23 - Crazy Cat Shuffle

[godsoffortune]

Who: Everyone!
What: Crazy Cat Shuffle
When: September 20
Where: Shibuya & Ikebukuro, as well as the Far Shore
Summary: The new Crazy Cat mascot keychains are sparking real passion in Tokyo's hot spots. Brawls have broken out over the extra-rare versions, and all of this angst is attracting ayakashi. The gods have been asked to step in before things get out of control.







Crossing Crisis

The Shibuya scramble crossing is always busy, but it's especially wild today. Ten new Crazy Cat vending machines have been installed at the mouth of the alley across from Shibuya Station's exit. Rumors are flying that these machines have extra Blue-Star Cats in them: the very rarest kind! A crowd of hundreds of excited fans have gathered, but the people at the front of the lines are buying lots of cats, and the mood is starting to grow sour as the people at the back of the lines begin to wonder if there will be any left by the time it's their turn.

This crowd needs crossing guards... or just someone who can snag some of those ultra-rare Cats and sell them to the back of the line for crazy cash. Everything a god does is righteous, after all.

Sunshine Struggle

Crazy Cat machines dot the Sunshine City complex in Ikebukuro. The machines here are attracting some particularly nasty ayakashi: jealous little purple creatures with too many legs that stoke buyers' envy and need for more and better collectibles. Under their influence, it's not just the Cats going fast. The local stores are selling out of everything cute on the shelves.

Worse, some of the ayakashi victims are turning to theft when they run out of pocket money. Time to exterminate those bugs before they start a new crime wave.

Taking Stock

Accident? Sabotage? No one's telling, but a delivery truck carrying boxes of new keychains to restock the machines blew a tire and overturned on a major street. Under the influence of those greedy little ayakashi, collectors are descending on the wreck to snag their favorites before the police show up.

The dazed driver doesn't know what to do, the crowd is starting to get violent, and those Cats do look amazingly cute. And appealing. And, for that matter, valuable.

Bad Kitty

The cat keychains are super cute! Even gods or shinki might be tempted to buy one and take it home, but taking these keychains back to the Far Shore will give away their hidden secret. It's not just human envy that's attracting ayakashi to the Crazy Cats. There are ayakashi hiding inside this batch of cute kitty dolls, and bringing them through a shrine to the Far Shore will force the hidden creatures out of their plushie prisons.

They're big, they're mad, and they're hungry. And the Heavens are full of souls that smell delicious.

The ayakashi escaping from Crazy Cat dolls on the Far Shore resemble gigantic (taller than a person at the shoulder) versions of the cute plushie cats, with very real and sharp teeth and claws. They run and attack at random once released from the dolls, so even gods and shinki who did not bring the toys back could be faced with a fight. The patrolling shinki will do their best to hold them back with borderlines, but they need help to rend these crazy cats before they do too much damage!

In Summary:

• Placate the crowds
• Squash bitty ayakashi
• Struggle with temptation
• Defeat the cat invasion
• Have fun~

Comments

[nopixiedust]

Not to mention there's a ton of these things....

[Standing on the tips of her toes, Wendy peers into a window to see if it's the kind they're looking for.]

So we could probably be busy for a while, I guess.

[onehandsomeslickninja]

We're right back to how irritated I am that we can't just kill these things. [Edge has no problems looking straight over her, though he doesn't see anything that registers as useful for their purposes.]

[nopixiedust]

You and everyone else.

[Moving on to the next store, she shakes her head.]

Okay, this looks like one that has tools and things, I think. Is this good?

[onehandsomeslickninja]

Buckets! Those would do the trick, right?

[Buckets are typically metal or wood, to his knowledge. Certainly sturdy!]

[nopixiedust]

Yeah, probably! [In she goes! Catch the door for yourself, Edge.] I've never been in a store like this before... Know where anything is?

[onehandsomeslickninja]

What the heck --!? [Take that as a no, as Edge has to stop and stare at modern tools and hardware. Some of them are familiar, most of them not -- but though his mask hides his expression, the light in his eyes starts to shine almost with glee. Definitely with interest.]

[nopixiedust]

[Having never given a fuck about tools in life, Wendy doesn't really care much now, either, but she does pause when she hears that exclamation.]

What? What's that look for?

[onehandsomeslickninja]

Apparently I'm really impressed by all these tools!

[Hey, he doesn't know why, which he acknowledges with a shrug. And they have better things to do...]

Oh, there's a bucket -- that IS a bucket, right? [The confusion is because of its material, the plastic that isn't familiar to the ninja. It has the right shape, at least.]

[nopixiedust]

You're a- [What's the word...] You're a nerd. A huge nerd~!

But yeah, that's a bucket, I think. [Trotting over to check it out, she picks it up and starts turning it around.] Do you think this would hold one of those things?

[onehandsomeslickninja]

I'm pretty sure that's not right. [Edge raps the bucket with his knuckles, his eyebrows lowered.] I think it'll do. I guess. I'm not comfortable with this sort of stuff, but it doesn't seem like it can just break.

[nopixiedust]

Maybe we should test it out...

[...And with that, she abruptly flings it at Edge.]

[onehandsomeslickninja]

[Edge catches it.]

[C'mon, he's a ninja. Throwing things is one of his specialties; he saw it coming a mile away. In fact, he doesn't even recognize her act as anything other than passing it to him so he can give it a thoughtful squeeze between his hands.]

It's much more flexible than wood or metal... but that's a good thing, isn't it?

[nopixiedust]

[Hey, a girl can try. She doesn't pout over it, at least.]

Well, if it's too flexible, that means things can tear through it, right? Unless there are things that are strong and flexible.

[onehandsomeslickninja]

If they can't get a grip, no problem. Flexible's good, it means it can absorb blows better. You know that parable about the tree and the weeds in the wind, right?

[nopixiedust]

....No. Definitely not.

[onehandsomeslickninja]

When the hard wind blows, the reeds survive because they bend, but the tree can't bend so it gets knocked over.

[nopixiedust]

...I'm pretty sure trees survive lots of times because they're really sturdy.

[what do you mean that's not the point]

[onehandsomeslickninja]

It's not a casual wind, it's a strong one! And the reeds survive the casual ones too!

[nopixiedust]

If it's a strong wind, wouldn't the reeds just get pulled out of the ground because the dirt is going everywhere!?

[Totally just a normal discussion between a tiny girl and a ninja in a hardware store.]

[onehandsomeslickninja]

No way! They just bend over and there's barely any tug on them at all. ['Discussion' is sure a charitable word for it.]

[nopixiedust]

But they're plants!

[onehandsomeslickninja]

I -- hwazaghr -- so? [What did that -- what did that have anything to do with anything!]

[nopixiedust]

You can tug plants. That's how you get rid of weeds!

[onehandsomeslickninja]

Okay, but that has nothing to do with flexibility providing resilience!

[nopixiedust]

Wind tugging and people tugging is basically the same thing, that's what it has to do.

[Logic?????]