An Insignificant Girl

[sabakakrazny]

A week ago….

Lien Tsu listened with satisfaction to his lieutenant as he reported on their progress. The ritual was underway, as was attested by the muffled shrieks and screams from the other part of the converted warehouse. The hunting team of enforcers and ink men had collected a victim for the sacrifice in Steel Canyon and were prepping her as he waited. A young girl (anyone would have done, but apparently she had been an easy catch) and Japanese, which made it even better. He smirked…he hated all Nipponese with a singular passion, his father and venerable grandparents recitations of the excesses of the Japanese ghouls from before world war two still echoing in his ears. Her weakening and choked screams were truly music to his ears.

He went to watch the ritual, as underlings required constant supervision. Four sorcerers were hard at work in the arcane square, and as ink men held the nameless child down another plied the silken strangling cord to her throat. They had already made the necessary markings, encircling her navel and crawling to a point between her breasts, where, as she thrashed and choked under the cord the Ink Man plunged a large bore silver needle, drawing precious blood directly from her heart. Hearts Blood was a vital component in the tattooing inks, and they pulled nearly 4 pints of it, loaded with oxygen and adrenaline, before she finally succumbed 20 minutes later.

At the end of the ritual, what tiny spark of life she had remaining was spent as they used her as a receptacle to channel a minor demon, useful creatures however unruly they were. Once it had inhabited her body, she was beaten to death with inscribed mahogany clubs studded with jade to encourage the demon to reside in the figurine that was to be its new home. The corpse he had them dispose of in Atlas Park – there were Hellions there to do such mundane chores, and he let the matter slip from his mind as he oversaw the creation of the newest inks…he had other more important fish to fry.

[sabakakrazny]

She awakened to a dim light in her eyes her eyes, which seemed …oddly…open. Slowly, she turned her head, her hair stiff with something, and reached up to push it from her face. She was numb, numb all over, like when she….

Like when…she couldn’t remember. Somehow, this disturbed her. She flailed feebly with her hands, (also numb, she was numb all over, it seemed) at some plastic that covered her, and found a zipper, and finally fumbled her way out, and sat up. The effort was difficult, she seemed so stiff, and what revealed itself to be a body bag slipped from her to gather around her hips as she sat up in what was an alleyway, on a rainy nighttime scene. She was beside a dumpster, and as she looked around, she saw several men, policemen from their uniforms (she wasn’t sure how she know, but seemed certain that’s what they were) busied themselves in some police activity she couldn’t fathom. She tried to get up, but stumbled, falling over and landing on her hands and knees, and finally untangled her self from the body bag as a homeless man, loitering near the alley entrance watched agog.

Looking down, she ran her hands across herself, and pushed her hair from her face again, and the rain covered hand came away from her temple caked in dried blood and maggots. She shuddered and hastily yet creakingly rubbed them off in a puddle, revolted at their filth. Staggering a bit she regained her feet and shuffled out of the alley and down the street, in streetlights dimly illuminating the foggy boulevard. She was in a city, but where, she couldn’t say. She encountered several people; all of who took one look at her and fled. She paused by a darkened store window and looked at herself.

She saw reflected in the window an apparition of horror…Small; she was a petite five feet four inches tall and had a pasty whitish cast. Her hair and clothes, drenched with rain, were matted with blood and her body bore the marks and discolorations of many bruises. The dragging at her feet was her leather miniskirt, pulled down or fallen to clutch at and trail from one of her ankles, exposing lean white expanses of leg covered in bluish bruising and her red panties, and she hastily pulled it back on (oh, so stiffly) in embarrassment. She had lost a shoe, somewhere; only her baggy sock on one foot, thought the other shoe remained. Looking up in the window, she caught her face…eyes sunken slightly, and glazed and filmed over, along with the gaping wound in her head. Hair and blood matted, and her flesh and brain were exposed and still writhing with maggots and other insects, and she gasped, a cockroach scuttling from her mouth.

She clutched her mouth in revulsion, and though she felt nausea nothing, neither retch nor gag came. She openly stared as her hand snuck down to her throat, and feeling (unfeelingly) at a small, stylish spiked collar and at the still viciously apparent welt of a brutally deep ligature. She reached, tentively to the window, touching the reflection as she leaned forward, peering…and felt…nothing. Rain cascaded from her arm, her jacket, her torn and shredded shirt and filthy skirt… and she felt nothing.

“Yo, bitch! Looking for some fun?’ A harsh voice and laughter beat out, and looking up shyly she saw three large young men, wearing vests and leathers with a goat headed emblem. Laughing, they moved forward to her.” Ain’t ya heard, little girls shouldn’t be out late at night?’

She stumbled back, and stepped into the light, where they could see and suddenly they paused.

“Whoa, dayam, Johnny, that’s one fucked up bitch!”

She blinked her glazed eyes, noticing she wasn’t breathing (or blinking, she didn’t blink unless she made a point of thinking to do so, she realized) and lifted a hand…

“Dozo…please. Don’t hurt me! I just...” was as far as she got before the fourth she hadn’t seen clubbed her to the ground with a baseball bat, caked blood and maggots flying.

“Gawddam! “ Repulsed, he stepped back as the others, still not sure what they had found, made disgusted noises as a foul fluid seeped from her nose and mouth. As she stared at the ground, she suddenly felt something. A terrible pang of hunger, painful and urgent, and looking up she sensed, smelled, saw…she couldn’t say …that they were hers, they had a quality that made them right. She reached up a placating hand and suddenly a black smoke rushed forward engulfing the nearest, and as he shrieked in agony she was surrounded by a bilious green glow. She shuddered, and felt relief, and a sensation, of strength, of well being. And standing she turned, suddenly intensely scrutinizing the three who looked in surprise at their now dead companion.

“Never mind…you will do” and she stepped forward…



Later, when the police came, they found her sitting on the rainy sidewalk, surrounded by the dead hellions and rocking back and forth mumbling to herself, but before they could disembark their police cruiser, she had fled into the night…

[sabakakrazny]

The Sixteenth Year of the Emperor Hisei, Month of June, the Season of The Verdant Crane

The little kitsune bounded up the stairs of the Bridge of Heaven, rounded the edge of the gardens and hurried into the Castle of The Heavenly Palace, where the Guardians of Heaven and the sohei watched him. Bloodthirsty humans! He thought, always looking for a battle. He screeched to a stop most comically before Amatarasu and her court, and bowed low in her divine light.

“ Amatarasu sama, Gomen nesai but there has been a great uproar! I most respectfully beg of you, allow this worthless kitsune to bow before you and present my message!”

Amatarasu smiled, amused by the kitsune as she always was. Cunning, conniving and deceitful as all their kind, their humor was also only matched by the tanuki, or raccoons. She nodded her permission, fanning herself as helpful wind kami made a cooling breeze.

“Hime-sama, the God of the Paths is most upset! A reikon is at the Bridge of Heaven, but cannot cross it to the mountain because it is tied to the earth still, and he says its cries are most piteous! He bids I tell you of his outrage, and that a great crime has been done against one of the Nipponese, and that she is unable to cross over nor aid herself. It is most distressing!”

“Indeed? Summon him here at once, the Princess of the Shining Heaven commands it!”

The God of the Paths, who was the guardian of the Bridge of Heaven reported quickly, and succinctly stated his case. A reikon, bewildered, tortured and pained had arrived at the bridge but could not attain the crossing to heaven to reincarnate; being bound to earth by its corporeal distress. Not death by accident but murder caused it to be hideously bound to its body, for without the proper prayer, the soul could not proceed, thus she was trapped in a body slowly decomposing, subjected to kegare of the worst sort and tormented beyond even the imaginings of Amatsu-mikaboshi who openly admired the deviltry of the perpetrators (He was not a popular figure in the Court, but the God of Evil had his place due to his peerless ancestry, thus all were obliged to tolerate his presence though he quieted at Hachiman’s scowl).

All were, of course, both aghast at the reikon’s pitiable state as well as outraged at the crime against it, and both Hachiman and Bishamon raged at the Princess’s decision to not act at once. Examination in the Pool of Peerless Sight revealed the perpetrators, and at once a delegation of Oni were sent directly to the nearby Celestial Kingdom with a missive worded most strongly to the August Personage of Jade as well as the Yama Kings of the lower kingdom, whose servants had performed the crime. Amatarasu spoke in tones of anger yet reason, and it was decided to bide a bit while they awaited a response, but to placate both the Protectors of Nippon, Hachiman and Bishamon were allowed to make ready for heavenly battle if the August Personage of Jade did not act decisively.

[sabakakrazny]

The Year of the Tiger, 4707 in the Chinese Calendar, Month of the Horse, day 12- The Gates of the Celestial Kingdom

In the Celestial Kingdom, the August personage of Jade was unhappy, very unhappy indeed, and when that happened the very Pillars of Heaven shook. Amatarasu’s missive had created an enormous stir- The Yama Kings admitted that their earthly minions (an unruly and depressingly unmanageable lot, it was no wonder they needed one thousand hells to hold all the sinners) had committed the crime, and after consulting the Imperial Book of Etiquette, the August Personage of Jade was incensed. The Book was the guidepost that all Heaven followed, (even the August Personage of Jade could not ignore its strictures) and in this matter it was harsh but clear.

By imprisoning the soul of the girl to a corporeal prison, the minions had inadvertently condemned the girl to eternal torment, and here was the crux of the matter. Even the Yama Kings concurred that Etiquette was clear – before a soul could be sentenced to eternal damnation and torment, it must be judged, and the soul defended in the Yama Kings presence, and the Yama kings must unanimously concur to pass the sentence and deny it a place on the Wheel of Transmigration. Procedure that had existed for millennia had been ignored, and was it any wonder the Nipponese gods (who were known for their warlike tendencies) were making ready for battle? Honor was at stake, face lost, and to top it off, it was patently the fault of the Celestial Kingdom!

To think that so much trouble could be at the plight of a simple soul of a Nipponese girl? Yet, there it was, and the Book made it plain that for good or ill, rules were not made to be broken. Something had to be done, and quickly.

After all, The August Personage of Jade had risen to the throne because of a very similar error on the part of his predecessor the Heavenly Master of the First Origin, something he had no intention of falling prey to. He consulted with his best advisors, and while the Celestial Dog growled and snarled he offered little, and as the goddess of Compassion Kuan Yin was sympathetic she was obviously siding with the girl and said nothing. It was the Peerless Warrior Ehr-Lang who suggested the Stone Monkey. Stone Monkey represented intellect and while he was regarded a mischievous creature he was also thought to be the cleverest, and indeed it was he who suggested the solution after hearing the situation out.

The poor soul was, after all, not Chinese, and while the crime was at the hands of minions of the Yama Kings, the fallibility of mortals was well known. Observe! Did not the Book make provisions of retribution? Indeed, the Nipponese were very fond of that sort of thing; simply look at their usual practices - why it was a simple fact that nothing pleased the Nipponese gods more than a good honorable vengeance! Obviously, then, the Yama Kings may have lost face, but by stepping aside after a few kowtows to the Nipponese, the girl could be allowed to return to earth, not as a prisoner of her body but as a Hungry Ghost. Should she achieve her revenge, why, then her spirit would be released of its burden, The Bridge of Heaven climbed, and best of all The Celestial Kingdom relieved of its responsibility in the matter. The Book demanded restitution had to be made, but was vague on the method, and what could be better than to allow the spirit its own chance at controlling its destiny?

(The Stone Monkey when on earth often manifested as a lawyer, a habit he was now putting to good use.)

This the Yama Kings found acceptable, and after a bout of negotiations, the Nipponese found it acceptable also. The Yama Kings would continue their affair, but would leave the reikon to sort out her own issues, conversely, they would leave off any interference. As they told Lo Pan - the Mandarin of Demons who oversaw that plane - fair was fair, and if the minions in question couldn’t manage the problem, well…there were one thousand hells to choose from and no doubt a place could be found for them all without too much trouble.

Thus it was, that in the year of the Tiger, in the sixteenth year of the rule of Hisei, 2010 as humans reckoned it, that a war in heaven was averted, and a small and frightened reikon of an insignificant girl made its way down the stairway of the Bridge of Heaven, to make its way and meet its destiny, whatever that might be.

[sabakakrazny]

Three days later….

Lien Tsu frantically hurried to the office, where The Great One waited. He had no idea what he had done, but as he entered he saw Tuan Shin prostrated before the Great One, and he knew it could not be good. He hastily approached from the northwest side of the room, and performed the three obeisances and the nine kowtows, and rested his forehead awaiting the Great Ones word.

The Great One sat before them, and with several others, wearing his ceremonial finest – in Tsoo terms, a formal meeting, his silks and robes surmounted by the square black silk cap with the six gold spattered tassels and the jade button of the third rank. Lo Pan was no small personage, and everyone here trembled in the presence of a Great One of the Infernal Gates of the Lower Kingdom.

“Lien Tsu, as I have no doubt why you do not know why you are here, listen like one whose very soul depends on it! Did you not kill a girl for Hearts Blood a few days ago?”

He nodded, and quickly banged his head on the carpet.

“And you did know she was of Nippon, yes?” He nodded again, puzzled. “ You did what after you killed her?”

This stumped Lien Tsu. “ Venerable One, we took all the usual precautions, the implements were of the finest and all in best order, and when she was slain, we choked her, and beat her to prevent her P’o from returning…”He was cut off as Lo Pan bellowed.

“Ignorant FOOL, do you not realize what you have done, and yet you claim to be a sorcerer? Jinyashu, educate him!”

An advisor (Japanese, Lien Tsu noted, to his hate and disgust) stepped forward and spoke softly.

“What the Most Honored means to imply, but of course cannot say because of his position, is that the girl was not Chinese, and thus has no p’o nor was she Taoist or Buddhist…she was Shinto, and her reikon, her Shinto soul falls not to the jurisdiction of the Celestial Kingdom but to that of Mount Takikichi and the Divine Princess. “ He leaned forward, and spoke with obvious relish.” In other words, you fucked up. Her soul made it to the Bridge of Heaven”

Lien Tsu blanched as the implications set in. “ But, Great One…”

“ Insolent Dog, SILENCE! Do you see what you have done? Your ineptitude has cost us enormous face in the Lower Kingdom! Amatarasu sent an appeal to the Yama Kings and the August Personage of Jade! The Celestial Kingdom has censured the Three Lords for this outrage of the Treaty of The Seven Stars and Nine Kingdoms! I myself have been made to make restitution, and now the girl’s corpse was seen by Shin here when she destroyed our laboratory in Skyway City, costing us a month’s production of rage! She has returned to this plane as a yuurei* and we shall be to no end of trouble to be rid of her,.”

“ But Great One, she was only an insignificant girl…”

Thunder sounded and flames erupted from the frail body that was Lo Pan, as his true demon form manifested. Everyone scrambled to prostrate them selves, as the demon stooped over the thoroughly terrified Lien Tsu.

“Never imagine the insignificant to be harmless, you fool! An insignificant truck driver cost us our entire San Francisco operation, and sent me, ME, back to the Hell of Screaming Dogs! Never imagine the insignificant cannot achieve the attention of their divine ones, or do you really want Hachiman here, in this city with your name on his lips? It is by mere good fortune her rotting brain holds no memories that you live this long!”

The demon resumed its frail mandarin form, though the ringing of their ears reminded all of its displeasure.

“ I should destroy Shin for his failure, but for the fact that his failure is your fault. Solve the problem, and regain your face or I shall see you in the Hell of The Upside Down Sinners! Be gone!”

The room emptied speedily, the Japanese advisor smiling to himself. Ever since the incident with Jack Burton, the Great One had been more cautious (if no less volatile) and he knew Lien Tsu would never see next week’s peace. Lo Pan sat to himself, thinking. A yuurei was troublesome, to be sure, but for now he had other matters. He delegated a man to look into the girl’s whereabouts and report. As he mused, he scowled at the only souvenir of the San Francisco fiasco, a battered trucker’s cap with the logo “Pork Chop Express” on it. Wherever its owner was, Lo Pan sourly reminded himself, he had learned a valuable lesson - he was certainly proof that there was no such thing as insignificant.


*Yurei : A ghost, usually a vengeful spirit or one with unfinished business on earth.

[sabakakrazny]

Galaxy City, China Town

It was just after noon, when the lunch rush was just getting brisk when she walked into the Hungry Dragon Chinese /Japanese buffet. A popular place for tourists and locals alike, it was a favorite of the local Asian community as well. The owner maintained an excellent Chinese buffet to one side, while in another section the sushi bar and noodle counter did a booming business. The food was tasty, plentiful and inexpensive and the place was packed on this, a Monday.

The girl walked in, simply another of the several flocks of her ilk that came here for lunch from the colleges and high school down the street, wearing the prefectural school uniform the nearby predominately asian Noriyuki Morita High School favored. She walked to the back, her slightly natty short skirt swishing, and while several young men and some boys admired at first her lithe legs and figure, they noted her pale complexion, and any who looked at her milky eyes only did so once. She seated herself in a rear booth, and sat there for over an hour, simply watching people eat. While she smiled ever so slightly and shook her head at the offers of a menu her young server brought, he noticed that the booths on either side of her remained empty even on this busy day and though she wore a strong jasmine scent, there was a faint smell like a dead animal. She sat near a vent, and the server noted it in his pad to tell the owner Otomo-san – a rat in the airshaft had died again, best see it tended before customers complained.

An older group of Chinese businessmen came in and took their customary seats, but before they had settled one looked over at the girl, and blanched at the sight of her. A huddled whispering ensued, and then the server was amazed at the scene: ten of Chinatowns oldest and most respected gentlemen bowing politely to a young schoolgirl, and leaving as quickly as dignity permitted. He wondered at it, but soon forgot as the dim sum cart came out, and he made the rounds.

A commotion erupted near the sushi bar, as several Hellions and a few toughs of the Lords of Death street gang (who they shared the turf with) came in and paraded about harassing customers and helping themselves to the buffet as they chased a few customers from the back banquet room. They did this a few times a week, and Mr. Otomo had learned to tolerate it –if he did not what they did to vent their displeasure had previously been made expensively clear.

The girl got up in silence, and went toward the banquet room, and while the server and a few others tried to stop her, they were surprised at Otomo-san’s reaction. All of the staff were younger people, mostly students and American born, and while they were liberal in their attitudes Otomo-san and much of the kitchen staff were all older first generation Japanese or Chinese. They were surprised to see Otomo-san (a notorious martinet) rush forward, only to pale and bow deeply, just like the Chinese businessmen. The girl bowed in return to him, and the server overheard “ They seemed discourteous, I hope they were not bothering you.”

“ No, no, yuurei –sama, they are nothing! It is a matter of no concern, I assure you, most honored one!’’ he bowed feverishly, sweat on his brow.

She looked at him, and the server saw her clothes were dingy, somehow, and stiff and dirty. She said nothing, but went to the room, and turning, silently pulled the twin doors shut as she backed into the room, her horrible eyes burning. Screams and shrieks of agony followed, bringing all business in the Hungry Dragon to a standstill, and in moments she stepped back out, placid and sedate, and nodding to Otomo-san and the kitchen staff who had erupted knives in hand (and who were now groveling on the floor) she left without saying a word. The server and others rushed to the room as patrons crowded behind them, and found the room in disarray. Street tough Hellions and hardened Lords of Death were scattered about like broken dolls, and all had looks of the most unimaginable horror frozen on their faces.

The police were called of course, but Asians have always had their own sense of priorities and telephones rang and cell phones chirped in an ever-spreading area as Chinatown sang like a chorus of crickets. Tourists were startled to see antique shops closed in midday, and stores being locked, as the scent of incenses and burning joss sticks wafted into the air while firecrackers popped and banged. In less than two hours Chinatown, the busiest tourist neighborhood in Paragon City was a ghost town. There was not an Asian face to be seen, with only bewildered tourists on the streets.

A Vengful Ghost, a yuurei walked the streets of Chinatown, and where she walked death was sure to follow.

[sabakakrazny]

Hanako, after some some fighting in Skyway city, stumbled back into the dorms clutching her communicator. Manifesting a corporeal form was difficult, but unless she did the med transporter and the automated systems in the medbay couldn't repair her body. Her left arm, nearly severed in the fight with the Trolls dropped off behind her and she at first didn’t notice it, for her body was literally a corpse and felt nothing.

Off balance, as she came to the corner of the medbay she realized its loss and going back to pick it up she returned to the med bay pad, and sitting on the operating table she waited patiently and without comment as the autodoc injected nanobots and began renewing the flesh, reassembling the arms joints, muscles and blood vessels. She watched it all dispassionately, musing at how fortunate it was that the mebay systems simply repaired what they found without comment, concern or excitement, and simply fixed what was damaged as efficiently as they would any machine. Wasn’t the body an organic machine? But the driver, long gone…!

Life had left long ago and her spirit was possessing her body, not inhabiting the body . Her spirit drove her previous body in a manner much as she had driven her scooter in Osaka…hadn’t she? She squinted her eyes shut, ashamed. She couldn’t remember clearly. Her body was slowly decomposing, and her brain was rapidly losing memories, as it melted it became a dried husk of itself. Whatever it was that allowed her to come back to this place, driving her vengeance only preserved her body imperfectly and the only thing preventing its decomposition was her remaining in ghost form. Manifested, it was subject to all the laws and travails of lifeless flesh, and rotted like any other meat.

She had no difficulty remembering things after she’d returned from the Bridge of Heaven – but things from her past, from before she died were rapidly becoming harder or impossible to recall.

She shuddered at the thought of it. She could feel nothing as the autodoc finished its work and she worked her left hand, clenching it and waggling her fingers as she stared at it. Repaired, it looked now as if new ( but dead, pale and cold like alabaster) but she felt nothing, as always. She looked around the medbay wondering to herself, was it cold? Hot? Looking at the examination bed she sat on she felt her skirt, then her leg…and felt nothing. Running her hand through her hair she watched it filter through her fingers, fall and waft in the faint breeze of the medical ventilators – but she felt nothing.

She could hear…but not feel. She could see, but not smell. She knew others smelt something, from their reactions, but what did they smell? She hoped it wasn’t unpleasant, but that hope was forlorn as she thought of the shame and disgust she brought to others. Some were more polite than others, while some seemed indifferent – Kevin, for example, seemed to think she was nothing unusual at all.

She felt again the only things she ever felt, sharp, unending hunger, and she doubled over on the bed, curling up and she clutched herself around her stomach, So hungry~! But she couldn’t eat.

So thirsty! But neither could she drink. The only respite came when she was killing her victims, the lifeforce that the strange smokes and clouds drew from them healing her dead body, and at least temporarily relieving her misery.

She curled up there, on the medbay table, and sobbed, wanting to cry but unable to shed tears. All she had ever wanted to do was go to school, be with her friends (Hanako had been gregarious before, but now…) and learn business. Maybe become something useful. But now…what had she done to deserve this? What karma led her here, to this awful thing she was?

She did the only thing she could when these moods hit her, and fading into transparence then to invisibility, she fled the medbay to a remote corner in one of the dorms rooms. There, haunting a spot that was bitterly cold (and unknown to her smelled faintly of jasmine and rotten meat) she stayed in what was for now her new home.

The only sound that could be heard by passersby (had she known it) was the faint sound of a lonely, bitterly distressed girl, crying dry tears.

[sabakakrazny]

The Dorms, Steel Canyon, 3:35 AM



Hanako hovered, flitting here, then there through the dorms as she always did. Invisible, there was nothing to betray her presence beyond a tell tale coldness in the air as she passed, a faint scent of jasmine and corruption. Faint, and soon past as she meandered aimlessly. She did so constantly for she never slept, and often had little to occupy herself. Sometimes, she would watch the others as they chatted, played, and went about their business. They had come to accept her presence, and she sometimes wondered if they knew how often she watched them unawares, too shy to reveal herself as she hung in a high corner,floating there invisibly.

She peeked in on Rachel, watching her sleeping, and materializing very briefly dropped off another of a series of small gifts. She liked the child, who didn’t seem to be afraid of her and she was always charmed and amused by the girls delight at the appearance of a box of Pocky, a shirt or a small doll.

She wafted along the hall, deserted at this early morning hour and was overwhelmed by immense hunger, thirst and sadness. She finally returned to the garden, a place she had come to prefer to haunt, and settling there beside the tree. She sighed, her resolve breaking as she once again was racked by shame, guilt and despair and she curled up and wept dry, bitter tears for all she had lost, and all she now was. Tears, because she had to cry as sobs wracked her decrepit body, but dry tears, for now no tears flowed.



The Celestial Palace of the Shining Princess, The year of the Tiger, in the sixteenth year of the rule of Hisei



Amaterasu sat on her Throne of Eternal Light and idly stroked the silk of her kimono sleeve and the kitten that slept in the crook of her arm. Neko-chan, the kitten, purred as she contemplated the Pool of Peerless Sight and watched the form of the Japanese spirit that cried, unseen to all but the Shining Lady.

“You are cruel, oh peerless one. Crueler than any of my kind”. She looked down at the kitten, who stared at her with eyes like glass marbles, one blue, one green. “Why do you play with her so?”

“Yes, Most Divine One, I would ask the same” She looked to her left, seeing the tall, lean form of Hachiman. He scowled at her, and she secretly smiled though her face was as politely blank as any Noh mask.” I have always wondered why you stayed our hands in that execrable treaty with the Nine Heavens.”

She regarded Hachiman, but he neither cowered nor looked away. Only the God of War would be so bold in the presence of The Divine Lady, but that was just as it should be, she thought. It was right that the defender of Nippon should stand for what he felt right, and the treaty made regarding the little reikon had never been to his liking.

She stroked the kitten, and spoke as she regarded it fondly – whether to herself, the cat, or Hachiman was unclear.

“Perhaps I am cruel. Or, perhaps there are other plays yet to be made in this most strange and inscrutable of games. I have my own purposes, as do we all – even the girl has her agenda, though it is of course simpler than any of ours. Whatever the case, she is under my scrutiny. She does what she does because I desire it, and if that desire is not obvious then all the better.”

She stroked the cat, fondling its ears. “But it’s said, there is no honor but that which we make ourselves. There is evil in the Real World, and the reikon may yet lessen some of it. Though she is in pain and agony, she gains great face in my eyes, and there will come a day when she may yet come to the Bridge of Heaven and join us on Mount Takakichi. But that day is not yet come.”

She spoke no more, simply watching the tiny pool of water beside her throne. The cat purred, lulled to slumber, and Hachiman stood silently for some time before he bowed, and stepped back into shadows from where he had come.

In the mirrored surface of the pool, a ghost cried in a darkened garden. And Amaterasu smiled inscrutably.