/jp/ - Otaku Culture

"Yu-" Reimu began, but another one of the gaps opened over her mouth and her voice cut off. I almost started toward her, but Hearn raised a hand.

"Hearn, dear. Hearn." She said, with great enunciation on the second word.

She removed the gap and Reimu breathed in sharply. "Fine. Hearn..." She drew the name out, as if she was making fun of it. "How nice to finally see you. It's only been...What, half a year? Thought you would have forgotten my name by now."

"Now, now, don't act so childish, Reimu. It's unbecoming of you. I'm a very busy women, after all." She cast an eye at me. "As you can attest, given my usual sort of whereabouts." I probably couldn't actually attest to that, but I supposed that the two locations I had met her in were very strange and probably required lots of work to get to, so I nodded. "See? Excellent. And how are you, hmm? I may know what you've been up to in regards to Eientei, but what else? Ah, but perhaps we should go inside first? It is rather chilly out here, you know."

"Yeah, I do know. That's why your shikigami's been here fixing up the Shrine, isn't it? So you can go and nap for the next three or four months." Reimu muttered, shrugging off my coat and passing it back to me. I put it on gratefully. "Fine, whatever. Come on." She stalked off toward the Shrine, rubbing her shoulders.

"It would appear that she is rather upset with me." Hearn told me. I shrugged, saying that she was probably grumpy because she was cold. "Hm. Perhaps I'll have to give her a little present." Like...what? "Ah, don't mind me. I'm just thinking out loud. Wise youkai do that, you see." I supposed I would have to take her word for it.

"Come on!" Reimu shouted at us from the other side of the courtyard. "Too cold for this!" She stomped off toward the Shrine, so I began following. As I did, I spotted another gap appearing, this time over the offertory box. Several slips of paper floated down, landing in the box. I looked back at Hearn, who just offered me one of her smug smiles. Well, I supposed that it would at least make Reimu happy, so that was okay.

As I set off toward the Shrine, I looked back and saw that Hearn had exited the gap, which shut behind her. I'd only really seen her while she was sitting before, but she wasn't all that tall. Not quite Lady Kasen's height, though I supposed that an oni would be hard to beat. That also meant that she wasn't as tall as me, though her general stature and posture did lend her an imposing sort of air.

I reached the Shrine first, stepping into Reimu's rooms to find that Yamame had woken up at some point and was still lying down, swaddled in blankets. Reimu was busying herself with making tea, and I stepped inside fully to tell Yamame what was going on, but she turned out to be in a surprisingly playful mood, because she jumped up, threw the blankets over me, then dragged me down to the floor with her. "Oh my, whatever do we have here?" Hearn's voice asked, and I mumbled a muffled curse as I tried to find the top of the blankets and free my head from the hell of warm and comfy sheets and spiders that didn't want to let me go. "Reimu, have you gained a pet? A jumping spider, perhaps?"

"What? No. You know, you've only been here for about three minutes and you're already saying stupid things." Reimu sounded annoyed, but I supposed that she sounded like that a lot. "Yamame, let him go."

Yamame gave a little gasp, then released me enough to get my head out of the blanket. Hearn was watching me with an amused look while Reimu was watching with an expression that was somewhere between annoyance and amusement. "Oh!" Yamame exclaimed, looking a little embarrassed. "I, er, didn't realise that there was a guest." She said, her face burning red. I found her hand underneath the blanket and squeezed it. "Um, sorry about that."

"Quite alright, dear." Hearn said, taking the cup of tea that Reimu had just poured with one of her gaps. "You're rather amusing. Perhaps I shall have to keep you." I raised my head with wide eyes, and Hearn laughed. "Just a simple joke." It wasn't particularly funny, but I didn't say that out loud. "In fact, my shikigami's shikigami might take an interest in you." She already had, but I didn't say that either. In fact, it was confirming the thoughts I had been thinking during my meeting with Ran, about how I couldn't imagine Hearn treating her shikigami like Ran treated Chen. This, it seemed, extended to Hearn's treatment of Chen. "So, this is rather nice, isn't it? New floor, repaired ceiling, a less rickety door...You're living like you're the Queen of the Nile, Reimu!"

"The what?"

"The - Oh, never mind. My excellent referential humour is lost on you." Hearn looked a little put out. I couldn't claim that I would have understood the reference either. "What I mean to say is that you seem to be in a good state for the Winter. And you're in much better spirits than I remember you being in last Winter."