our wake. Occasionally, a small wave launched the bow into the air. Cheery giggles and salt spray greeted its inevitable return to the sea.

But even with taking the long way across the lagoon, the U-shaped island of Matamoros and its unwelcome marina grew ever closer. Tewi tapped my hand and shook her head. I backed off the throttle, almost bringing the boat to a stop.

Immediately, the straw hats and sundress came out. Reisen slicked her long ears back until they hung behind her like long white ribbons from a bow. Tewi just set her hat at a rakish angle and smiled. "You know what they say about all good things," she said, smoothing her skirts underneath her before she sat.

"You sure that you don't want another trip around the island?" I asked. Even with the sprawling Rumrunners bar and resort taking up a third of the island, Matamoros still had some of the best beaches in the atoll. Some days I wished that my company had built its facilities here, but I was well aware of the dangers in keeping large numbers of engineers anywhere near polite society.

"If we weren't meeting friends," Reisen said wistfully, eyeing the golden brown sandy shores.

"College friends?"

"More like the dorm mom," Tewi said, laughing. Reisen flashed her cousin a glare so cutting that it could have sliced diamond. "Oh, lighten up, Long Ears. At least I didn't call her, 'Grandma.'"

"Don't let her hear you say that." Reisen's eyes grew widen as she huddled against the railing and shuddered.

"One of our friends went prematurely white. Reisen found out the hard way just how sensitive she can be about that," Tewi said, pulling out another box drink from the cooler at her feet.

"She put the Evil Eye on you?" I said, working the wheel so that that boat steered to the right side of the traffic buoys.

"Worse. She said that if I continued to tease her, my hair would go white as well," Reisen muttered.

I bit back a chuckle. Reisen's fur was pure white, even if her hair wasn't. Looks like my two guests are as much young women as they were rabbits. Then again, I did remember a twenty-something version of myself agonizing over each stray hair in the sink.

The waves lapped against the bow as the craft crept closer to the marina. Peace, however, were nowhere to be found. Tewi climbed her way back and forth across the boat, looking out towards the horizon. Reisen had to pull her back over the railing once, before her cousin disappeared into the water.

We circled around to fish Tewi's hat out of the drink. At least she had the good grace to look abashed while Reisen scolded her. Both of their spirits quickly returned, and the last mile to the dock was full of laughter. Some of it was even my own.

It was with regret that I pulled back sharply on the throttle. The engines surged in reverse and then cut out, leaving the boat motionless just inches from the Rumrunners pier. The waves finished the job, nudging the boat against the pier so that my two assistants could tie the craft securely to the dock.

I checked their work before stepping onto the floating concrete rig. "I'll be out this way for a while. If you see me, don't feel shy about asking for a ride," I said, holding out my hand. A mere pleasantry; most boat bunnies kept on the move.

"Thank you," Reisen said graciously, holding my hand as she stepped out of the boat. She knelt down and took the cooler from Tewi. "I'd like that."

Once more, I offered my hand. Tewi pulled herself out of the boat and onto her toes. For the briefest of instants, her lips brushed my cheek. "For luck," she said catching my eyes.

I watched them walk down the pier towards Matamoros island, trading the occasional wave. After the bunny girls disappeared from sight, I settled my dock and fuel fee and walked towards Rumrunners in search of a cheeseburger in paradise.

Some proprieties have to be observed. Even if it meant listening to that damn song again.

***

It's been five weeks, and I find myself once again sipping a Jack and Coke out here at Rumrunners. Maybe I'll see them again, but they're most likely halfway to Kwajalein by now. Boat bunnies aren't known for staying in one place, and I guess that'd be doubly so for those two. All I have left from that day is a kiss and a promise of good luck, along with a bundle of fading pleasant memories. It wouldn't be the first time I'd gone sentimental over a kiss.

Then again, something inside is still telling me that my luck's about to change...

***

Author's Notes:

Thanks to Captain Vulcan for giving this a look prior to posting.

Re: Songs of the Illusionary Veil
« Reply #6 on: February 19, 2013, 12:31:55 AM »
The Country Doctor

***

Nobody knows the trouble I've seen.

I've sent my wife away; as long as the mountain goddesses smile upon her, she should be safe. I've kept this secret even from her. Now that my life is forfeit, I find that I must write it down.

She is coming for me; I know it in my bones. Those red-eyed stares stole what little joy that I could find from my wayward daughter's wedding to the half-breed shopkeeper. She passed by me in the reception line, taking deliberate care to catch my eye. Her red eyes flashed, and I saw the moment of my death down to the silk chord and the shattered glass bottle my daughter will find by my body.

We all thought she was perfect, even those of us who hated her kind. I know I did, now I can't remember why.

A year ago, sickness swept through the village. They called it the bird flu, but even tengu medicine could not help its victims. My wife caught it first, and my daughter, may the devils take her, only deigned to leave her forest when her own mother could no longer sit up in bed. Then I caught the fever as well. Not willing to risk my daughter's concoctions, I slipped out the door to ask the country doctor what was wrong with me.

This was before the rabbit doctor lost her sick friend. A rare affliction, she called it. She said that she was doing all she could do. We believed it; not even her boss, the moon doctor, could bring the little bunny back from Death's door. Some call death the ultimate healing, but the white rabbit's release was still weeks away when I walked up to the country doctor's office.

I pushed open the door into an empty waiting room and settled on a couch. No assistant sat at the desk; that bunny was withering away at Eternity Manor. I rang the bell, but no one came out from behind the curtain to greet me.

Time crept by, stoking the fire in my veins. Wobbling to my feet, I staggered to the water jug and slaked my thirst, but not my pain. In a haze, I slipped past the curtain that separated the clinic from the waiting room. She kept her remedies in a closet near the entrance. I'd seen her go in it before. Like the rest of the village, my wife and I relied on her to tend our wounds, aches, and illnesses. At this point, I'd have settled for sake, but more potent medicines were closer.

The remedies were separated in labeled bins. Feversbane was easy to find, right next to an unmarked bottle. Still hoping for sake, I uncorked it. A familiar acrid bitterness met my nose. I immediately set the glass aside. My wife used something similar to control the rats that plagued our shop.

I turned around and saw two shadows entwined in the room in front of me. A ghostly mist surrounded them while they made eyes and their hands roamed free. A gasp later and red eyes followed me as I hurried out of the office, leaving the bunny doctor and her blushing mistress to their shame.

Now you know the trouble I've seen.

I've passed her many times in the village since then, and I can never bring myself to meet her eyes. Maybe if I had, I might have had more warning.

The land loves rumor, and many surrounded the rabbit doctor as her friend died. Some said that there was another woman. How could they not, when the ghostly girl clung to her side? I never breathed a word of that day, but she wouldn't believe me that the tales didn't start with me.

So now I sit alone in my parlor, choking down my bitter drink as I write these words. I'm waiting for the red eyes that will be the last thing I will ever see.

The door slams against the wall. Red eyes peer from the stalking shadows, petrifying me as chills run through my body. The bottle slips out of frozen fingers and shatters against the floor.

I can only hope that my daughter will avenge me.

***

Author's note:

Inspired by Bruce Hornsby's song, "The Country Doctor". Thanks to WillieGR and Captain Vulcan for prereading.

Re: Songs of the Illusionary Veil
« Reply #7 on: May 06, 2015, 02:03:43 AM »
Kiss of the Spider Woman

***

Her tea had that pleasant copper tang she craved, although only that cocky vampire waif in that impossible mansion would agree with Yamame Kurodani's taste. Her human form didn't eliminate the spideress's thirst for blood, just diluted it. She could appreciate the rice and vegetables common throughout the Village, but the needs of her spider nature eventually won out. A cup of her special blend with every meal sated her thirst. Doubly so, if Yamame could suck it down through a straw, just like the gods intended. It kept the humans' spears away.

Yamame loved a good fight more than that Kirisame witch. But when the humans brought out the spears, they were no longer interested in a good fight, just slaughter. Other beings accepted their place in the food chain, but only humans insisted that it didn't apply to them. And they made convincing arguments with a multitude of sharp points.

She placed her teacup down on a carved rock table. It had come as a shock to her that the surface peoples didn't like her. It was personal, fiercer than the general mistrust aimed at her people. At first, she didn't understand why. Yamame was just as outgoing and spirited as any of the darlings on the surface. Like them, she had a host of suitors waiting for the first sign that she might be willing to marry. But they didn't have her power.

Even among civilized folks, the gift to tell whether that animal the village was about to dine on was just sickly or going to make everyone sick was highly sought after. If Yamame's ability had only been limited to such, the surface people would have likely overlooked her...oddities. Maybe her people could have lived freely on the surface, instead of sneaking out at night to do the odd construction job. But her gift had proven to be broader than food inspection.

The door to the rock cell opened. Yamame winced as reflected sunlight stung her eyes. Her native form was nowhere near as sensitive to minor changes in brightness.

"Miss Kurodani?" A young spiderling still too young to wear the brown dress of an adult poked her blonde head into the cell. "You have a visitor."

"Send them in," Yamame said. She pulled herself out of her comfortable web-backed chair.

The spiderling paled and stammered. "She's on the surface."

"A human?" The spideress raised an eyebrow. The spiderling nodded vigorously. Yamame rolled her eyes and whispered to herself, "Not another one."

"I'm afraid so."

"Didn't you shoo her away?" The spiderling turned white and stammered. Yamame rolled her eyes and slurped down the last of her tea. She hadn't asked the spiderling to duel Reimu. "Just take me to our guest."

***

For once, it wasn't a village girl that loitered in front of the sinkhole that served as the mouth to earth spider dens. Yamame hated dealing with the steady trickle of jilted lovers seeking the "Kiss of the Spider Woman" for rivals and cheating cads. Part of her was disgusted that they thought such vile plagues were her kisses. After all, she was acclaimed as one of the best kissers in the Underground. But Yamame couldn't send them home with so much as an itch. Her people had been driven underground for less. It was better to make them wait until impatience and the cares of life drove them away.

However, the well-dressed woman with the scarlet-fringed shawl waited patiently among the chaparral brush that lined the sinkhole. Her eyes followed Yamame as the spideress skittered along a network of hidden nooks and spyholes hidden inside the mouth of the sinkhole. Not even the tengu with their keen eyes and sharp noses could find a spider in that earthwork maze. Yamame chewed on her lip and reached out with her power. Her eyes grew wide. The woman outside was free from all infections, even the symbiotic ones that aided in digestion, unlike every other beast, youkai, or human.

Yamame settled in her tight bolt hole hewn out of polished rock and glanced over her shoulder. Spiderlings and guards filled every spyhole behind her. Eyes, compound and human, flickered between her and the scarlet-shawled woman, watching, waiting, weighing.

Bowing her head, Yamame asked Grandmother Spider, creator of the world, for Her blessing and wisdom. A serene peace that matched the visitor's poise filled the spideress, and Yamame stepped out to face her visitor.

The serene woman pressed both hands against her heart and bowed. "Pax tecum." Peace be to you. "Are you the Pale Horse of the Spider clans?"

"I am a spider." Yamame's lips turned in a childish moue.

"I am Iku Nagae, servant of Heaven, emissary of the Dragon Palace, and chatelaine for the Hinanawi clan. Please don't be afraid."

"I'm not afraid, although I might be insulted. What's a Pale Horse?"

"'And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him.'"

"I'm not a shinigami." Yamame crossed her arms and palmed a spellcard. "Yep, pretty sure I'm offended."

Iku bowed again, her shawl rippling in the breeze. "I prefer the poetic whenever possible. It lends a gravitas that Pestilence and Plague Bearer lack."

Yamame winced as each title as though she had been slapped. "What do the honored clouds want of me?" Iku froze and stared at Yamame. The spideress sighed. "I mean Heaven. My people believe that the honored dead become clouds."

The heavenly messenger cleared her throat. "I should spend more time among the beasts and the fishes than among humans. Please relax; I'm here for personal reasons."

"You could have fooled me with all those titles."

"It's a habit picked up from the humans." Iku shook her head and wrapped her shawl tight around her shoulders. "I never understood why the Pancreator made such troublesome folk."

"Grandmother Spider is prone to whimsy." A ghost of a smile flashed across Yamame's lips. "Mine, however, has just about run out." She turned her back on Iku. A score of spiders ducked into their holes.

"I can give your people the sky again."

Yamame's breath caught in her throat. Eyes wide, she spun around. "How? Driving us underground was practically the only time humans and youkai agreed on anything."

Back in times ancient to humans but still in the living memory of the earth spider clans, Yamame's people had been indiscriminate on what they preyed on until their name grew synonymous with every highwayman and bandit that waylaid people throughout Japan. The Emishi had joined with the tengu and a confederation of youkai tribes and drove the spiders into hiding. It had been cold comfort when Grandmother Spider had allowed Heian samurai led by the Fujiwara to mete out justice in kind upon her children's oppressors, since the misunderstanding at Rendai field soon after had dashed the spiders' hopes of living once more under the open sky. Yamame hoped that when Grandmother Spider next wove on the Web of Life, her people would enjoy the sky once more.

"You'd be surprised what a word in the right shrinemaiden's ear can do." Iku's voice boomed throughout the sinkhole. Her shawl billowed in the breeze, unfurling behind her like scarlet wings.

"I wouldn't trust in Reimu's goodwill," Yamame muttered. She massaged her shoulder. The quick smiting shrinemaiden hadn't needed to attack her the day that Okuu had gone mad with power; Yamame had only asked Reimu to join in the Underground's feast, not be it.

Iku hid her laughter behind a span of scarlet fringe. "I was thinking of Sanae, actually. Her ear is inclined towards the heavens instead of money. But before we can appeal to the Moriya priestess's goodwill, I need yours."

Yamame cast a look over her shoulder. One blonde spiderling was slow in diving into her hole. "You've got to convince me, not them."

The heavenly emissary's poise never wavered. "'Be as wise as serpents and innocent as doves.'"

"What do you want, Madame Sea Serpent?"

For once, Iku's placid mask cracked. "I fear that the Eldest Daughter of the Hinanawi has once again proven to be indiscreet."

"I was wondering who had leveled the Hakurei Shrine yet again." Yamame tapped a finger against her lips and smiled.

Iku bowed her head and stepped closer. "It is worse than that." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "The Eldest Daughter's confidence exceeds her common sense. Why else would she spar with an oni? Now that oni has taken residence in the Eldest Daughter's heavenly manor. Do you have any idea what revelries that demon inflicts on the serene peace of the Dragon Palace?"

"Yes." Yamame's smile widened and she fiddled with one of the metal buttons that lined the front of her jumper. Her eyes grew distant as she remembered dancing to the thunder of the taiko drums, showered in sake and kisses. She shook her head and fixed a wan smile to her lips. Iku was still talking.

"?holly, salt, silver, even soya. We tried it all. But the oni just laughs each away." Iku's shoulders slumped. "And Lord Nai is about to return." Iku paled and, for a moment, only the rippling of her scarf in the wind could be heard.

Yamame cleared her throat. "Shouldn't you be talking to a shrinemaiden?"

Iku shook her head. "The matter requires subtlety to remain a secret from Lord Nai."

Yamame bit back a sigh. No matter who tried to buy her cooperation, they always danced around their requests. "What's the job?"

"The oni has returned to Gensokyo to pack her belongings before she moves in for good. I need a month to strengthen the defenses of the Dragon Palace in secret to repel her."

"I don't fight oni."

"I'm sure a skilled Pale Horse like yourself could keep an oni bedridden for months. Perhaps with influenza. Cowpox?"

Yamame shook her head. She knew this trick. If she considered the challenge, even for a moment, she would be suckered into the job. "My people have treaties with the oni bands under the mountain. Grandmother Spider doesn't look kindly upon oathbreakers. The oni would finish the job the Emishi started."

"Your people will be protected."

"By who? You're asking me to do what you can't."

"For the sake of your people." Iku's voice projected across the field. "Think of the sun and the sky."

"My people will live underneath the honored clouds again." Yamame turned so that her voice carried throughout the sinkhole that led to her home. "But we will do so by Grandmother Spider's blessing and our own efforts, not through fox tricks and tanuki treachery."

Iku opened her mouth to speak, but froze. She cocked her head, as if listening to a faraway voice. The envoy bowed low, debasing herself beyond a mere supplicant. "I will leave you to work out your people's salvation." She stood up. A paper charm similar to the good luck charms of the Tanabata festival dangled from her fingers. "If you change your mind, tie this to the fairy shrine in the forest. Your reward will not change."

Yamame swiped the charm from Iku's hand. "May the blessings of Grandmother Spider be with you."

"May you find peace as well." Iku's shawl billowed behind her. The wind caught it like a sail. One heartbeat later, Yamame stood alone.

"That was stranger than expected." The charm hung from her hand and twirled. Yamame held it up in front of her eyes. A single eel-like character from an unknown script decorated the charm. Whoever inked it had a graceful touch with the calligraphy brush finer than even Reimu's florid hand. She watched the paper spin in the sun until a spiderling's quieted cry fixed her attention beyond the heavenly charm.

Two lines of earth spiders crowded the entrance of their underground home. Burly construction spiders stood with their arms around their wives while spiderlings clung to their parents. Yamame quailed under her people's thin-lipped stares. For the first time in her life, she felt like a fly caught in a web.

***

Three weeks later, under the light of the noonday sun, Yamame led a pair of spiderlings by hand through the human village's main street.

Re: Songs of the Illusionary Veil
« Reply #8 on: May 06, 2015, 02:04:27 AM »
At Ten Paces

In the morning's misty calm, before the Hakurei Shrine's torii gate, Alice Margatroid unlatched a flat leather case and presented a quartet of dueling pistols to her friends. Her lace filigreed hand brushed across a polished wooden stock. "Nitori made these over the weekend. They should work with any of your spellcards." She pulled a yellow pamphlet from the case's lid. "Are you still resolved to answer this challenge?"

"I've been looking forward to knocking Wonder Girl on her butt for weeks," Reimu Hakurei said. For once, the shrinemaiden had left the robes of her office at the shrine. Instead, she wore a scarlet rifleman's jacket studded with silver and a pair of black breeches. Alice had insisted that everyone involved dressed the part.

"Please remind your principal to remain respectful at all times." Suwako Moriya bowed to Marisa Kirisame. The Emishi goddess had traded her dress for an archer's traditional kimono, hakama, and headband, all in purple. Marisa tipped her witch's hat and spun about, her black duster coat twirling behind her.

Before she could speak, Reimu held up a hand. "I heard. I just don't see why we have to do everything in this roundabout manner."

"It's all part of the game." Sanae Kochiya fiddled with the shoulders of her green tabard. She had chosen a musketeer's costume, complete with a wide brimmed cavalier's cap, a peacock's feather, a sky-blue cloak, and a snake and frog emblem on her tabard.

Suwako placed a finger on her priestess's lips. "The rules apply to you as well."

"You're the one who said she was bored with spellcard duels," Reimu muttered.

Alice slammed the case shut. "If you won't take this seriously, I'm afraid we shall adjourn." Her white hoop dress and parasol lent the young woman an air of authority beyond her years.

Marisa leaned over towards Reimu. "That means she's going to take her toys and go home."

Suwako flourished a deck of spellcards into a fan. "I hope I didn't get dressed up for nothing."

"Are you resolved to settle your differences according to the rules of this book?" Alice held up the yellow pamphlet.

"Yes," the principals and seconds groaned in unison.

"Very well, we shall settle this affront at ten paces." Alice pursed her lips and opened the leather case. "Did we ever decide what the affront was?"

Reimu rolled her eyes. Taking Marisa's hat in her hand, she whispered into her second's ear.

Marisa flounced and snatched back her hat. "My principal says that her opponent's presence is sufficient cause for the duel."

"Just because you two fight like sisters isn't reason enough," Alice snapped. "Pick something more glamorous, more romantic. Can't you at least fight over the same man?"

"As if last year's flower could compete with me," Sanae said through Suwako.

"Bold words for a girl hiding underneath her grandmother's bedsheets," Marisa relayed. Reimu stood with her arms crossed, smiling as she eyed the brace of dueling pistols.

Sanae strode towards Reimu, but Suwako's arm barred her way. "Mistress Kirisame, I propose that we no longer allow our principals to riot each other's passions prior to this solemn occasion." The goddess's voice grew regal and she dipped into a deep curtsy. Despite her best efforts, a smile spread across Suwako's lips.

"It shall be as you say, Lady Moriya." Marisa returned the curtsy, an awkward gesture for one dressed as a Puritan witch hunter. Unlike her counterpart, she made no effort to hide her amusement.

Alice stared at Marisa, her mouth agape. Gensokyo's most notoriously boisterous hoyden had actually acted like a proper lady for once. She looked to the sky to see if the morning sun had risen in the West. But the slender fingers that drifted towards her case shattered Alice's wonder. Her hand lashed out, slapping away Marisa's hand. "Stop that. You'll get your turn after this." Her hand darted out again. Suwako pulled hers away.

Sighing, the pretty dollmaker pressed a glowing spellcard against the felt-lined compartment in her hand. A dour Hourai doll appeared and propped a steel-tipped lance against her shoulder. She surveyed the assembled group, giving special attention and enmity to Marisa.

"No fair, Alice. You made everyone dress up except for Hourai." Marisa returned Hourai's scowl.

Alice rolled her eyes and opened the pamphlet. "Before we begin, let us review The Rules?"

The puppeteer started down the list of Mother May I's and By Your Leave's that only postponed the shrinemaidens' showdown. By the seventh Rule, the participants' eyes glazed over. At the fifteenth, even Hourai's head had drooped. Finally, Alice closed the pamphlet. "Are there any questions?"

Sanae raised a hand. "How long until you stand at the edge of my field of vision and drop your handkerchief?"

"For once, I agree with her." Reimu massaged her temples.

"Fine!" Alice snapped. She tapped two fingers against the snoring Hourai doll and retrieved her as a spellcard. "From this moment, the two of you are under your seconds' charge. They are required to use any means necessary to compel obedience, or both you and your seconds will face my chastisement." The puppeteer held up a kappa-made camera phone. A single white feather dangled from its chain.

"You can speak plainly, you know." Suwako shielded her eyes with a hand. "Are we going to start, or will I need to send Sanae to fetch my hat"

"Fine. Screw up and tomorrow's Spirit News will name you as a coward." Alice's face turned red as she stamped her feet and shouted. "Stop ruining my fun. It's not like my spellcards even work with these things."

Marisa eyed the pistols. "Don't worry. I'll give you a couple of mine."

Alice coughed into her hand. "Well, Nitori said to remind you that these are magical devices. Don't expect recoil." She thrust the case into Sanae's hands. "Miss Kirisame, a spell card please." With deft hands, the puppeteer slid a brass ramrod out from beneath the pistol's barrel.

"I said borrow, not ruin!" Marisa reached for the balled spellcard in Alice's hand.

The puppeteer rammed the wadded card into the pistol and replaced the rod. Spinning the device in her had until she held it by the barrel, Alice slapped the wooden grip into Marisa's hand. "There you go, one single shot. Keep it pointed at the ground until you have cause to use it."

"And then what?"

"Don't miss." Alice slid a ramrod free from another pistol. Suwako held onto that one and the third, intended for Sanae. After Marisa grasped hold of the final device, Alice took the case from Sanae and set it down at her feet. "Now, if you would stand your principals back to back. Upon my word, you shall both advance five paces. Now, advance!"

Sanae counted to five and stopped quivering as she waited for the next command. Suwako stepped in front of her and smiled. If was a comfort to have her grandmother present. The wise earth goddess always knew the right words to calm Sanae.

"Try to spook Reimu into firing early. I want a shot at her too." Suwako handed Sanae the pistol and patted her priestess on the shoulder.

Sanae laughed and squared her shoulders. The pistol felt right in her hand. She could grow used to this manner of dueling.

"Arm!" Alice bellowed.

It took her free hand to pull the hammer back, and not her thumb, unlike in the movies Sanae had watched. Suwako stepped three paces to Sanae's side and leveled her pistol toward Reimu.

"Turn!"

Sanae pivoted around, her long cloak trailing a wide circle behind her. She locked eyes with Reimu. Neither girl blinked, but, like horses just before a race, they strained against the need to stay still, waiting for the word that would release them.

"Present!"

She raised her pistol and turned her body until she peered down her shoulder, along her arm, and down the barrel, a mirror of her opponent's actions. Despite herself, Sanae scowled at Reimu's narrower profile. For once, the shrinemaiden held the advantage.

The world narrowed until Sanae's pistol and Reimu all but filled her sight. At the fuzzy edges, a figure in white raised her hand. Sanae's breath hissed from between her lips.

The white handkerchief floated out of Alice's hand.

Hammers fell, spraying sparks as flint met steel. Storm walls of danmaku surged toward the shrine maidens, obscuring the dueling grounds in a tempest of magic, fire, and shot. The last ripples of danmaku streaked past, and as quick as the field roiled into a magical inferno, it subsided.

Sanae groaned and lowered her spent pistol. Reimu still stood, without a streak of white bleaching her scarlet jacket. The danmaku had passed her by, just as it did Sanae, who had not felt its astringent sting. The matter between the shrinemaidens remained unresolved. Their game must have a winner.

Suwako rushed towards her, brushing her hands through every fold of Sanae's cloak and tabard.

"Give me yours." Sanae reached for Suwako's pistol.

The goddess laughed as she slipped out of the way. "Stand still and stop that. The longer this takes, the longer it'll be until you can go again. Next time, though, aim to the right a bit." She brushed off Sanae's shoulders. "Although there's nothing stopping you two from deciding a winner through more traditional methods. You'll have to wait, though, until Alice has her bit of fun." She spun about and waved a hand high over her head.

The Mistress of the Duel beckoned with her hand. Marisa and Suwako met in front of Alice, wide smiles on their faces.

"'Our friends have exchanged shots. Are you satisfied, or is there any cause why the contest should be continued?'" Alice read from a small pamphlet in her hand.

"I've seen that look in Reimu's eye. She's going to keep going until she wins." Marisa pointed over her shoulder to where her principal stood with her arms crossed, tapping her foot.

"Sanae's blood is up as well." Suwako pursed her lips. "You know, if we don't stop this now, we won't get our turn to play."

Marisa thrust out her hand and winked. "Satisfied?"

Alice shoved her pamphlet into the witch's hand. "You have to say the lines. That's the entire point of the matter."

Marisa rolled her eyes and crowded next to Suwako in front of the rules. The ancient battle goddess traced a finger across the page before stabbing at the appropriate response. "'The point of honor being settled, there can, I conceive, be no objection to a reconciliation, and I propose that our principals meet on middle ground, shake hands, and be friends,'" the two seconds read in unison.

Alice plucked the pamphlet away from Marisa. Her voice cut high and clear through the field. "''We have agreed that the present duel shall cease, the honor of each of you is preserved, and you will meet on middle ground, shake hands, and be reconciled.'"

"No fair!" Reimu shouted. The shrine maiden rushed towards the Mistress of the Duel. "No one won." She stripped the rules from Alice and searched them.

Sanae bounced up to her and clasped Reimu's hands in her own. "See, I told you that we should have been dueling like this all along." The priestess's eyes shimmered and she beamed.

Reimu stared down Alice. "I want a rematch."

"The matter has been decided." Alice unfurled a paper fan with her free hand and covered her mouth. "Just be glad that I didn't tell you two to kiss and make up."

"You can do that?" Reimu tugged her hands free from Sanae's.

"I think Alice wants her turn to play." Sanae scooped her cavalier's hat off of Suwako's head. "Otherwise she wouldn't render offense like that. Can you duel two people at once?"

"I call first shot, Wonder Girl."

"Get in line, you three." Marisa twirled her pistol in her fingers. "The tadpole and I go next. Unless you all want to see up close what a Master Spark looks like through one of these."

The duelists spun around as a loud squeal pealed from the treeline. Four doll-like heads poked out from behind an ancient tree. Cirno bolted towards the dueling grounds, with the three Fairies of Light nipping at her heels.

"So much for their chores." Reimu shook her head and pointed toward the fairies before pointing towards her shrine. Instead, Star and Luna mobbed Alice, while Sunny pestered Suwako.

"You know better than to try to keep a fairy away from anything exciting." Marisa held her two dueling pistols high over her head. Cirno bounced in circles around the witch, straining for the prizes just out of her reach. The ice fairy's wings fluttered and her leaps grew until her fingers brushed against the cold iron. Unlike the sidhe of the West, touching the metal did nothing to dampen her enthusiasm.

"At least they're not the tengu reporters." Sanae's smile grew strained as Sunny yanked on her cloak.

Cirno dropped off of Marisa's arm. "How was that fighting?" She looked up at Reimu with a furled brow. "You just stood still."

Reimu cast a pleading glance to Alice.

"It's a test of bravery. Only the brave will remain still, and only by standing still will you not get hit." Alice tugged the hem of her dress out of Star's hand.

"It's the opposite of a spellcard duel?"

Reimu watched as that idea worked its way from one side of the ice fairy's brain to the other. "Don't look at me. It's something that men came up with and Sanae insisted on trying." Her voice dropped into a stage whisper. "I've given up on trying to understand either of them."

"So that's why the men of Gensokyo insist that you provide a dowry before any of them will court you." Suwako tapped a finger against her chin and looked into the sky, contemplating a cloud.

Sunny took one look at the shrinemaiden's face and ran behind Cirno

Reimu's shoulders slumped. "Don't remind me. The aliens make more sense."

Cirno's eyes lit up. "So, if it's like a spellcard duel, all I have to do is challenge someone?"

Sanae knelt in front of the ice fairy and her friend. "Not quite. There's more rules than a spellcard duel. For instance, you only fight over slights and insults, not for fun. And Alice over there insists that we dress up and speak fancy." Her voice shifted into a rough parody of Mokou's courtier accent. "Do fairies read Heian poetry?"

Luna glowered at the priestess and nodded.

Cirno held out her hands and concentrated. Water pooled in the air until a reasonable facsimile of Sanae's cavalier hat froze solid, complete with an icy feather plume. Placing the hat on her head at a rakish angle, the ice fairy puffed out her chest and glared at Marisa. "You have offended me..." Her eyes flickered towards Alice and Sanae.

Alice hid her smile behind a lace glove and knelt next to the fairy. Cirno nodded as the puppeteer whispered into her ear.

"...and I demand satisfaction. Meet me upon the field of battle and die!"

"Close enough," Alice muttered.

Marisa laughed and held out her smoothbore spellcard pistols towards Reimu. "Miss Hakurei, would you be my second?"

***

Author's Notes:

Excerpts from The Code of Honor, Or, Rules for the Government of Principals and Seconds in Dueling by John Lyde Wilson are used without permission.
« Last Edit: May 06, 2015, 02:14:25 AM by Achariyth »

Re: Songs of the Illusionary Veil
« Reply #9 on: May 06, 2015, 02:07:50 AM »
A Book for Her Pillow

***

Kosuzu leaned over an ancient scholar's desk and tapped a chalcedony inkstone. Charcoal ripples splashed inside the stone's shallow bowl, threatening to spot the leaves of snowy paper that the bookseller had unwisely sat the polished well upon.

Her breath hissing from her throat, Lady Akyuu grabbed her confidant's sleeve. "Careful." The young landgravine, heiress of the Hieda clan, guided Kosuzu away from the trembling inkstone. She pointed towards the paper. "That is a treasure beyond measure."

"You do realize that we sell blank journals by the shelf." Kosuzu's eyes narrowed and she swept a hand towards the bookshelves surrounding the desk. "Wait, what have you been reading lately?"

"'What do you think we could write on this?'" A smile graced Lady Akyuu's porcelain lips as she paused in her quotation, drawing out the caesura. "'Perhaps we should make it a pillow.'"

Huffing, Kosuzu rocked back into her chair. "I knew it. There was no way that you could spend all that time studying. But why Sei Shonagon? She's so frivolous. Lady Murasaki's works are better." She tilted her head and stared at the landgravine. "Did any of your past selves ever meet Lady Murasaki?"

Pursing her lips, Lady Akyuu, ninth reincarnation of the Child of Miare, brushed a dark lock of hair over her ear. "Ami passed away before Lady Murasaki came to court."

"Pity. I would have loved to have met her, if I were you."

In the heart of the village, surrounded by suitors, Lady Mokou Fujiwara huddled in her fiery mink robe and sneezed.

Lady Akyuu picked up the inkstone well with both hands and set it upon the desk. "We can fill up the pages with our thoughts."

Kosuzu picked up the loose leaves of paper and tamped them into a tidy stack. "You mean poetry."

The slight landgravine giggled. "You could use the practice. At one time, a clever turn of phrase and clean brushstrokes were all a girl needed to lure a suitor." Rose crept into Lady Akyuu's cheeks. Ami's amorous adventures in the Heian court flashed vivid in her mind.

"I've watched while the boys chase after Komachi. It isn't her poetry that they're looking at." Kosuzu crossed her arms beneath her breasts.

Lady Akyuu closed her eyes and sighed. "Well, at least you looked up from your youkai books for once."

The bookseller thrust the stack of paper in Lady Akyuu's hands. "Better ghost stories than dusty histories."

Lady Akyuu's smile grew strained. Kosuzu was closer than a sister, and occasionally bickered like one. The landgravine hugged the ream of paper again her chest.

"I'll use a pen this time, not a brush." The bell at the bookstore's door rang, and Kosuzu vanished into the maze of tall bookshelves.

Smiling, Lady Akyuu set the pages on the desk, dipped a brush into the well of the inkstone, and began to write.

"'In spring, the dawn - when the slowly paling mountain rim is tinged with red,and wisps of faintly crimson-purple cloud float in the sky.'"

Lady Akyuu tapped her brush dry against the inkstone and sighed. Fighting the urge to blot out her lines, she blew the page dry and slid it beneath the stack of paper. She wanted a pillow book of her own, a journal of thoughts and memories, not a transcribed copy of the 291 entries in Sei Shonagon's. Kosuzu's bookstore could print a copy faster.

Besides, she had been relying too much on poetic allusions since reading The Pillow Book. Yukari Yakumo, her editor, had mentioned as much, although the enigmatic youkai preferred the grace of Heian verse to the more scholarly Chinese proverbs. But a woman of the Hieda was expected to know her poetry, and the Child of Miare, more so.

Before each child of the Hieda clan could read, she was brought before the head of the family. He would read a line from the twenty volumes of the Kokinshu and wait for the child's reply. If she completed the verse, he would read another and another until the child made a single mistake or the twenty volumes were exhausted. Only the reincarnated Child of Miare would be able to recite the poems from a perfect memory of her past lines.

But if a chronicler steeped in the classics found a simple journal a challenge?

Lady Akyuu stood up and peeked around a bookshelf. Kosuzu chatted with Alice Margatroid by the shop's counter. The blonde magician traded silver for a slender book of sonnets, her cheeks glowing like the sunrise. As the door chimes rang out, Lady Akyuu swooped up the paper on the desk and rushed towards the counter.

***

Kosuzu leaned against the checkout counter and tapped a capped pen against the pure white page. She never knew how to start, at least whenever Lady Akyuu wanted to play her word games. The blank page invited her to fill it with the smoke-like glyphs that the youkai used, but her copies lacked the virtue of the texts written by youkai. Besides, her neighbors grew worried whenever they couldn't understand a word that Kosuzu had written.

Her pen spinning through her fingers, Kosuzu pursed her lips and looked behind her. Back by the scholar's desk, Lady Akyuu checked a stack of books against a list in her hand. Knowing the landgravine, it was probably a list of lists, just like many of the classics on the table.

Kosuzu sighed and turned away, gazing through the storefront window and watching as the people of her village hurried past the bookstore in the course of their day. A young girl ran across the village street and leapt into her father's arms. Kosuzu cooed as the man spun his daughter through the air.

The bookseller's pen twirled to a stop, and Kosuzu began to write.

'Things that delight - Fairies singing as they dance circles beneath the blossoming sakura flowers. The crackle and hiss of the phonograph as it spins up a new song. Resting among the daisies with a favorite book in hand, basking in the midsummer warmth alongside the damselflies. The chimes of the storefront bells as they greet my father at the end of his long book-buying trip. The first sip of leftover plum wine from my mother's cup while I'm clearing the dinner table, after she's gone into the kitchen, of course.'

A shadow fell over the page. "You do frivolous well."

Kosuzu shrieked and threw her body across the page.

"It's too late. I've already memorized it."

The bookseller looker up. "Oh, it's just you."

Lady Akyuu's face became a placid mask. "'Just me?'" A ghost of a smile flashed across her lips.

"Well, I don't see what you've written." Kosuzu sat up and smoothed out the front of her shopkeeper's apron. She held out a hand towards her friend. "Hand it over."

"It's not ready yet." The landgravine cast a look over her shoulder. "My family is known for their writing. It takes time to craft something worthy of their name."

Kosuzu sighed and slid her writing into a nearby drawer. "I'm surprised. With a memory like yours, I'd have just written down something that a past life had overheard."

"Then it wouldn't have been mine." Lady Akyuu hid her scarlet cheeks behind flowing sleeves.

The pixyish bookseller twirled her pen before flipping it at her friend. As Lady Akyuu caught it with both hands, Kosuzu said, "Just bring something tomorrow. Make it two. A poem for a poem."

"So you'll keep writing?"

"As long as you do."

"That's great." Lady Akyuu smiled and pointed to the ream of paper at Kosuzu's elbow. "One down, two hundred ninety-one to go."

Kosuzu groaned, but slid a fresh white sheet onto the counter.

***

Author's Note:

Akyuu quotes from Meredith McKinney's translation of The Pillow Book, by Sei Shonagon, and used without permission.

"A Book for Her Pillow" is set several weeks after All's Fair in Love and Thievery.

Re: Songs of the Illusionary Veil
« Reply #10 on: May 06, 2015, 02:08:40 AM »
The Sea of Stone

***

The border of the Great Moon Palace was always being churned under by the motion of spreading stone and regolith. It had always been so, or so it seemed, from the days when Reisen's namesake had been a birth-blind bunny, and the scholars in their tall caps whispered that it would always be so, until the rocks finally buried the Great Moon Palace. Indeed, if a rabbit were so inclined, she could watch the slow creep of stone chew away at her home. Only from the Palace side, of course. The other side was nothing but airless desert, and, again, the scholars whispered that it would always be so.

None of the auguries ever explained just how the deadly excess of earth swept all life away, but back at the proscribed eight spans of eight strides from the desert, Reisen read her book in safety. It would take a year and a half for the desert to reach her. She'd be finished with the series before then, and that included the visits to Earth to hunt down the sequels. For the moment, the serene quiet allowed her to imagine what might have been and what might yet be.

The lop-eared moon rabbit peeked over the top of her book and licked her lips. A young scholar-in-training, built like a blacksmith's apprentice instead of an aesthete, knelt by the regolith and charted its spread. Perhaps he would prove to be as attentive to poetry and anatomy at night as he must be to the ancient classics in the day. Reisen pursed her lips and watched. Would he respond to a coltish maiden, or would the brash coquette catch his eye?

"Reisen, darling!"

Or would another come by and steal him away? The moon rabbit cringed and turned towards her name. With a wan smile, she greeted her master. "Hello, Princess Toyohime."

The radiant Princess of the Moon, with her flowing hair and wide-brimmed hat, glided towards her. Princess Toyohime's eye caught the scholar at the border. "I was worried about why you would stay out here in the shadow of death. Now I'm sure that it isn't death that you are seeking. Have you tried to play hard to get?"

"It won't matter now." Reisen closed her book and rocked to her feet. The young man hadn't been attentive until Princess Toyohime had arrived.

"Two centuries ago, I would have agreed." Lady Toyohime turned her back to the scholar and raised her voice. "Alas, I am now a respectable woman, and must only console myself in my husband's arms."

The scholar turned quickly to his work, occasionally casting a glance at the two moon women. Reisen combed out her white ears and arched her back. To her delight, the young man found renewed enthusiasm for his duties even as his eyes wondered more. She glanced over at the princess, who stared forlorn out at the sea of stone and shuddered. "Princess?"

"How do you stand it out here?" Princess Toyohime whispered. She held a hand atop her hat as a gust blew through the grey rock border. "The gardens would be more suitable to pleasure and courtship than this desolation. How can there be joy here, where the mechanical age grinds wonder into dust?"

Reisen shuddered and crept away from the slow churn of regolith. The mechanical age had been the lament of the Moon for centuries. Wonder had slowly died as the humans on Earth poked into the strange and made it familiar, and the familiar, contemptible. The ancient tales, flayed and diagrammed for all to see, no longer reigned in the imagination, so the ancient wonders on Earth and above it, such as the Moon Palace, faded.

The moon rabbit looked up at the blue and white marble in the sky. Following her namesake's footsteps, she had floated upon a moonbeam with a mooncloth robe, and found wonders of her own in a hidden valley. Reisen pursed her lips and gathered her thoughts.

"Some say I should enjoy the decline and chase the dragon with love and wine until I no longer notice what is being stolen around me. Others, that we must return to the Earth and embrace the cycle of life and death that we rejected centuries before. Still others, that we must flee to the stars, ever doomed to an eternal procession of lost homes." As the princess bared her soul, her face grew to match the encroaching rock. "I'd wager that if we asked your scholar, he would tell us to embrace the ways of the anchorite in austerity and venerate the ancient tenants. Yet the old philosophies offer no consolation

"What room is there for wonder in these clockwork days?"

Reisen's breath caught in her throat as two tears slid down the princess's cheek. The moon rabbit swallowed and chose her words with the care of a jeweler sorting stones. "Before I met Sanae, Wind Priestess of Youkai Mountain, I would have thought the same."

Princess Toyohime wiped away her tears. "What does the rival of my sister's reluctant apprentice have to do with the Moon Palace's fate?"

"I've read through a few of her books, the ones she brought from the greater world outside of Gensokyo. They were full of heroes rescuing and rescued by maidens, mighty deeds, and breath-stealing spectacles. Sages commanding Nature herself across countless strange lands. Just like in the tales of old. The mechanical age did not destroy the old myths, but just changed their clothes." Reisen tapped the book in her hand.

Princess Toyohime leaned closer and ran her finger across the book's spine. "Dressed them up in rags, you mean."

Reisen shook her head. "Who among the ancients dreamed of building a ring in the sky larger than any star? Or would seed the night sky with new diamonds, each a home to a new nation? Remember, it was wonder that drew Apollo's arrows here to the moon."

The princess tapped a fan to her lips. "I thought it was because of a competition between nations."

"They still chose the Moon for their quest, constructing devices that still cause the gods of the forge to tremble." Reisen looked and scrunched her shoulder so as to hide her neck from an executioner's blade. The Apollo excursions still wounded the pride of the Moon Palace. "Your Highness, perhaps we have confused wonder with worship."

The Moon Princess's face had turned into an inscrutable stone mask leveled at Reisen. Princess Toyohime reached out with the same fan that had driven the Apollo astronauts from the moon and tapped her servant at the base of her neck. "Explain."

"It is true that the Earthlings have forgotten us. Read about their heroes, though. Watch as they control fire, water, wood, wind, and metal. Can you tell me that, even in this mechanical age, that you cannot see echoes of the gods in their knights? In their aliens, our angels and demons? In their planets, the uncharted lands where once was written 'Here Be Dragons'? Can you tell me that people have truly forgotten wonder?" Reisen trembled underneath the paper fan but refused to shrink away.

"I would, but I have yet to read the tales of which you speak."

The moon rabbit handed over her book. Toyohime, Princess of the Moon, stood on the shore of a sea of stone and the tales written by dreamers from another world. She turned over a page, and then another, unmindful that Reisen squeezed next to her, until with two final words, she closed the book. "I must show this to my husband."

"You will give that back, right?" Reisen asked as the book vanished into her master's pocket.

The princess nodded and, with sudden mirth, pointed to where the young scholar finally walked away from the regolith. "I think he's delayed his duties as long as he can." Princess Toyohime spun Reisen about and shoved her in the young man's direction. "Better hurry!"

Late that night, after the Earth had set, a scholar-in-training had found delight in a coquette's kisses, and a husband counsel from his wife, the regolith waves ground to a stop. For the first time in centuries, the sea of stone ebbed away from the Moon Palace's lands.

Re: Songs of the Illusionary Veil
« Reply #11 on: May 06, 2015, 02:11:13 AM »
Queen of Clubs

***

I didn't care what bullshit rambled from my lips. It didn't matter anyway. Strip all the fluff away from lurid tales and stories of old, and the core of my spiel was simple. Look over here at what I want you to see so you can't see what I'm really up to. It doesn't take much to palm a red ball from under a cup when no one watches.

Listen, only a sucker plays the shell game. You might have seen it around your city. Three shells or cups or whatever and one ball. Place the ball under one, and around and around they go. Where it stops, any sharp-eyed mark thinks they know. Pick the cup, and double your money. But you never will. I make sure of that. And when you walk away, broke, another will take your place. The lure of easy money always draws a crowd.

Call me Bandit. Many already have. I drift from place to place so you'll never have a chance to call me a second time. Give me nothing but a three cups and a ball, and I'll be back on my feet in no time. Give me a pack of cards, and I'm golden. Since I've made a wrong turn somewhere and ended up in the Village that Time Forget, this is a good thing for me.

The Way Back Machine had dropped me into a valley that wouldn't be out of place in one of those old samurai movies. There's a strange mix of peasants from before the Meiji, Western dress, and grown adults wearing animal ears. Not that it mattered. Whether human, rabbit, cat, or wolf, their yen still spent the same.

I raked in another pile of coins. The fools in front of me never seemed to learn that the ball that should have been where their money was had vanished into my hand. This next round, however, I'd leave it to chance. The occasional win would keep the crowd's greed stoked. Afterwards, I might even persuade a few to a friendlier little game of cards. High stakes or even odd ones, of course.

A couple days ago, that wheedling had been bountiful. I felt my smile brighten as I spun the cups. A pretty young librarian succumbed to charm instead of common sense. She'd walked into my rented room with a purse of yen. She ran out with nothing but an incandescent body blush, no match for a deck stacked colder than a glacier's heart.

I told you to call me Bandit.

The crowd cheered and pressed against the winners, a tall, lanky merchant with ash hair and a pretty blond in a strange take on the little black dress. Too many frills for my taste. I'd seen the look in their eyes before. Bandit had them hooked. Give me enough time, and I'd have both the merchant's shop and the girl on his arm.

Once again, the familiar spiel rolled out of my mouth. The shells swirled on the little board pressed against the edge of the dirt road. He followed a cup with his eyes, ignorant that my quick fingers had done their job once again. The ball would appear inside another cup, after he lost his money, of course.

The merchant set a stack of coins down in front of the center cup. Part of me expected the number in the frilly dress to protest, but her eyes were even hungrier than her boyfriend. Sorry, sister, the First Bank of Bandit always wins. I'll be the only one doubling, tripling, quadrupling his money today.

I lifted the center cup, watching for the exquisite moment when hope shattered. But the couple's smiles grew wider and the crowd cheered again. A single red ball sat beneath it, a twin to the one I'd slipped into my pocket moments before. Faking a smile that could mask the grinding of my teeth, I slid a large chunk of the day's gains next to the merchant's bet. A quick brush against my pants reassured me that I had indeed removed the ball from play.

At best, I had an amateur cheat on my hands.

The crowd groaned as I announced the end to my peculiar brand of streetside theater. I didn't care. Time to leave.

Take a tip from Bandit. If you find someone cheating, leave. Don't try to figure out the trick and, by the Crooked Warden, don't be a dumbass and confront the cheater. If you're lucky, and steel isn't tickling your ribs or you haven't had the sudden need to learn how to catch a bullet in your teeth, you're going to meet the hired help. Skull kickers, face smashers, brawlers, and brutes. I say this as someone who has hired his own collection of highly regarded and expensive unsavories on a regular basis. Save Bandit the need for these, and you might just save yourself an expensive set of medical bills.

As I tied the cups and coins inside a thick bundle, I couldn't help but watch as the merchant's girl stood on her toes and whispered in the ear of her friend, a honey of a honey-blonde tall enough to grace the streets of Tokyo, New York, or Paris. This honey laughed, and then cast her eyes towards me.

I'd seen her kind before. There's a type of young woman of a certain age that needs to be bound to their mothers' apron strings before she dives headlong into trouble just to prove she's no longer a girl. Had Mama Honey just seen that smolder in her daughter's eyes, she wouldn't have let her out of the house ever again. There's no way the tall blonde in the blue dress learned that from her mother. I'd make sure keep an eye out for her. And one more for that cheat.

***

"Isn't there some way we can keep playing?"

"I could buy something off of you..."

"But I don't have anything to sell."

"Perhaps that caplet?"

"You'll give it back after the game?"


***

Her name was Elysse or Alice; I couldn't tell which. Her lips did delightful things to vowels that no proper Japanese woman could match. It didn't matter anyway. Girls like her, so willing to plunge headlong into trouble, never used their real name.

I didn't set out to find this honey-blonde with the smoldering stare. She found me, Your Honor, I swear. I did keep a deck of cards, a candle-lit room, and soft sheets ready just in case opportunity came knocking with blonde hair, a model's body, and a sea of white frills and red ribbon.

I knew her type after all. And I knew how she'd act when a two pair revealed that a caplet, no matter how cute, doesn't cover much of a young woman or her debts. She turned her face, but her eyes met mine as she tugged on the laces of her dress. I slid a stack of chips over, and the fabric around her neck began to part.

I turned my back as she shimmied out of her dress. There's a dance to this. The more dignity now, the less likely she'd be to run out of here. So I pretend that I'm not that interested in her delicate state of undress, and she pretends that she doesn't know what the sight of her in a thin white shirt and petticoat does to a man. Meanwhile, we both ignore that she's taking off her clothes in front of a stranger. We're playing a game after all, and just doing what the cards tell us to do. Elysse doesn't realize, though, that the cards speak with my voice.

You really think I'd rely on blind luck with an adventurous young woman's body on the line? Are you kidding me? OF COUSRE I CHEAT! So does every red-blooded man that plays this silly game. Marked cards? Please, I'm a professional. Amateurs ink and rough up cards, and never as cleverly as they think. Professionals shuffle their way to success. I'd rather spend thirty seconds shuffling than a week doctoring cards.

Elysse folded her dress and set it on the table. Then, with a little twirl that spun the hem of her petticoat just enough to reveal a flash of toned thigh, she sat down in her chair. She made no effort to cover herself as she slid the cards toward me; if I hadn't seen her in her street clothes, I would have thought she was wearing a regular white dress. Not that she'd wear that for long. I'd purposely set the blinds high enough that it was essentially one garment each round.

I picked up the cards and smiled. There's a special hand I deal when it's time to discard a young woman's modesty, complete with a suite of Bandit's special lies. Two pair can be a great hand, especially when the high pair holds the Queen of Hearts and the Queen of Diamonds. I'll leave it to your imagination what sweet nothings you can whisper with those cards in mind. Too bad my hand's three of a kind.

See, there's more to Bandit's heart than larceny. There's a smidgeon left over for poetry. A little poetry sweetens the scam, after all. That three of a kind? All knaves. That's jacks, for those of you using Vegas-style decks. Not one ing?nue has picked up on that little flourish; she's too drunk on the constant refrain of crazy, sexy, and beautiful.

I slid the deck towards Elysse. The pretty little thing, now only in white, cut the deck in a straight cut. None of this dozen little piles nonsense. It doesn't work, trust me. The longer cards slip and slide past each other in my hands, the better I can stack the deck in my favor. This time, I shuffled the cards just long enough to hide her losing hand at the top and my winning hand at the bottom. Meanwhile, the small talk chattered on.

The betting was over in a heartbeat. I pushed the beat a little harder than seen in a friendly game, just enough for a second piece of clothing. It was time for the lace round, after all, and I wanted to put to bed this silly nonsense that there weren't legs under that shift.

She smiled as she set down her hand in a tidy stack. One by one, she flipped the cards over. A pair of fives, then the queens. I stopped her right there with some soothing saying about the cards revealing her fate. "Artistic modeling," if that three of hearts I slipped into her hand is to be believed. The last card turned over.

The Queen of Clubs.

How the hell did she get a full house? No card shark worth their salt would ever lose track of cards like that.

I let the next hand go, too shocked to really pay attention to my cards. I should have stopped right there, once Elysse had earned enough cash to buy back her lost clothing. But hand after hand, it just got worse. A pair of sixes beaten by a pair of eights; three fours by three sixes. I even got beat by a queen high hand. Clubs, again. No matter if I dealt or she did, I still lost by narrow margins. With the blinds so high, I was soon down to only my skivvies.

A black-hearted trio of queens robbed me of even that.

Elysse scooped the cards up and tapped them into a deck. Cards rippled past each other as she gave them a quick but thorough shuffle. She flipped over the top card. The Queen of Clubs vanished back into the middle of the deck. Another quick shuffle and the first card again was the queen. Then she shuffled frantically, turning over cards at random, yet only the Queen of Clubs stared back at me. Whether second dealt, bottom dealt, or even pulled from the middle of the deck, the same card appeared over and over as Elysse gave a master's class in the art of the card shark, complete with tricks that I had never seen. She slapped the deck against the table and cut the cards into five piles. Dainty hands revealed the top of each. The Ace of Spades. The Ace of Diamonds. The Ace of Hearts. The Ace of Clubs. And you guessed it, the Queen of Clubs.

Proof positive that I'm the sucker at this table. Time to pay. I stood up and looped my thumbs through my waistband. Elysse stood up and help up her hand while another slid my pile of clothes off the table.

"I'll leave you with more than you left Patchouli." My brow furled until I remembered the librarian from earlier. I couldn't help the leer; in another place and another time, artists would have begged her to model for statues that would have made the de Milo gnash her teeth in envy. I got to see that show for free, courtesy of fifty-two assistants.

The blonde girl slammed her hand against the table. "Focus. You have only a couple hours to reach the border before nightfall. Leave now and you might make it."

"You're throwing me out like this?"

Her eyes narrowed. "My friend had even less when she ran out of this room." Shadows rippled behind her.

Fair enough. "So what happened if I don't make it to the border?"

"The cats around here remember a time when they stalked people for food and sport. Some of them long for those days of old." I gulped as I reached for the cards in front of me. The stacks flared in eye-searing gold flashes and vanished. "I said 'leave,'" she said. Steel filled her voice and her hands.

I'd seen longer knives, but hands that deft would make sure those points dug into something vital. "I'll let myself out."

***

The wind had already grown cold long before the sun ducked behind the mountains, but the darkness just pushed it into my bones. I'd even stopped shivering. With no sight of whatever border that blonde devil woman had mentioned, I'd need shelter and a fire. I'm no mountain hermit or survivalist, so I just stumbled through the thick forest.

Leaves rustled behind me. A figure padded out of the darkness. A human, thank the Crooked Warden. And while the night covered her face, it couldn't shroud the girl-next-door dress she wore. Not the most elegant of outfits, but, right now, I was in no shape to criticize.

"Hey, mister, let's play a game," the girl purred. She moved out of the shadows, and the moonlight caught the two cat ears poking out of a mass of braids.

***

Author's notes:

I find it interesting what different languages can do to the same name. Portuguese, for instance, pronounces Alice as Elysse...

I spent too much time watching Ricky Jay shows the night before coming up with this.
« Last Edit: May 06, 2015, 02:18:09 AM by Achariyth »

Re: Songs of the Illusionary Veil
« Reply #12 on: May 06, 2015, 02:12:24 AM »
Howl

***

"'In her house in Mayohiga, dread Yukari lies dreaming,'" Ran Yakumo muttered. She lurked next to her master's four-post bed, shadows hiding both the fox woman and the giant pillow in her hands. Smothering her master now would quiet the jet engine roar howling from the sleeping youkai's mouth by a factor of a thousand. Too bad that the resulting buzz saw whine would still be a hundred thousand times shriller than Yukari's normal pleasant, yet cryptic, speech.

Ran wished she could spend a moment to figure out down to the last digit exactly how much the feather cushion would silence Yukari's snoring. The vixen loved numbers to the point that her master often called her a living computer. With a little coaxing, they could tell her much about the world and how it worked. For instance, she had only ten minutes before Chen woke up to add her own caterwauling to the mix. Sleeping through that cacophonous duet, Ran knew from hard-learned terror, would be impossible.

Unless you were Yukari Yakumo.

The Buddha taught that to desire is to suffer. Limiting desire would end the ceaseless pain of existence. But even the Enlightened One would crave a night of uninterrupted sleep. especially if he had spent the past week stealing little cat naps around the Doomkitten's fits.

The vixen's hands twitched as she crept away from the mountain of ruffles and silk. "Even Reimu would forgive me," she whispered. The cushion dangled from Ran's loose grip until the fox hugged it tight against her body.

Unlike humans and beasts, breathing down would not kill Yukari. Assuming that the blonde youkai would even deign to notice the inconvenience, Ran figured that her master would be 33% likely to just roll over and moan Aya's name. After that, Ran was 100% certain to smother her for real. That left a 67% chance that Yukari would wake up raring for a full-contact pillow fight where she owned all the pillows. Yet no matter how Yukari applied the switch of correction, Chen would sleep away, oblivious. After the ruckus, Ran then could get a few hours sleep, at least until Yukari's feral snore awoke once more to murder all chances of rest. If the vixen acted in the next nine minutes and seventeen seconds...

...sixteen...

...fifteen...

Ran cast her burning bloodshot eyes about for any way to silence that infernal snore. Merely waking Yukari for anything short of Yuyuko's yearly banquet or Reimu and Marisa kicking down the door to Mayohiga would earn the fox a swat or ten.

Some days Ran wished that she had never agreed to become Yukari's familiar, but she'd never step away from the wonderful world of numbers her master had introduced her to.

Her eyes lit on the small portal by the bed. Yukari kept one nearby the bed as a chamber pot. Ran normally wished that her boss would get out of bed and walk to the bathroom like anyone else. Anything for a respite from the rasping snarl belting from Yukari's bedroom. However, her master loved convenience dearly, and Ran suffered on.

"In for a penny," Ran said. Her tails swished behind her and she flashed a toothy predatory smile. She ran towards the bathroom, opening herself up towards her master's power. Warmth flooded through her body, reminding the fox woman of running through fields on a midsummer day.

The vixen burst into the shrine to brass, porcelain, and beauty products. One swift kick spun the dial over the tub, flooding it with cold water. Meanwhile, Ran seized in both hands the portal hovering over the toilet and channeled her master's power into it. It took every bit of the warmth within, but the fox dragged the portal over the tub and pulled it just wide enough for an eternal seventeen year old.

Ran stepped back, watched the water fill the tub, and pursed her lips. Dashing out of the room, she reappeared minutes later, dragging a bag of ice as long and as full as one of her tails. Swinging it around, she smashed the ice against a wall before dumping the bag into the water.

Two minutes and thirty-eight seconds before the Doomkitten's yowl, Ran stood again by her master's bed and gripped the underside of the mattress. Lightning quick calculations told her how hard, how fast, and how high to life. With a minute to spare, and a bright smile on her lips, the kitsune trickster hauled her side of the bed high into the air. Yukari tumbled over the side, and a pleasing splash filled the air.

"RAN!"

And Chen slept on.

***

Yukari huddled against the porcelain tub, shivering inside a heavy terry cloth robe. Her teeth chattered as she flipped through a phone-book sized manual in her hands, stopping only to wipe sodden blonde strands out of her eyes. "Why is my familiar misbehaving?" Yukari read.

Your Kitsune 9.0 familiar is acting out in an attempt to bring your attention to her needs. The manufacturer recommends that you sit down with your Kitsune 9.0 and work your way through the following questions until you are able to diagnose and correct the underlying need causing her misbehavior.

Yukari scowled, her lips twisting into a moue of disgust as she read on. Flinging the thick book against the wall, she reached for a small pamphlet atop a stack of scattered magazines and books by the toilet. Titled "Familiars for Dummies," this single sheet folded three times had been written by Yuyuko Saigyouji and distilled the ghostly courtesan's wisdom into a series of pithy sayings. Where the Kitsune 9.0 manual had reams of paper devoted to troubleshooting, Yuyuko's philosophy could be reduced to two sentences.

"Equipment that can't work is replaced. Equipment that won't work is abused until it can't or it does," Yukari read aloud through blue lips. The waterlogged youkai grinned and reached through a portal, grabbing a familiar wooden switch.

Re: Songs of the Illusionary Veil
« Reply #13 on: June 18, 2015, 08:32:19 PM »
Dark Matter

Hidden inside a basement recording booth beneath a steel and glass box building at Tokyo University, Sumireko Usami yawned and rested her head against her computer desk. Ignoring the flashing scarlet warning from the On Air signal lamp on the wall, she set her glasses by the phone switchboard near her head. "Just fifteen more minutes, Mom."

"I'm not your mother and the first commercial break is in fifteen minutes," Ruri Himeyuri called out over the intercom. Separated from the recording booth by a pane of glass, the slight recording engineer reigned over the upcoming radio show from her perch in the sound booth. "Dead air won't pay for our tuitions."

Sumireko waved away Ruri's concern before melting against her desk. A howl of shrill feedback squealed from the recording booth's speakers. The dark haired girl leapt to her feet and fumbled for her glasses.

The On Air lamp flickered one last time before bathing the booth in a steady red glow. After a short explosion of clicks and pops from the speakers, the intro to Sumeriko's radio show started playing.

"From Godzilla's Playground on the edge of the Pacific Ocean, good morning, good evening, wherever you may be. Welcome to Tokyo University's most listened-to late night talk show, Dark Matter."

As the recording of a communications student pressed into the service of Tokyo University's only late night talk show rattled off the phone numbers for the call-in lines, Sumireko spun around and stuck her tongue out at her sound engineer. Ruri laughed and pointed Sumireko back to her chair, the red light giving her elfin features a devilish cast.

"Slavedriver," Sumireko mouthed. She took her seat and placed a set of mammoth tin-can headphones over her ears. She flipped the page on the daily calendar and groaned. For every show Sumireko hosted about magic, telepathy, and lost civilizations like the Turtles of Pararakelse, Dark Matter needed two shows on UFOs, government cover-ups, and cryptid sightings, complete with the cringe-inducing refrain of "Aliens!", to pay the bills. Only engineering students would be calling in tonight.

"?and now, here is your host, Sumireko Usami."

She unmuted her headset microphone and read from her prompt. "Three years ago, the space station greenhouse TORIFUNE malfunctioned, flying from low earth orbit to Lagrangian Point 4, some 384,000 kilometers away from both the earth and the moon. At the same time, the crew vanished, leaving what should have been Japan's lush green ark floating derelict through the night sky. The newspapers have all told their version of the story over the years, but tonight, on this Phone-in Friday, I want to hear from all you True Believers on what really happened out there in space."

Sumireko rolled her eyes as Ruri added a deepening echo to the word "space." Glancing down at the switchboard, she saw a constellation of phone line light up. Picking one at random, she read from the display. "Tokyo University, you're on the air."

A syrupy voice bubbled from the speakers. "Hi, I'm Karin-"

"No real names. You never know who might be listening."

"Can I be called Spooky Girl?"

"We do have two others calling in by that name," Sumireko said.

"They'll just have to choose new nicknames."

The radio host stifled a giggle. "So, Spooky Girl, what's your take?"

"It's obvious. Aliens."

Sumireko rolled her eyes and waited for more. After thirty seconds of silence, she cleared her throat. "That's it?"

"It'd be more fun if it were ghosts, but I wouldn't expect a ghost to know what happened to a space station. It would make for an amazing tale for your ghost story show, though. When's the next one?"

"Next week."

"Oh. I'll call back then. I've got the perfect story. No space stations, I promise."

"I'm looking forward to it." The twintailed host toggled her switchboard. "Hello, Lake Suwa, you're on Dark Matter with Sumireko Usami."

"Good evening, Sumireko. Call me Inari. I'm a long time listener and a first time caller," a matronly woman said. Sumireko could hear pages rustling in the background as though Inari was correcting papers while she spoke. "You are right not to listen to the newspapers."

"Tell me why." Sumireko steeled herself for the certain cry of "Aliens!"

"Look at the delta-V and the distances. Numbers don't lie," growled Inari.

Sumireko shuddered. The respite from the engineering dorms had been short lived. "I hope you're not asking me to check your work, because I'm not a physics major, thank the gods."

"Fine. Let's start with a simple claim, that TORIFUNE was moved to the L-4 point for the purposes of recovery from earth."

"That is where the astronomers found it."

"True, but for recovery? With what?" Inari gave a sharp laugh like a fox's bark. "TORIFUNE is as far from both the earth and the moon as they are from each other. It's been forty years since humanity had the capability to fly that far, and the Apollo program is now nothing more than a museum piece. Soyuz and the Space Shuttle could only reach TORIFUNE when it was in low earth orbit. There is no recovery at L-4 possible without designing a new spacecraft from scratch.

"Furthermore, there wasn't enough fuel on TORIFUNE to move the station the 604,442 kilometers to the L-4 point, much less in a single day. You'd need a rocket the size of the station to do that, and you'd kill all life aboard in the process. Since the camera feeds from the onboard greenhouses still send back pictures of the plants and animals, we know that didn't happen.

As Inari lectured on, Sumireko jotted down notes on scratch paper. Math wasn't her talent, so she would need to copy tonight's show off of Ruri's hard drive so she could have Renko check the claims. Her cousin ate up math problems as complex as the ones Inari described. "Those numbers say a lot."

"The numbers don't lie," Inari said.

"Do they say who moved TORIFUNE to its new orbit?" Sumireko waited for the inevitable refrain.

"No." Inari sighed. "You can't tell that from the numbers alone. But the L-4 point is a hint. Not only is it too far away for anyone on Earth to reach, it's one of two points in all of space where a space station can remain over the same point on the moon's surface without drifting."

An emerald light flashed atop her switchboard. Sumireko looked over her shoulder towards the glass window that divided the recording booth from the sound engineer's domain. Inside, Ruri held up two fingers. The talk show hostess nodded and reached towards her switchboard. "You've given us a lot to think over, Inari. Thank you for calling." She toggled the switchboard to line two and read the identifier. "Mount Yatsugatake, you're on Dark Matter."

"Sumireko, darling, it's Cherry," a husky voice crooned into Sumireko's earpiece.

Ruri pointed to the clock and mouthed, "Keep her talking."

Smiling, the radio host flashed a thumb's up at her engineer. The coquette was a favorite of the audience and Sumireko alike. "I wasn't expecting to hear from you tonight. You usually don't call in during our space shows."

"I couldn't bear to think that you might replace me with that vixen that was just on the phone," Cherry cooed.

"Wait, you know Inari?"

"Honey, I get to meet everybody." As Cherry giggled, the switchboard filled with calls. Between shows, Dark Matter's audience flooded the suggestion line with demands for callers to talk to Cherry while she was on. Sumireko and Ruri were adamant in their refusal. People dialed in to listen to Cherry vamp her way across the air waves. Horny engineering students and drunken frat frats stumbling over the latest pick-up line would tank the show's rating faster than a night of commercial reruns. "She should know better than to slip her leash like that."

"Have you met someone who knows what happened to TORIFUNE?"

"Several of the darlings. If you do meet them, don't look in their eyes."

"Let me guess." Sumireko braced herself. "Aliens?"

"No," Cherry chirped, "moon bunnies."

Sumireko cast a glance at her calendar. It was indeed the night of the full moon. "Aren't they the same?"

"Hardly, dear. The only saucers those precious girls use are for tea. Haven't I told you about my visit to the moon?"

"For a month with your gardener, right?"

"You do remember. Excellent! But maybe I should retell it for all of the True Believers listening?"

"Maybe next time." Sumireko ignored the pounding against the recording booth's glass. "We'll make an entire show out of it." That would mollify Ruri. The advertisers would pay five times the going rate just to have Cherry simper her way through the phonebook on the air. And after Ruri finished her newest extortionate shakedown of the advertisers, they would pay six times more.

"It's a date," Cherry purred.

"Looking forward to it." Sumireko coughed and tried to hide her burning cheeks in her hand. She cleared her throat. "Tell me about these moon bunnies. What do they look like?"

"Like you or me, but with long white jackrabbit ears."

Sumireko shook her head, trying to banish an image from her mind. "TORIFUNE was stolen by Playboy Bunnies?"

"Nothing that crass, dear. Trust me, you'd understand if you saw one. Just don't look in her eyes."

"You've said that already."

"I always forget if I've said that. But then again, I forget a lot after the moon bunnies visit for some reason," Cherry said.

"When did you last see them?"

"Last evening, while I was watching the sunset underneath my cherry tree. Such delightful girls. I did mention not to look in their red eyes, right? Anyway, after a stiff shot of spirits, their leader started bragging. You see, the Moon is a garden, and the moon rabbits need new plants. You humans were so kind to ship up a special delivery to your neighbors. Who could resist that opportunity?"

"Why didn't they just take the station to the moon? What's so special about the L-4 point?"

"You know, she didn't say, but I think the answer to the first has something to do with purity. As for L-4, didn't you listen to that vixen? That's the only place where you can park it overhead on the Moon and have it stay there, which makes it easier for the rabbits to travel to it. With proper care, the seeds and cuttings from TORIFUNE will last for millennia."

Sumireko whistled as she mulled over Cherry's revelation. "Well, an interplanetary heist makes more sense than most of the stories I hear on the show. So what did the rabbits do with the missing crew?"

"No, silly girl, the rabbits were the crew-" A shrill whistle on the phone line cut Cherry off. Sumireko flinched and covered her ears, forgetting about her headphones.

"Seiran, terminate the phone call from T-7," an aristocratic woman ordered over the phone.

The line went dead.

As the disconnected tone pulsed like a heartbeat in her headphones, a wild-eyed Sumireko caught her breath. "Cherry? Please call back. Let us know that you're all right." She hung up the call and tapped the "return phone call" button on her switchboard. Once again, the monotone disconnected signal rang out into the night. "True believers, I don't know what just happened, but we'll try to get Cherry back during this commercial break."

She muted her microphone. As the red On Air lamp faded away, Sumireko unplugged her headphones and charged into the sound booth. "Ruri, did you hear what just happened?" A squeal escaped her lips as she froze in the doorway.

Behind the soundboard and laptop of the sound engineer's desk sat not the petite wunderkind Ruri, but an athletic schoolgirl in an amber crop top, shorts, and a battered newsboy's hat. The stranger chewed on a long wooden skewer as she pried the hard drive out of the computer with a screwdriver. Two white rabbit ears hung out of her cap like twintails.

Cherry was right. A chill ran up Sumireko's spine.

A willowy woman in a white dress stepped out from behind the door. A white derringer with bunny ear sights rested on her hip. Sumireko shrank away from her, for, like the yellow stranger clutching her prize, the lavender-tressed woman sported a pair of snowy bunny ears, like a March hare's. The white rabbit grabbed Sumeriko by the wrist and pulled her inside the sound booth.

The door slammed shut behind her.

Sumireko clenched her eyes shut, just as Cherry advised. "Where's Ruri?"

The white rabbit shrugged. "She had a sudden errand to attend to."

"At three in the morning?"

"She didn't say before she left."

"She's going to be furious that you're messing with her computer."

"I don't think she'll remember." The willowy woman caressed the radio host's cheek. "Neither will you. Try to remember to leave the hidden things alone. If you can."

Sumireko pulled away from the electric touch, wide-eyed. She looked up at the white rabbit and whimpered. Despite the warnings, despite her will, Sumireko grew mesmerized with the woman's glowing red eyes.

Author's notes:

ZUN put a lot of time into getting the astronomy of TORIFUNE and Trojan Green Asteroid right, even down to correct distances, to the point that a reader could figure out that the station had been moved to one of only two specific points in space. The rocket science, however, leaves a little more to be desired?

Karin Sasamori and Ruri Himeyuri are borrowed from ToHeart2 by Aquaplus.