Ruukoto was sighing in frustration, a great part of her maid outfit was burnt and charred, even thought not embarassingly so; the four girls were laid out in front of her in a relatively safe place with lots of water. That was, of course, Cirno’s respawn point, so even if she went too far into negative Hps, there would be no problem, or so Ruukoto thought.
“Aaaaah...”, she moaned in frustration, “If only organic beings were born with USB adaptors...”, while hopelessly trying to fit a USB plug in Wriggle’s ear.
The four party members were all with greyed status, and none of their Hps were anywhere near positive; this would have been a moment to use phoenix downs, but the only person in Gensokyo that had anything to do with a phoenix was the one that ganked them, so resurrection magic was absolutely out of question.
This left Ruukoto alone with her medicine score of 0. Not the brightest situation she has ever been in; the other members’ Hps stopped dropping but did not increase, and how exactly do you heal a bunch of youkai?
Nevermind the fairy, these things have telepathic death mimes.
Morning came at the Hakurei shrine, the structure was largely overpopulated and has been like this for two consecutive days by now. Unheard of, especially given its occupants weren’t of the sort that used to stick together. Except for Yukari, who was always everywhere as long as it was the most inappropriate moment to be there, but Yukari is a haxx0r so she doesn’t really count.
Patchouili was one weird guest, she would be locked who knows where to read who knows what, but given the Hakurei shrine was an old-style japanese structure, there were no locks, so she was either in the living room or in the kitchen, doing weird stuff for that Toho StrikerS cosplay thing that, really, was starting to grow into epic proportions of wrong.
On top of that, Reimu had nobody to do the chores for her, because her personal slave girl was slacking off somewhere after having been cast away from the Hakurei Border. Why wasn’t she back yet? Well, she better be soon, otherwise her debt could be quadrupled anytime soon.
As she figured things couldn’t go worse and that, because at least there ought to be some quiet since they couldn’t do much without Meimu, Suika came to visit.
“Oss!”, she greeted, carrying her jug of endless whatsoever with her, “Nice to see you clean once in a while!”.
“I have come out to clean simply because I do not want Patchu’s geekdom to infect me, but I’m starting to reconsider my strategy now that you’re here”.
“Ah, don’t worry, I’ve come to play with Mocchan”, the little oni then started looking around, “Where is she?”
Reimu blinked. Oh sure, Mocchan, “This is supposed to be my house, why everyone keeps camping here because of my guests?”, guessing the fastest way to get rid of the oni was to be bluntly honest, she continued with “Meimu isn’t here, she’s been shot away from the Hakurei Border and we don’t know where she is now”.
“Really?”, said the oni with the expression of somebody who not only didn’t understand, but wasn’t listening anyways, “So when will she be back?”.
“She... I don’t know, she could be anywhere”, Reimu took a deep breath to avoid losing her (short) temper, “If you care so much, why don’t you do everyone a favor and bring her back already? She’s gone since yesterday”.
The clutch on the broom was becoming so strong it could snap at any moment, just looking at the out-of-focus stare and demented smile of Suika was enough to break her patience, let alone the whole situation in general. Really, wasn’t she supposed to be the main character anyways?
“I know!”, Suika said, “Let’s throw a party!”.
Patchouili left the building, book in hand and Koakuma following; she looked like she was set on something, and that something had to do with Reimu. Her expression was imperscrutable.
“It’s unusual to see you leave the house”, Reimu looked at the wizard of the week, trying to guess what was going on in her reclused and sociopath mind, “Where are you going?”.
“I needed some fresh air”, she said, sounding a lot like an execuse considering her habit of locking herself somewhere and never coming out, “And I wanted to check out who you aimed that Demon Sealing Ring at”.
“I just saved everyone lots of trouble, so don’t mind that”, Reimu paused for a moment, still holding the (somehow) intact broom in her hands, “By the way, why don’t you check out on Meimu while you’re out?”.
“Why me?”.
“Because you’re out already and need air. Promenades are good for your health, and a healthy body has a better air intake, which you need for your asthma. You want to get rid of that, don’t you?”
“I would love to see mistress in a healthy body”, was Koakuma’s comment, “It would suit her so fine...”.
“You’re just too lazy to do it yourself, aren’t you?”, was instead Patchu’s unimpressed answer.
“Just go, or I’ll let Suika throw a party”.
Moments of silence passed, in which Koakuma stared at Patchu’s body, making fantasies on her “healthy” body, which ended in getting her a stupid expression and a bleeding nose.
“Fine, fine”, the wizard said in the end, “Koakuma, let’s go look for Meimu”.
Koakuma was shocked, blinking in disbelief, “M-mistress, you really are going to...”, dramatic pause, “... Exercise?”.
“It can’t hurt, can it?”, and she meant as much irony as her low-on-iron body allowed.
“Waaaah! Mistress!”, the devil glomped her mistress, her ero-grade fantasies taking over her body and feeling the need to explore her mistress’ supposedly healthy body for... Research purposes, “Mistress, you’re so wise! I can’t believe you finally did this for m-”.
One Rage Trilithion High Level later, Patchouili clarified: “It’s not for you. It’s for my asthma”.
Meanwhile, Mokuren was doing morning exercise just in front of Keine’s house. Haedonggum, Keine and Meira were slightly behind, looking at him like he had become some sort of alien while they were sleeping.
“Shouldn’t we... Tell her?”, Meira mused. Keine winced, biting her fingernails as if she was worried about something.
“Naah”, said Hae with a shrug, “She’ll be fine, she’s a good girl”.
Meira blinked. Sure, Mokuren seemed to have recovered pretty well considering she was supposed to be on the brink of death just yesterday, but still... “Are you sure it’s ok? I mean, how come she didn’t even notice?”.
“She can be pretty stupid when she needs to”, Hae nodded, giving Meira a pat on the shoulder, “Come on, we’ve got to go back to the HQ”, she then took a deep breath and called with her powerful voice: “Oi! Meimu! Let’s move!”.
“Eh? Already?”, he blinked, “Move where, by the way?”.
“Hello-o? Did you get hit too hard? To the Hakurei Shrine, of course!”
“Oh”, he paused, “Oh, true”, he nodded, “Sorry, it’s just that so much happened lately... I was in hell just yesterday, you see”.
“Tsk, execuses, execuses...”.
Ignoring his talking and sentient (and sexy) sword, he walked over to Keine, “Look, I don’t know how to thank you for being my walking respawn point...”
“Ah, no need to worry. I didn’t do much, really”, her eyes were so THIS IS A LIE, INQUIRE MORE AS TO EMBARASS HER that Mokuren felt sorry for just having asked, “Mokou seemed to count so much on me, I just couldn’t say no...”.
“Mokou?”, he blinked, Mokou? Mokou cared for me? Mokou actually cares for me?, he blinked again, Are we sure I’m not in an alternate Gensokyo?.
“Yes. She’s a good girl at heart, she’s just a little shy...”
“It’s good to know”, he smiled genuinely, that was some good news, “Then I’ll make sure to thank her as well, if only I could manage to find her when I’m up and healthy...”
“You really should train your hps more”, said Meira, “Everyone knows the miko class isn’t high on them, you should let me tank from now on”.
“Well then, Keine”, Mokuren kept ignoring his followers, “I’ll be seeing you soon”.
As he returned, thought, he noticed nobody but Reimu was there, and Reimu didn’t look all that happy to see him back.
“So, you’re finally there”, her voice was dripping ice-cold venom, and her eyes were those of a murderer, “Just where have you been while us honest people have been working and waiting?”
“Shot away in Gensokyo, deep in the forest after a double spark to the face, amongst 4chan memes and then to hell and back. Sorry I didn’t call home”, he looked around, noticing the presence of the small oni, “Oh, hi Suika!”
“Mocchan!”, she ran towards him and dived head-first in his lap. Good thing her horns weren’t straight forward, or he might have got holed up. And sent to hell again.
“By the way, Reimu”, he said while petting Suika like a small kid, “I was wonder-”. He blinked, noticing she was pretty interested in the scene, “... Reimu?”.
“So, you’re the mother”, she muttered, nodding at her own genius as she contemplated what good mother/daughter pair the two could make.
“... Eh?”, he blinked, “Wait, no fuckin’ wai. I can’t be Suika’s mo-”.
“I was talking about you and Wriggle”, Reimu explained, “I figured that of the pair, you’d be the father when I reprimanded you last time. Guess I was wrong”.
Of course Suika was all into her “Mocchan Cuddling” mode, and so she didn’t care, but Mokuren was starting to feel pretty pissed of this gender distortion situation. He opened his mouth as to talk back, but then remembered he had something better to ask.
“By the way, Reimu, I was thinking... Since I have a lot of people, you included, to thank for having saved my ass over and over and over...”, he smiled at his own genius, “Why don’t we throw a party?”.
If silence could kill, Gensokyo would be dead by now.