[x] Somewhere else! (Write-in) Introduce her to the Kappa! Maybe they can use their tools and water manipulation to create an underwater pathway to their river so they can hang out! Or build a mobile pool! Or a mech!

“We all ready to go?” I ask the group. They each confirm in their own various gestures.

Since yesterday, we’ve added a couple to our headcount. Kagerou was hesitant of our arrival at first, but came around to our cause after mentioning Wakasagihime’s interest in the trip. Her head might have inflated a bit when we told her she was needed to move Wakasagihime, admittedly.

As for the other…

“What?” Chen challenges my narrowed gaze.

“Nothing, just… What are you doing here, again?” I accept her challenge.

“What, is there some problem if I want to spend time with my friend?” she probes and prods me, stepping next to Cirno and resting an elbow on the fairy’s shoulder. “See? I told you he’d be mean to me.”

“I’d consider it your own fault, you brat,” I tut the kid. I take an instant to reflect on what I just said and turn to Ran to apologize, “Sorry, Ran. I don’t mean to parent her.”

The fox waves off the statement and replies, “Yakumo are responsible for their own antipathy.”

“Lady Ran, why are you letting him insult me?!” Chen pleads to her maternal figure.

Ran doesn’t even say anything in response, only looks at the cat with an obvious annoyance.

A trill from the other corner stirs us from our bickering. Wakasagihime, sat in her wheelchair with a blanket covering her tail, pats Kagerou’s arm and comments, “See what I mean? They’re so fun to listen to.”

Kagerou scratches her cheek, still looking a little stiff at the shoulders. “Y-yeah, I guess they do have some chemistry.” Her eyes shift about, unsure where to rest them around our temperamental bunch.

Cirno grunts and throws her arms up in defiance, tossing Chen from her shoulder in the process. “Aughhh, let’s get moving!” she whinges.

She starts to fly off in the direction of the mountain, but Chen jumps to grab her ankle, forcing her back to the ground.

Cirno turns to her friend and questions, “What was that for?!”

“What do you mean? We’re walking, you idiot!” Chen is quick to correct.

Cirno gives her a confused look and then glances to Wakasagihime in a wheelchair. Her eyes trail down guiltily.

I’m about to step over and comfort the girl but Wakasagihime points Kagerou to roll the wheelchair over before I do. The wooden wheels grind against the hardened dirt as Kagerou pushes her friend up next to Cirno.

Wakasagihime pats the fairy’s head and consoles, “Don’t feel like you need to be so mindful of me. In fact, wouldn’t it be fitting to announce the arrival of royalty in advance?”

Oh, she’s still on that gag. Or, well, it’s more like Cirno is with her crown so brazenly on display. Shouldn’t the arrival of royalty include herself, actually? Surely she’s not going to–

“You’re right,” the fairy perks up, a sort of fire in her eyes as she rears her feet into a sprinting takeoff.

I see Wakasagihime has had time to understand the ways of Cirno; gas her up and she’ll do just about anything.

Chen stares on in bafflement at how easily swayed her friend is, and turns back to us to ask, “Should I go after her? Like, she’s gonna be an issue, isn’t she?”

“I think she’ll have to cause a lot of damage to impress us at this point,” I counter. But thinking on it further, I double back and say, “We really should start walking, though. I don’t want her to impress in ways she shouldn’t.”

I move along the tree obscured path with the two Yakumo on my heels and the crunch of the wheels from the wheelchair at the back. I remember most of the way to the kappa’s hideout, having to pass by it on the way to Hina’s remote residence. Lucky for us, coinciding with a shrine’s route means the area is wheelchair accessible, regardless of how dilapidated it’s become. Not sure how true that stays for where we’re going, though.

In some hour or more of walking I stop, having to let Ran take the lead for me. I ask her how close to the right path we are, hoping that I kept my bearings correct despite the foliage covering even the top of the mountain. She tells me that I was seventeen point three degrees off and South-bearing for the last several kilometers. Not only that, but I was bound to step into the river in another kilometer.

Chen laughs at my misery for a few more kilometers after that. Overall, could have been a better walk. Kagerou as well starts to have some trouble getting Wakasagihime through the thickening foliage and tree roots. By the time we finally find where we’ve been going the wolf almost tosses our princess off a cliff side.

We stand above the Genbu Ravine, one of the few locations I’ve heard about that has a real name rather than something more akin to a nickname. Akyuu, or one of her ancestors, attempted to draw a picture of the area, but it hardly captures how strange the location is. I realize a ravine needs to be a steep drop for a long stretch of ground, but this is a straight cliff more like a small canyon. Furthermore, the rocks making up and immediately surrounding the walls look almost like they’re forming into columnar joints. I thought that was something usually reserved for volcanic areas. Is Youkai Mountain volcanically active?

The group continues up along the path of the ravine as I’m observing the walls, forcing me to put a pin in my thoughts and jog over to them. Some few minutes walking along the edge Ran and Chen stop in unison, looking out perpendicular to our position. Chen crouches at the edge and looks at the same point Ran points to, a small dark hole at the base of the cliff face, easy to miss with shade covering it.

“That is the only above ground entrance to the kappa’s hideout. Or lodge, or cave system, there is no official name given to their gathering space,” Ran explains.

“They don’t employ guards?” I question.

“Not outside of the entry. It would counteract the natural camouflage the cave opening has.”

“Makes sense.”

Kagerou leaves Wakasagihime for a second to look at the sheer drop to the bottom, and wonders, “How are we supposed to get Hime down there?”

“Or me, for that matter,” I addend, leaning over the side.

Chen grabs me from behind and lifts me off the ground, floating down into the ravine. Behind us I see Kagerou bridal carrying Wakasagihime down while Ran takes the wheelchair. I still forget this is usually the first option. Complete free flight isn’t something instilled in a human’s natural understanding.

Chen plants me nearly on my ass as we reach the bottom. I’m only on my feet because I expected her to. I slap her arm, fully aware it barely registers to her nervous system, and await Ran and Kagerou to drop off their cargo. Ran is careful to place the wheelchair down, mindful of the foot rests that Wakasagihime doesn’t make use of.

Kagerou returns Wakasagihime to her chair, lowering to one knee as she does so.

Chen snickers at the display, and comments, “You look like you’re used to sweeping women off their feet.”

A red glow crosses Kagerou’s cheeks as she pops back up, combating Chen’s jeering with, “Don’t put me as some brutish figure, you rodent!”

“Oh look, she responds to every little poke!” Chen laughs. I knock the bottom of my fist into her puffed up hat. I think that one registered.

“Don’t be rude, Chen. She’s under no obligations to be here,” I confute her attitude.

“That doesn’t mean you gotta–!” she starts to bicker, but pauses as Ran walks by into the opening of the cave. We all fall in behind her before she disappears in the darkness.

“Ran, what’s up?” I ask my partner, since she doesn’t take the lead unless something’s happening.

She continues her pace through the dark hall, taking up the entire cross section with her tails, as she reports, “There are normally two kappa standing guard at the sealed door, but they are currently vacant and the door ajar.”

“Oh my!” Wakasagihime exclaims. “Are they in danger?!”

“Surveillance dolls do not carry visual detail, only general information. In person inspection will be required to ascertain their circumstances,” Ran continues, fetching something that emits a dim bluish glow against the stone. “Chen! Move on ahead! A mass of people are in the main hall at the moment.”

“Lady Ran!” Chen returns in confirmation.

She slides low to the ground and shoots through the bottom of Ran’s tails as if they were a curtain, the clicking of her claws against the rock fading into the distance ahead of us.

“How far away is this place?” I ask, curious why we’re still walking through the dark.

“Approximately ten minutes. The kappa put this side entrance onto the opposite side of their system. It works well to dissuade fairies from wandering in due to boredom,” Ran informs me, adding bits to stave off my wandering mind before it acts up.

“Is this really the easiest entrance?” Kagerou complains. “Why would they have a dark cavern entrance in the first place?”

“It’s an emergency exit. The entrance they normally take is at the bottom of the river. Wakasagihime could make use of it, but my opinion is against you using it, Miss Imaizumi.”

I glance back to see Kagerou’s wolf ear twitch as she tosses the idea about. I don’t think any of us want to smell a wet dog, including Kagerou, by the looks of it. Ran’s projecting as well, mind.

We find the end of the path, or more like I run into Ran who finds it. Everything is the same color and texture in this dim light. I don’t know how the kappa would properly keep guard of this door normally. Night vision goggles? Do they have those? Do they need them?

Ran grabs a wheel handle on a metal hatch, something that looks like it was ripped off of a submarine. To my surprise, Chen left it open, and it creaks ajar with a cry for oil. Ran passes through the high door frame and starts down a hallway without so much as a word. Kagerou and I rush to lift Wakasagihime over the door into ship halls.

“Thank you, I know that mustn’t be easy,” Wakasagihime chimes when I go to stretch my back straight.

Soft incandescent lights line the roof in every direction, the cave walls have been replaced with sheet metal, and the floor is corrugated for traction. Thank gods they left out the extra doors and guard rails of a real ship, otherwise this would take a while to get a wheelchair through.

We start jogging up to Ran but are immediately assaulted by the sound of the wheelchair rumbling against the floor. The sound seems to hit us all the same, as Kagerou’s ears fold down and Wakasagihime covers her fins.

Down the many corridors and junctions we go, with occasional peeks into open rooms the kappa use for all manner of machination. It’s hard to tell what purpose a room serves when it looks like a workshop blew up in every one of them. The smell of shaved metal and various lubricants doesn’t help. Gods and whatever that terrible burnt smell is.

It’s stranger yet since the halls seem to be clean, if not spotless. I do wonder how that’s possible, but I’ll have to add that to the list of questions for later. Right now, I can hear a crowd of people gathered ahead, even over the rumbling of the wheelchair.

The hall opens into a grand chamber, the metal walls evoking the hangar of an air carrier. A large zero-two is painted on a bulkhead at the far side, suggesting there are more of these open spaces. There are full sized cargo crates in a corner. Many vehicles of varying completeness sit around with some hung high above by chains. In the center of the room a pile of scrap metal sits with a sheet of ice along the top formed into a throne.

I need not state who’s sitting at the top of said throne.

“Get down from there already!” A familiar voice pipes up from the front of the crowd of kappa surrounding the throne. There’s a lot of them, actually. This is probably all of them from the base, and they’re crowding pretty much the whole area from wall to wall. It’s a wonder Nitori is loud enough to shout over them.

We sidle up to Ran and Chen at the back of the crowd when Ran commands, “Chen, report.”

Chen turns to us and replies, “The ice fairy has made a commotion in the kappa hideout by freezing their water boiler over.”

“Why would she–?!” I stop myself from asking, knowing well enough that a fairy’s logical reasoning can be both meticulous and entirely inane in equal parts.

My outburst attracts the attention of a few nearby kappa. Their uniformly short statures make it obvious that we’re interlopers around here. And more importantly, the giant fox woman with nine tails is probably not here to mess around. They notify the persons next to them of our presence and the message passes as a ripple through the room until they all turn their heads our way. Cirno spots us and waves, though she doesn’t retreat from her throne.

“Uhm… hi?” I awkwardly greet the crowd.

“HIM!” Nitori practically screeches over the rest of the kappa. Clattering can be heard from each kappa’s backpack as they adjust to avoid her march. A march that ends with her lunging straight at my collar. She drags me to a knee, eyeing me down worse than any demon or Ran, and growls, “Get. Her. To fix this.”

She tosses me to my feet before I can get out a word and points to Cirno.

“Hi to you, too, Nitori,” I force the pleasantry while adjusting my shirt and rucksack back into place.

Why would she need me to fix this? It’s a frozen water boiler, isn’t it? What’s keeping them from rioting against Cirno?

…

Cirno can dissipate her own ice, right. And I can talk to Cirno, maybe.

But the last thing… “A water boiler, was it?” I ask the fuming gremlin.

“Try our gods damned generator!” she shouts in my ear. “What do you think keeps the lights on?!”

A thought occurs, and though it may be better left as a wandering thought unasked, I can’t help but tease, “I thought Youkai liked the dark?”

A blood vessel visibly bumps on her forehead, barely containing the rest of the irate kappa. It seems to take a lot of willpower for her to not throw a readied punch, and I’d bet that’s only because Ran is standing right next to me. She decides to grab my arm and hurls me into the crowd of kappa.

The few kappa I land on push me back into balance, though their voices suggest they wish they didn’t have to. The rest look at me expectantly as Cirno continues her cackling taunts to those below her. I begin sifting my way through, piecing together just how I’ll talk down Cirno from whatever nonsense she’s doing. We only just got here and Wakasagihime hasn’t even gotten the chance to meet anyone. Not gonna get kicked out just yet, even if pissing off Nitori is a lot of fun.

[x] Reprimand Cirno, her playing around needs to stop when it can cause serious damage.

[x] Meet Cirno with her madness. Getting a kid to do what you want can sometimes be about meeting them in their own little world.

[x] Something else, she’ll never predict it. (Write-in)

---

The votes went all about this time. I counted the mountain the same as kappa but am respecting where we’re really starting the trip. That is to say, that last choice was a bit of a split in multiple ways. Now back to figuring out ways to piss Nitori off.

[X] Meet Cirno with her madness. Getting a kid to do what you want can sometimes be about meeting them in their own little world.

“You’ll know the strength of fairies, you evil kappa!” Cirno calls down at the crowd around her. She certainly enjoys the dramatics, her energy transferring into crossed legs, one bouncing on the other.

The kappa around me grumble all manner of inanities as I approach the pile of metal Cirno’s found herself on. The thing is a maddening mess of gears, cogs, screws, bolts, nuts, nails, and even a misplaced tool here and there. It’s hard to imagine what these kappa actually do with such a mass. For my purposes, though, it’s something dangerous to clamber up.

Cirno takes interest as I start climbing the man-made hill, careful of any sharp metal jutting out. While I can find all manner of dangerous persons on my day to day, I think tetanus would be an embarrassing way to go. Although Yagokoro probably has something for that, too.

I crest the top, Cirno’s ice mixing with the loose metal in a way that actually provides enough traction to easily hike along. The fairy looks up at me, diminutive in stature now that I’m standing on the same plane as her.

“And what is this peon doing here?” she questions. Who’s been teaching her these words? I may need to have a little chat with Chen later.

I kneel before her, cautious of the weight on my knee, and reply, “Your royal advisor, not a peon, oh king of fairies.”

“Ooh,” Cirno sounds in understanding. “What does my advisor want to tell me? Just how great I’m doing at invading these kappa?”

I chuckle, “You’re doing great at that, sire. But if I may ask, what have the kappa done to earn your scorn?”

“S-sco–…” she mouths out to herself, piecing together the definition of the word. “These idiots ignored me when I told them to stop what they were doing and get ready to greet the princess. I thought it would be right to do something that would get them all together, then!”

She grins to herself. As quick to dig into her own confirmation bias as usual, I see. Clearly they blew her off and she just lashed out.

But how to spin this? “Perhaps it would be wise to let the miscreants have another chance at showing my liege and the princess hospitality?” I chance an argument.

“Hospitality? What do you mean, we aren’t sick?” Cirno breaks character in confusion. I adjust my gaze, trying to confirm that she’s serious, and sure enough her eyes avoid me

“Hospitality refers to that which you may do in greeting, such as tea, my liege.”

She rounds back on me, a red tint on her cheeks as she flusters to correct, “R-right! I knew that! Let’s do that, then!”

Looks like I’ll need to have a talk with Cirno, too. She’s far too easily lead by the ear after being caught unawares.

“Well, then, you’ll have to unfreeze their generator, as they seem to need it to do things,” I conclude.

“What sorts of things?” Cirno ponders. Or is this some sort of test?

“Hospitality things.”

“Hmm…” Cirno parses intent from my tone, narrowing her eyes and rubbing her chin. “Alright, sure. I’ll do that, and then they’ll throw a big welcome for Wakasagihime!”

It’s at this point I truly wonder to myself, where is she going with this? Hopefully I’m not being a bad influence by feeding her little fantasy here.

She pops up from her throne, floating above the ice to avoid contacting the metal with her bare feet, and descends the hill. The kappa unanimously stare daggers at the girl, less than thrilled their base’s captor would even so much as dare to speak above them.

Cirno clears her throat, a volume nowhere near matching her personality, and announces, “All of you, send your leader to me! She will take me to the thing I froze! And then! Then we can discuss greeting the great princess Wakasagihime.”

The kappa look to one another, the obvious question on all of their minds. Who is Cirno talking about?

Cirno floats above the crowd, waiting for Nitori to make her way back across the room. Wakasagihime and the rest fall in behind the supposed kappa leader, whose path splits the mob before her.

I go down the hill careful as I can, forced to boulder lest the loose metal scraps give way like dirt. I can hear Nitori in all her usual vigor complaining to Cirno and the latter taking the complaints in stride, but I’m too focused on my movements to really pay attention past that.

By the time I’m on solid floor and checked for cuts and holes I turn to see everyone moving to a door perpendicular to where we came in. I force my way through the sea of kappa right as it starts dispersing.

I break through to one of the many identical halls, catching up to my group just as they round a corner.

Nitori speaks up, leading the conversation with, “So what are you even doing here, Yakumo? I’m still mad about that human of yours doing… things with my sister…”

“Which I thought I told you in no uncertain terms that that was a lie made up by Chen to harass me,” I cut in before anyone else comments.

“Yeah, sure, ‘cause that’s believable. Takane keeps evading the question when I ask her, so I don’t know what to think about that.” She continues her pace several steps ahead of us, quieting down at the admonition.

Am I being toyed with? Chen starting that lie is no issue but for Takane to not put it to rest is an altogether different problem. Is she doing it to mess with her sister?

Ran kills the silence with, “To your first question Kawashiro: Regis has been given the task of studying Wakasagihime, who’s idle curiosity led her to follow Cirno’s request of, in verbatim, an ‘adventure.’”

“So you’re here because you’re bored,” Nitori puts it lightly. “I should string you up for that, you little brat!” she directs at Cirno, now.

“The king does not like the way you’re talking to her,” Cirno retorts with a puffed up face. “You had better make a grand welcoming party for the princess and I.”

Nitori stops next to a doorway not much different from the others. It has a sign with ‘generator’ plastered next to it, but it’s hard to say where the hell we actually are anymore. “Stop whatever nonsense you’re talking about and fix it already!” she commands the fairy, opening the door and pointing into the room.

I watch Cirno waddle into the room and I observe the space before her. It’s no larger than the rest of the minor rooms we’ve come across but there’s a device covering the entire wall. In it’s current state it’s inoperable, ice stuck inside every crevice and potentially moving point. I can’t say I understand how such a device would generate power for the whole base, let alone any power at all. Cirno crouches down at the base of the machine and reaches her hands out, doing something to start removing the ice. It’s slow, but that only means we have a few moments to exchange words before she commandeers the situation.

“This is your generator?” I ask the kappa. “It doesn’t look large enough to power the whole place.”

“It’s more than enough to do that!” Nitori retorts, sounding offended by the statement. She puffs her chest out to continue, “This bad boy is my own make, and he’s capable of powering every invention in this base and then some!”

Ah, it’s hers. No wonder she’s so pissed off.

“Guess I should’ve figured. It’s you, after all,” I admit. “Change of subject, how’s you face feeling?”

“Wait, do you mean you punched this kappa, or something?” Kagerou asks.

Nitori rubs her cheek as she recalls, “My fa–? Oh, right. No, during that whole misfortune incident I was the first person to get injured. One of the wooden supports in a cabin came down on my head. I had trouble speaking for a week even after the bandages were off.”

Damn. It’s strange to hear just how durable Youkai are even compared to my unidentified healing. To her that whole thing was just a minor bother, like a cold sore that wouldn’t go away, and yet the actual injury had her entire face caved in.

“… Tanner, are you alright?” Wakasagihime notices my wincing.

… I should stop conjuring the memory. Even for me it’s a little too disturbing. “Nothing,” I pass off.

The lights all around show a bit more life as we hear the generator start to churn awake. I hear Nitori mumble to herself about a gas backup needing refueling as Cirno claps her hands to a job well done. If we ignore the fact that the job required her because she was the cause of the issue, then yes, it was a job well done.

“Now, a welcoming party!” Cirno dictates to all of us.

“Tanner, translate fairy for me,” Nitori sighs, rolling her eyes up in an already present exhaustion.

“She wanted the kappa to greet her and,” I gesture to the mermaid, “Wakasagihime. She’s on a little power trip, considering herself royalty.”

“That sounds like my royal advisor making fun of me,” Cirno pouts.

Wakasagihime giggles, “No, miss king fairy, that is him translating your words to the kappa dialect.”

Cirno nods in understanding, sounding out an, “Oooh…” Chen shakes her head with a low groan.

Nitori scratches at her head, thinking aloud, “Welcoming, huh? I don’t think you’ll want what we got. No offense, but kappa live pretty lean.” She’s not all too sorrowful of the statement, in fact she seems to take delight in the excuse.

“Shirikodama and cucumbers? I don’t think either are even slightly appetizing,” Kagerou counters.

“Oh, something we agree on. I didn’t think I’d agree with a dog,” Chen jabs at the wolf, much to the other’s chagrin.

“Very funny. We can make other kinds of food, you know. We just choose not to,” Nitori spits back.

“Then you’ll provide great food, I’m sure,” I half goad and half encourage her, not bothering with the slightest attempt of subtlety in the matter. “But what about the party part of this ‘welcome party?’”

“Huh? Sweets aren’t enough?”

“Why, of course not,” Wakasagihime interjects. “There must be tea as well for any high class party.”

My first thought would be wine but then I guess we’re both stereotyping.

“And something fun!” Cirno adds.

Everyone looks at Cirno, a sort of concern mixing into the air.

“I shudder to imagine what she finds fun,” Kagerou states without an ounce of amusement or sarcasm.

Chen snickers, loosely placing a hand over her mouth, “She’s more Youkai than fairy, so it shouldn’t be hard for any of you to imagine.”

“Yeah I think I’ll be the first to take offense to that,” Nitori can’t help but join in the banter.

“Hey! No ganging up on me!” Cirno rages towards the lot of us. “I’ll gang up on you and then you’ll see!”

I press on with the conversation in spite of Cirno’s very direct threats, “So we were talking entertainment, Nitori?”

“Cute diversion. But no, I ain’t got anything in mind for a gang of misfits like you all. The best I could possibly do is sit your butts down and tell you a–“

She freezes mid sentence. Everyone casts a glance her way as she shrinks inward with a pensive thought brewing.

“For them, though?” she inflects aloud, probably without intending.

“I must admit I’m curious, now,” Wakasagihime speaks up. She rolls her wheelchair over, dainty hands hardly concerned by the force required to move, and claps one of Nitori’s hands. “Please, tell us what you’re thinking of, dear kappa. I’d love to hear your thoughts.”

Her supple smile glows in purity, strong enough to banish all thoughts or ideas of ulterior motive. Even Nitori seems blinded.

“Uh… well…” the kappa flusters. “I-I was thinking of a project some of the base and I have been working on.”

I practically feel Ran’s eyebrow raise next to me. There are some obvious things that can pierce her stony face, and the kappa’s antics is very much one of them.

“There are a couple of very smart people here with us and I’m sure they could truly appreciate your efforts,” Wakasagihime mediates. “I know I’d love to see something you worked hard on.”

“Y-you think so..? I mean, I guess they’d do well,” Nitori scratches at her cheek, off kilter more than I’d ever seen her.

I mean, sure I’ve seen her at possibly her most emotionally vulnerable, but this display is like someone’s pulling a rug out from under her. That or pulling her along with that rug. Wakasagihime is more dangerous than I thought.

Nitori calmly leads us through the halls once more, mollified like a babe in its mother’s arms. I can’t even bring myself to perturb her from this state. She’s been enchanted in a way I’m sure sailors of ancient times would be envious of.

A short walk through the many similar metal halls leads us to an unmarked door. Nitori slides it open to show us a library. Not a library of books, but of old cinema records. Kinds far older than me which look as though they could service as car wheels. These are honest to gods film reels.

It’s a dingy room, the light barely functional, maybe by intent or maybe not. The shelves are numerous, and it’s clear this room, same size as all the rest, is filled wall to wall with these things. They’re in all shapes and sizes, and hold titles that I’ve only ever heard about. I wander down a row as Nitori splits the group off, explaining the objects to them in extreme detail.

I think only I and Ran would know what these are off hand, but in my case these are like relics of a bygone time, never seen in person. It’s hard to not be nostalgic of the film reel, of what was once the crowning of American culture above everyone else. If only I were still that young and naive boy that could feel such nationalism. But that is no fault of these reels containing the work of countless people into run times of under an hour.

“Tanner?” I hear Ran whisper next to me.

I feel my face turned down at the corners, getting all moody away from the rest of the group. This room is a sight I couldn’t have imagined, and not in the unimaginable way that Gensokyo commonly invokes.

“No, don’t mind me. Just… feel a little strange seeing this. These. In a place where forgotten things go.”

I’ll choose to believe that Ran’s look is sympathetic.

“So, has anything caught all of your eyes?” Nitori pipes up, finishing her explanation of the technology she so painstakingly wrought into fantasy. “Come on, I don’t think I need to tell you that these were all made with the desire to be watched, and we know what happens to tools that don’t get their desires met.”

“Moving pictures that hunt people to be looked at doesn’t sound too abnormal, if we’re talking Youkai standards,” Chen pricks a hole in Nitori’s bravado.

There was one title that spoke to me as I passed, and I pace back over to it, through the disorderly state the films are stored.

At a random shelf, on an arbitrary side of the room, I pick up a reel with a title etched into its metal. It reads,

[x] Shirley Temple’s Storybook: The Little Mermaid

[x] Silly Symphony - The Big Bad Wolf

[x] We can go deeper than that! (Write-in)

---

Alright folks, time for required watching. Yes this is your homework just as it is mine, and yes I won’t provide links to these. Best of luck in finding good sources!

[x] Shirley Temple’s Storybook: The Little Mermaid

A rather fitting title since Wakasagihime is here. Didn’t actually realize that the story was more than an animated movie, but I guess that’s always the case for movies.

“Nitori,” I flag the girl from around the corner, holding out the tape, “here.”

She inspects it closely, drawing a finger over the etchings.“Ah, yeah, I can see that,” Nitori replies, nodding in understanding. “Although, are you sure you wanna go with this? I thought it was pretty melodramatic.”

I look down at the record, and then over by Ran as I mutter, “Is it? I can’t say I really remember that.”

Never watched Shirley Temple before. It’s always been a novelty on my mother’s shelves, but a younger me thought it was something too girly to venture. Guess I’ll have to find out if it’s the pre-modern chic-flick.

“What’s the title?” Cirno nudges into the conversation, tilting the etched label towards her as I hand off the film. “Oh? I can’t read this…”

“You can’t?”

“Well obviously she can’t, it’s not like there’re that many people that can read English, genius,” Nitori scolds me. She picks up a set of notes from one of the lower shelves and looks it over, checking between them and the film. “Shirley Temple’s Storybook: The Little Mermaid. Actually remembered this one off hand.”

I realize the immediate issue with this, “Wait, if the movie’s title is in English is the movie also in English?”

Nitori glances up from the notes, thinking through the question before answering, “… No? I don’t like questioning those kinds of things. Too much of a headache. It was too bad, too, since one of the kappa is really into translating foreign languages.”

I suppose they’d need that sort of talent with the amount of foreign writings that could come into Gensokyo. Especially engineering related. Though I wonder just how much useless engineering writings have been forgotten over the decades? Does the barrier care for Sturgeon’s Law?

“Kappa,” Ran speaks, “how many of these records are of foreign make that you have found?”

The kappa in question takes a deep breath and blows it out like a bellow, looking around the room as if not knowing the answer off the top of her bald head. Hell, the notes probably have a running tally written on them. She’s probably stalling, weighing if she should answer honestly or not.

“About a few dozen or so?” she gives an estimate. Why does she need to be obtuse? Does she expect Ran to want to take the reels?

“Is something worrying about things from far off places, Miss Yakumo?” Wakasagihime weeds in on my question.

Ran pivots towards Wakasagihime from across the room. “If this is in some concern of your own person or belongings, then there is no such trouble. The Yakumo work to keep a list of all foreign agents that enter Gensokyo, and these pieces have seemed to escaped the current database. Kappa, how long have you had these records for?”

“A few weeks,” Nitori has no qualms answering. The speed at which she did so leads me to think she’s well informed on the project.

No, wait, before that. I gasp, “A few weeks..? You figured out not only what these were but how to view them in just a few weeks?”

“I heard it wasn’t even the hardest part,” Nitori piggyback’s my reaction, looking extra smug and rubbing the key on her chest. “Getting the sound going took the most of that time. Now those scroungers that like wandering Muenzuka are spending their time checking what recordings are intact or not. We watched that one already, but I’ll let you use the theater anyway…”

Staring at the thing, she harrumphs and adds, “Small price to get you all out of here.”

She exits to the hall and waves for us to fall in behind her. We quickly oblige as she heads into the next room over, flicking a light switch to the sight of a large screen and what must be the projector. I can only assume with the way it looks, something between esoteric and eldritch in design. Parts all about that have no discernible function, jutting edges, and the speakers sitting in spots that look like an afterthought.

But all given, it’s still all in one package about the size of a podium.

“Funny looking,” Cirno comments.

“Yeah, and runs off the generator, so be glad you unfroze the power, you twerp,” Nitori persists in her disgruntled state. Cirno sticks her tongue out as Nitori passes by, receiving a swift whack on her head for the slight.

A flick of her fingers shows Nitori there are no loose edges on the screen and that it’s still ready for use. “Alright, move in the seats you want, just make sure you’re out of the way of the viewer to the screen here,” she orders, signaling the angle the projection needs to display.

A few of us work on getting chairs and couches from the wall, specifically procuring a love seat for Wakasagihime. Everyone settles in as Nitori does a flight check on the projector, opening some of the many hatches, holes, and gauges the intrepid thing has. We talk amongst ourselves while waiting.

“Y’all happen to know anything about popcorn?” I wedge into her attention.

She pauses, rolling her eyes as she responds, “Don’t push your luck, foreigner. I might not hate you, but I don’t like you, either.”

“Foreigner..?” Wakasagihime drawls, curious of the word choice. “Not simply outsider?”

I lean on the armrest of my seat as I explain to her, “Yes, I’m American, actually. That’s the reason I know about this film.” That might be sort of a half lie, but at least the parts add up correctly.

“You never mentioned that you weren’t born in Japan,” she expresses a light disappointment. I didn’t realize she felt the need to know.

“Everybody shut up, it’s ready to go,” Nitori bickers. She flicks a switch, producing a light from the projector lens, and then another to roll the tape. After making sure things are working properly, she dashes over to the light switch, dropping the room into a pitch black cleaved by the solitary light on the screen.

“Does it need to be dark for this?” Kagerou asks at the other end of the chairs. Her annoyance may be warranted to the uninitiated.

“Yeah, sadly,” Nitori agrees with the sentiment. “We already ruined one film by using a brighter bulb.”

“Think about how a photo or stuff printed on paper tends to degrade in sunlight. Same thing,” I append.

Old music, expected more of a children’s show, breaks up our conversation. Showing the title and star of the show before cutting to Shirley Temple walking into the camera.

“Oh! My, how did she appear there?” Wakasagihime interjects as the woman explains the basis of the story.

“Hm? Hime, you’ve seen photos before, haven’t you?” Kagerou puzzles.

“Is that what this is? Some sort of magic photo?”

“More like a bunch of photos going very quickly,” Nitori elaborates. “The sound is–“

“Don’t tell them about the sound,” Chen deters, “it’ll just hurt their heads more.”

“Hey, it’s not like we’re dumb!” Kagerou fights the claim.

“Silence,” Ran chides them, “a movie is meant to be watched, not spoken over.”

A few words of apology are murmured across the room as the scene has already transitioned to the first shot of the little mermaid, played by Shirley Temple herself.

The briefest moment of silence as we observe the scene before Wakasagihime comments, “Is something wrong with her tail? Those scales can’t be healthy…”

“What? It’s just the lady from before in a costume,” Cirno points out. Rather… odd that Cirno would be more in tune with theater, but I’ll not bite into that headache for now.

A different question comes to mind. “Do mer-people have multi-colored tails like that, Wakasagihime?”

I can see her silhouette turn towards me and back to the screen before she responds, “No, none that I’ve ever had the pleasure of meeting.”

The scene shifts to men on a boat. Their clothes are…

“What’s with their clothes? They look funny,” Cirno finishes my thought, somewhat psychically.

The bright colors look strange on the Greco-Roman attires, maybe designed to better capture on early camera models, or a carry over from theater renditions. Regardless, it straddles the line of faithful and plain silly looking.

“By the helmets of the soldiers, these are Roman based outfits,” Ran outputs.

As the conversation between the men ends a quick shot of the little mermaid swimming upwards is shown. A few voices burst into laughter at the ridiculous looking special effect of the mermaid being dragged up by a few pulleys. Rudimentary as it is, it gets the point across, so I don’t think there’s any faults there. What is kinda silly is how one of the men, the royalty, topples over the boat from before. He just keels off like he wants to break his neck.

A few moments pass where the mermaid saves the man, returning to shore and wishing he’d live before several women approach the scene. When it cuts back the mermaid is gone and it’s just the guy.

“How did she get in the water so fast?” Wakasagihime notes. “That would take me a few moments to struggle on the sand if I were there.”

The scene goes on uninterestingly, though the guy proclaims his love to some random maiden he mistakes for his savior. He goes so far as to say he’d rather die than be without her. Men really are this stupid, huh?

The next portion under the water the mermaid seems to be talking with her grandmother. Wakasagihime actually seems to find the old woman very beautiful, though the dyed silver hair looks strange to me. A conversation about the little mermaid’s action comes to show how the mermaid fell in love at first sight with the man, a prince. The grandmother warns about this love being unnatural, though.

“People of the land can’t fall in love with those of the sea?” Kagerou paraphrases the argument.

“That old woman has some barnacles built up in her head,” Wakasagihime muses. “There’s nothing so strange about a love like that.”

“Speaking from experience?” Chen conjectures. This quiets our mermaid down real quick.

It doesn’t last, as the next scene comes to the pivotal decision of the young mermaid finding a way to change her tail for legs.

“Oh gods..!” Wakasagihime utters. “That’s horrid, why would you want to change yourself so?!”

“Hime, please, it’s a story. You don’t need to feel threatened,” Kagerou comforts her friend. It works to stop Wakasagihime from ranting and raging, though her numerous grunts and harrumphs put the scene at odds with the lighthearted mood it’s settled on.

This continues into the next scene with the introduction of the strange barrister. I hear a slight sniff from Ran as he describes himself as a fancy lawyer, a word that definitely wasn’t invented at the time of the plot.

The little mermaid’s insistence on her plan seems to endear her less and less to Wakasagihime, whose moans of ‘why’ and ‘for what purpose’ enunciate the point. I hadn’t realized just how prideful of her species she truly was, and here I am suggesting a story of a mermaid that shirks her entire being for a flight of fancy.

On the bright side the next scenes go by pretty quick now that Wakasagihime’s gotten her opinions off her chest. The only real notable thing is Ran getting a hearty snort out of the strange barrister’s joke about the little mermaid suing the witch of the sea. I know it’s Ran because only we would understand the joke, or care considering Chen is also here.

The witch of the sea explains that if the mermaid takes a potion to grow legs, her life as a mermaid is no more. To finish with dramatics, the witch and barrister summon the voices of the mermaid’s loved ones, calling for her to return home.

Wakasagihime joins the voices pleas, “Go back! You have people that love you more than you know!”

Only upon the mermaid’s decision to receive the potion does the witch explain that there is a time limit to this excursion. One hundred tides without marrying the prince and the little mermaid will perish. The mermaid states that she understands what death means for her: turning into a drop of sea foam to dance about the ocean.

“Really?” Kagerou wonders aloud.

“No, not really. Don’t be silly,” Wakasagihime refutes, followed by a groan as the little mermaid apologizes for leaving all of her undersea friends behind.

She then takes the potion… and…

“Hey, where’s that excruciating pain thing? I was promised a show,” Chen mocks.

Cirno hums at the comment, adding, “No, look, her leg’s cramping! That’s pretty painful.”

“Oh you little fairy…” Chen sighs, withholding her disappointment.

It seems the rest of the group chimes in more and more as the film continues on. Wakasagihime, however, seems to largely disconnect from the more standard romantic drama the movie turns into. I’d think she’d have some choice words for the prince’s use of the expression ‘til the seas run dry,’ but she doesn’t bite.

The little mermaid’s plight, never having stood a chance in her goal for romance, is indeed sad, and dying for it is insult to injury. Or, perhaps injury to insult, given the magnitudes of each.

The last real surprise the story has for me is the grandmother striking a deal with the witch for the little mermaid to stab the prince and return to the sea. I think she lies to her granddaughter about the prince being fine and instead turning into a merman after being stabbed, but I can’t say I fault her desperation in any way. Of course, the little mermaid doesn’t have the heart to go through with killing her love, and disposes of the knife with no further note.

On the day that the prince weds another kingdom’s princess, the little mermaid seems to break from the shock. She was so sure she’d be in the man’s eyes at the start and now the rug was pulled from under her.

The final proper scene is the little mermaid accepting her death to Neptune himself. Distraught at her circumstances would be an understatement. Hers is a face of utter defeat, having nothing to show for her sacrifices. Instead of killing her, though, Neptune forgives her, and even allows her to return to her family. It’s quite the whiplash of narrative and I do wonder if this is how the true original story goes, but I suppose it’s a necessity for something more geared to younger audiences.

A collective groan leaves the room as the scene fades back to Shirley Temple the host, describing the aftermath in all of thirty seconds. She also states her own moral of the story, which seems like a pretty cheap takeaway as far as I’m concerned.

“Lame,” Chen boos. “Aren’t old stories supposed to have people dying for their stupidity?”

I hear Nitori get up and walk towards the light switch. Everyone else shifts about in their seats, stretching their unused muscles from sleep.

“It’s important to remember that a god had forgiven the little mermaid’s transgressions,” Ran inserts. “To err is considered by some gods a divine aspect, though it be illogical.”

A click precedes light, blinding us for a second. It’s not like coming out to the sunlight after sitting in a movie theater, but the screen was the only thing properly visible beforehand.

We look about, and the first thing I notice I Wakasagihime crying.

[Please wait warmly as beauty sheds a tear…]

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That was a fun little journey to take. Don’t worry, we’ll still be quite on topic come next update.