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

[revolutionfalcon]

Obviously not. [Canteens aren't exactly the most directed manner of getting water onto something, as Ren is prone to remind him on the occasions he's espousing the relative benefits of carrying water pistols. As soon as Fubuki asks the second question, though, Shun reaches under the back of his coat and draws his short sword.]

Exactly where it always is. [He's still keeping a close eye on the ayakashi's movements, in case it lashes out suddenly.]

[blizzardrock]

[He glances at the weapon to confirm, then turns back to the ayakashi, creating four standard borderlines around it. At their strongest, his defensive borderlines can only withstand one impact each. The cage won't hold.]

Quickly!

[revolutionfalcon]

[While Fubuki's drawing the lines, Shun quickly dips his blade in the canteen. Once he's done, he darts forward with the blade out, and lashes out at the ayakashi's legs. It doesn't sever them, but it knocks the cat onto its back, and its flailing is much less effective when it doesn't want to move its legs so much.

Before it has the chance to recover, Shun's going to try leaning forward enough to catch its eyes and rend it this time.]

[blizzardrock]

[Disorientation needs eye contact; rend doesn't, so when Fubuki feels the god's will, he proceeds with the rend immediately.]

[Because of where the ayakashi is, the wave of pressurized air doesn't look like it's had an effect, and at first he doesn't think it worked—but after a few seconds, it lets out a horrible screech as it's eradicated.]

Got it. [He lets out a breath.] ...Release me.

[revolutionfalcon]

[That's an odd way of wording it, but Shun understands what he means by it anyway, and turns away from the last disintegrating particles of the ayakashi.]

Return, Tenjoin Fubuki. [And as soon as he does so, Shun's eying him off in a somewhat critical manner.]

You seem pissed off about something. [More so than he can remember seeing him before, in fact.]

[blizzardrock]

[Once he returns to human form, he belatedly looks around to make sure there aren't any other ayakashi nearby. Very probably Shun wouldn't have agreed to de-vessel Fubuki if there were, but Fubuki isn't thinking straight.]

I— [He knows that Shun has experienced a friend disappearing once. And Fubuki knows what it means when a god's temple disappears or a shinki's name disappears from the phone contacts list when he looked at it five minutes ago and noticed something wrong, it's just not something he can accept—]

...I saw Kotori not too long ago. [He's aware enough to notice there's something happening with ayakashi; he hadn't been able to ignore it when he saw Shun pass by, but he has to—] I have to go.

[He turns around and heads back the way he came.]

[revolutionfalcon]

[Yeah, Shun's having approximately zero of that shit today, and as soon as Fubuki turns to leave, Shun reaches out to grab him none too gently, and ideally turn him back towards Shun if he manages to get hold of him.]

I took you for a lot of things, but a hypocrite wasn't one of them. You won't let me fight alone while I'm in your kind of mood, so what the hell makes you think I'm going to let you get away without either backup or an explanation?

[Or both, preferably, but Shun will take one or the other if he has to. It's abundantly clear he's not planning to just let Fubuki walk away from this without some kind of further elaboration, though.]

[blizzardrock]

[He should have expected that, but he didn't—and his first reaction is to pull away even as he's being whirled around.]

I don't...need backup. I just...

I wasn't going to fight anything.

[Which is not an explanation, he knows. But he also knows how hopeless it is. Gods can go home. Shinki...are already dead. Even in the best-case scenario, that's—]

[What's the name for doing something he already knows is fruitless? Even though he knows. Even though he should already know.]

...I can't face it.

[Saying it out loud will make it real.]

I promise you I'll return. Just let me go.

[revolutionfalcon]

So you were just going to run into the middle of an ayakashi attack and hope for the best when you have trouble borderlining in your own defense even normally. [Shun's tone makes it very clear he considers Fubuki's idea just as stupid as going out to fight by himself, and he's definitely not considering this a convincing argument in his favour.

Particularly not when he mentions that vague reason why. Shun's eyes narrow a little, and his focus gets, if anything, more intense.] When has not facing it ever worked out well for you in the past? Putting off confronting a loss doesn't make it less painful when you finally have to. And you're not giving me any good reason to let you go.

[It's pretty obvious this has to be in regards to some kind of loss with that reaction, even if Shun isn't sure who it might be. He knows one person disappeared today, having checked after tracking down Mikoto earlier, but he's not sure it's the one Fubuki's thinking of.]

[blizzardrock]

[He puts a hand over his eyes. He wasn't going to run into an ayakashi attack...there was only one of them and he'd only intervened because it was his own god and they could rend it.] Shun...I don't care about that right now.

...Not right now. [As with his mysterygod...he has to look. Has to try, at least. He wouldn't be able to live with himself otherwise.]

...We have different ways of coping, Shun. [Shun's said it himself.]

I just...have to make sure. [He starts to back away.] Don't stop me.

[revolutionfalcon]

You might not, but I do. [He's still not prepared to back down on this, considering how Fubuki insists on tailing him whenever he has similar issues.] We might have different ways of coping, but standing there claiming it'll be fine if you handle it alone and not to stop you sounds more familiar than you clearly think.

[Considering Shun does it just about every other week. He's tempted to fight Fubuki out of the idea, but he runs over in his head who's disappeared recently enough for this to still be raw and only noticeable today. It's not a long list - in fact, thinking about it, Shun's not sure he noticed anyone other than Izumo among the disappearances today when he checked.]

If it's Kusanagi you're making this fuss about, his god blew up the temple this morning. You're not going to get any answers there.

[blizzardrock]

[He hadn't thought of Izumo's god, but if he's reacted like that, then that...confirms it, even more so than it already was.]

I don't— [He's not fine. He doesn't feel fine. But there are things he needs to process, and his emotions have started to spin out of control, and his god being there would make it worse.]

I'm—I'm a shinki. I need to go calm down. [His fingers dig into his palms.] I'm not self-destructive, Shun. I won't do anything like that. I just need to— [He has no idea what he needs to do, but it's something.]

...Come after me in ten minutes if you have to...just give me that much. [He continues backing away.]

[revolutionfalcon]

[Shun still isn't entirely convinced, and he highly doubts that it's just the one cat hanging around considering how many of those keychains were on the Near Shore, but he also doubts keeping Fubuki here is going to end well considering he seems convinced he needs to do this.

That doesn't mean he's going to just let him slip entirely, though.] Ten minutes, then. Don't do anything stupid.

[Because he knows full well and from experience that doing anything stupid is much more likely in moods like this.]

[blizzardrock]

[Ten minutes is not nearly enough time to do a search, or...or do any of the things that run through his mind as things that he has to do. But all he needed that ten minutes for was time to process.]

[When time is up, Fubuki has not even gone that far away, having stopped somewhere just out of Shun's sight, sitting propped up against a building, holding himself tightly, leaning his head forward a little to hide his face.]

...I'm alright now. [His chest still constricts, but...time will have to take care of that one.]

...You? ["Did I blight you," he means. There shouldn't have been much guilt there, but it was hard for him to tell.]

[revolutionfalcon]

[Shun can feel the general direction of where Fubuki is when he focuses anyway, so all he needs to do after the ten minutes (which he largely spends combing the rest of the area to make sure there's no more of those cats as an immediate threat, even if he's pretty sure he can see a few in the far distance) is follow that sense. Even then, though, he's a little surprised at how short a time it takes him to find Fubuki.

He doesn't sound all that convinced of Fubuki's response when he's found though.] I'm fine. But I doubt you are just like that.

[He doesn't sit next to Fubuki, but he does lean against a large decorative rock nearby.] I didn't realise you and Kusanagi were that close.

[blizzardrock]

...Mhm. [He buries his head in his arms.] Sorry.

[He's quiet for a long moment.]

I didn't think...there would be anything worse than remembering just someone's death and not knowing why, or even who they were to you. [He was wrong. Knowing exactly who someone was to him is far worse.]

[But he did semi-deliberately avoid answering Shun's last statement. It's too soon.]

...You're not going to go after the ayakashi?

[revolutionfalcon]

[Shun hums slightly in agreement with that. It would be more confusing to not know, but it also dulls the pain a bit. It's definitely more painful to know someone's important to you and lose them anyway.]

Knowing is worse, in my experience. I've never not known who someone was to me when they were taken, but if you know, it's more raw. You feel the pain more because you understand what it is you've lost.

[And while Fubuki is avoiding answering directly, it's clear that whatever Izumo was to him, it was something important.]

Not without a shinki. I was on my way to find Kotori when I ran into that one.

[blizzardrock]

[...You understand that there was nothing you could have done, anyway. And in some ways, that's worse than the guilt of knowing that there must have been something you could.]

...Yeah.

[...He shifts his arms slightly.]

I saw Kotori...she shouldn't be too far away. You should go. [The ayakashi aren't going to rend themselves.]

I'll return to the temple... [No promises that he'll stay there, though.]

[revolutionfalcon]

[Shun isn't exactly enthused about the prospect of leaving Fubuki in this state, but there's not a lot he can do for a loss like this either. He knows sometimes that it's best to just have some time to himself to think about it, and surely Fubuki can't spiral too badly in the space of a few hours.

He's somewhat hesitant about it, but he straightens up.] I'll believe that when I see it. If Kotori's back that way anyway, I might as well walk with you.

[And also double-check that they're not being besieged by any more cats.]

[blizzardrock]

[Fubuki doesn't move.]

Shun...you can teleport.

[Is he insinuating that Shun doesn't even have to walk to find Kotori, or is he asking to be teleported to the temple? He's not sure himself.]

[revolutionfalcon]

Teleporting doesn't let me keep an eye out for any more of those cats. And I can only feel the direction of my shinki, not your exact location. So I can hardly teleport straight to her.

[Not to mention Shun doesn't even like teleporting unless he has to, but that's beside the point for now. He's mostly just going to eye off Fubuki to see if he's actually going to stand or whether he should just find another way to get him back to the temple.]

[blizzardrock]

[...He keeps his face averted as he gets up.]

...Sorry. [The rush that had propelled him through the ayakashi a few minutes ago has faded entirely; if he didn't already know how his mental state can affect rending, he might try it. But honestly...he doesn't even want to. He's still carrying the urge to do something, anything—but fighting ayakashi isn't it.]

[revolutionfalcon]

[Shun keeps watching until Fubuki gets up, then starts walking back towards the temple. He's only going slowly until he can see Fubuki's following him, though.]

It's hardly something you can stop in this case. [Grief affects all of them, shinki or not, and it's not something that can just be clamped down on.]

[blizzardrock]

[He lags behind a bit. And it takes him a long time to finally realize that he should be doing lookout.]

...Shun...where did they come from? [He wasn't on the Near Shore when it happened.]

[There's also something else that might be bothering him about it, that he'd must have noticed right at the start, but he can't recall what it is.]

[revolutionfalcon]

The Near Shore, I think. Some stupid cat keychains are driving people mad with obsession over there. That ayakashi looked like one of them, but bigger, so I'm wondering if people have been bringing the keychains across.

[It would make some kind of sense that the keychains were cursed or contaminated, not unlike those chocolates from a while back. There's a precedent, and he doubts just those tiny ayakashi running around on the Near Shore would have the power to cause riots like that.]