As the moon shone overhead, a lone girl hurried her way across the street, being illuminated for no more than a second by the streetlights she passed beneath, keeping her mind on her mission as she rushed through the barren streets.
Finally a tall, neon sign came into view, and the girl breathed a sigh of relief, slowing down to a light jog, and closing the distance with the building in short order. Now she just had to find a way to get in without alerting anyone.
Noticing a window that hadn't been latched correctly, the girl walked over to it and began to slowly push it open fully, sticking out her tongue in concentration as she did her best to keep it from squeaking on the way up. These old Wooden frames had a tendency to do that, or get stuck, in cold weather.
Once she deemed the window open far enough, the girl carefully eased one of her stocking-clad legs over the sill, and then after ducking her head through, pulled her other leg in. Breathing a sigh of relief, the girl prepared to enter further into the building, when the lights suddenly came on around her, momentarily blinding the girl.
"For the love of Kami Marisa, must you always choose to do your job this late at night," an annoyed voice asked the girl, now recognized as Marisa Kirisame, ordinary magician extraordinaire.
Rubbing the back of her head nervously, Marisa turned to regard one of her Partners sheepishly once the spots in her eyes had faded away, "Oh don't be like that Alice-Chan, you know that our powers work best in the night, and all the big cases come in under the moonlight."
Crossing the room and waggling a finger in front of Marisa's face, Alice Margatroid, the Seven-colored puppeteer, growled at her partner, "Yes, but the Youkai are also much more powerful at night, not to mention the fact that you ran off alone, again I might add, without telling either myself or Patchy about where in Makai you were going!"
Marisa smirked lazily at her friend, brushing off her anger, and carefully wrapped her fingers gently around her fellow blonde's wrist, slowly moving the hand closest to her face down, and after bending it downwards slightly, pressed her lips softly against the girl's knuckle with a grin.
Alice's eyes shot open at the gesture, and she found her anger immediately defused as she began to splutter, face going bright red at the other girl's boldness. Marisa for her part was still giving her friend a lazy grin, knowing that she didn't need to say anything else in her defence against the puppeteer for tonight.
"Now that your flirting is finished, perhaps we ought to talk about you going out alone, without even support, to hunt Youkai?" Another voice droned out, and Marisa groaned as she turned to face the receptionist's desk, where a purple bean sprout was sitting.
"Can't get anything past you, Patchy-Chan," Marisa joked, but the no-nonsense glare she was receiving made her rethink all of the teasing that had been ready on the tip of her tongue. Instead opting for the smart way out, Marisa folded her arms behind her head and started grinning once more, "Just a bit of late night training girls, you shouldn't be worried about little old me."
"It is not you I am worried about," Patchouli Knowledge, the great Unmoving Library, stated, "It is what we will have to tell Reimu-Sama if one night you never come home because a Youkai got a little too friendly with you."
"Oh come on, we all know that Reimu is overprotective up to eleven, she would flip out if Cirno-Chan tried to make hot pockets again," Marisa tried to argue, but the receptionist and bookworm was having none of her excuses.
"Marisa, this has got to stop," The purple-haired girl stated, "If you are going to head out at night to do a little extra hunting because you are bored or can't sleep, that's fine. Just remember to set someone up to be your spotter first, because when we don't know where you are, we can't know if your safe, or lying dead in an alley somewhere."
"H-Hai, Knowledge-San," Marisa mumbled, kicking her foot as she realized her friends concern was justified.
She was startled when a blonde haired girl draped her arms over the other's shoulders, and the taller doll maker began to purr into her ear, "So, how many did you bag tonight, Marisa-Chan?"
Her mood lifted by everything being back to normal, Marisa grinned and flattened out the creases in her black vest, and matching skirt, before answering her friend, "I got three werewolves trying to eat a woman and child tonight, good game too, all three should be enough to satisfy Reimu for at least a week."
"It's amazing just how much this company has grown in only a few years," Patchy commented, having returned her attention to her book the minute she could see the two blonde's beginning to flirt amongst themselves.
"Yeah, anyways, I'm going back to bed," Marisa said, untangling herself from Alice's embrace, "don't wake me up unless you're dead, or on fire. You know the drill."
The two girls watched the Blonde leave the room, before a wry smile appeared on Alice's face, and she suddenly swooned onto the couch beside the window allowing the long skirt of her dress to fly up slightly, bringing the back of her hand to her forehead while her other pretended to fan herself, "Oh my but Marisa is such a lady killer," The doll maker teased.
"If you're going to start acting like an overdramatic love struck puppy, I'd be very happy if you took it somewhere else, please," Patchy said, not falling for the other girl's acting as she adjusted her tie slightly, never looking away from her book for a moment.
"For all those romance novels Remilia-San sends you, you are really such a fuddy-duddy Patchy-Chan," Alice huffed, getting up and leaving the room.
Once she was sure that the taller girl was gone, Patchy set down her book, and dug into one of the drawers of her desk. Procuring a much smaller book and cracking it open, Patchouli lounged back in her chair and began to giggle to herself as she read a trashy romance novel in the late hours, when she should have most likely been filling out paperwork to send to Reimu.
Oh well, she mused, I'll just do it in the morning.
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Gensokyo Youkai Extermination company, or GYE, as many people preferred to call it by, was a relatively new group, though their reputation preceded them.
Created only two years ago by then starving Shrine Maiden Reimu Hakurei, and her partner in Crime Marisa Kirisame, a friend she had made in college, the pair had sent out ads promising Youkai extermination services to anyone that needed them. Surprisingly business picked up almost overnight, and the two found themselves quickly overwhelmed by extermination requests.
Thus, the company began to hire able-bodied people to help keep up with the requests, and the company began to grow, along with it's budget.
Once the Shrine maiden, who was considered the head of the company, felt they had enough people to cover their first city, she began to create branch districts in other cities, to try and help spread out their services. Who was sent where, and who was in charge of each branch, was largely decided by Reimu herself, along with the Companies largest investor, and one of the shrine maiden's closest friends (and many believed was also her girlfriend), Yukari Yakumo.
All except for Marisa Kirisame, who had literally walked into her friends office, told her that she wanted to take both Alice Margatroid and Patchouli Knowledge to one of the smaller branches a few cities over, and then immediately left. The rest of the companies workers were amazed when a week later the forms had been filled out, signed, and stored, and the three great magicians had their things packed and were ready to go, with only brief heartfelt goodbyes outside of the building that Reimu had to break up because in her own words, "It was getting too sappy."
That was almost eight months ago, and the smaller branch company was performing rather well, with only a few minor incidents that gained the attention of their superior.
But as Marisa would always argue, "That oil tanker should not have been in the way of my bullets," when the Truck stop incident was brought up around the main office.
The real question on everyone's minds regarding the company were how the three were considered magicians, when magic was all simple hocus-pocus and sleight of hand. Reimu would then most likely laugh the idiot out of her office, and have them escorted off of the premises, most likely through force. She just loved watching idiots being thrown out of her lobby sometimes.
The others thought the girl was a closet sadist.
You see, the three girls weren't magician in the way stories make them out to be, rather they each had extraordinaire skills that relied on very witch-like stereotypes.
Marisa ability was potion craft, or rather Herbology. Give the girl any kinds of ingredients, and she could most likely create a potion that could change your body in any nasty combination of ways, though the girl seemed to focus mostly on highly unstable mixtures that, with the right catalyst (I.E: shooting it), would create a massive and devastating explosion. Very good for clearing out offending Youkai, and far more effective than any hand grenade that Reimu had in circulation.
Patchy's abilities lied in Alchemy, or the ability to change things into whatever was needed, through the use of an equivalent exchange of materials. What Reimu and Marisa found more useful to their interests, was the woman's intelligence, which made her one of the best spotters and tacticians in the company. It didn't help that the woman was severely out of shape, and after some initial tests, had been deemed unfit for active duty.
The last of the Trio was Alice Margatroid, with the ability of creation, and no one really knew the origins of the ability, or the ability of the woman behind them. Alice apparently had no memories of her childhood, and what little people knew about the girl (when she let them past her barriers) was that the was an accomplished seamstress and doll maker, and enjoyed theatre.
She also had a near infinite army of adorable doll soldiers, filled with gunpowder that she could detonate with a spark (usually shooting them). She was the crack shot of the trio, and they had found that with her keen eye to detail, she was great at urban combat, able to spot even the tiniest object that could help her stop a group of Youkai, and able to command her partner in combat to points of interest to make short work of their targets.
Sadly she was also ridiculously easy to wind up, had a love of romance novels, and was madly in love with her partner, which no one could say for sure was reciprocated or not. Not even Reimu seemed to know which way Marisa swung, and considering the blonde's ability to flirt with both genders equally, well, the betting pool back at the main office was still filling up, with new guesses coming in almost daily.
Marisa yawned loudly as she scratched her stomach, half stumbling down the stairs to the office's kitchen, and finding Alice already waiting there, with an opened book in one hand, and a cup of tea in the other, "Morning Alice-Chan!"
"Marisa, must you walk around in only your underwear?" Alice chided, noticing the blonde in her undershirt and bloomers as she began to dig through the fridge, "Don't bother, we need to go shopping today."
"Seriously?" Marisa complained, "Wasn't it Patchy's turn to do the shopping this time?"
"Have you seen that girl?" Alice replied dryly, "She once again fell asleep at her desk because she was doing paperwork long into the night, and I doubt she could even make it to the supermarket because of her condition."
Feeling a pair of arms wrap around her waist sent Alice's blood boiling, and her cheeks to go bright red, as she felt a lithe body rubbing up against her back, and the sound of her fellow blonde purring.
"And my, don't you look lovely today," The Herbologist complimented, nuzzling her cheek into her partner's shoulder with a lazy grin, "a pretty blue dress to match your dolls, along with a suave red tie. Are you planning for a hot date, Alice-Chan?"
The doll maker was struck speechless by the girl's flirting once more, and began to splutter incoherently as steam escaped from her ears, and she made little effort to dislodge herself from the grasp of her partner.
"Maybe I should send a request to the main office to be reassigned, having to find you two like this at all hours is ruining me," a droll vice interrupted the pair, causing two sets of eyes to turn to the other doorway that led out into the hallway through the rest of the complex.
"Ah, I know you wouldn't want to do that Patchy-Chan," Marisa stated confidently, finally releasing the conductor's waist, and allowing Alice to stumble and nearly fall over in her daze.
"And why do you sound so confident about that, miss bloomers?" Patchy asked, while putting on a pot of coffee.
"Cause you would miss all of this if you had Reimu reassign you," The girl replied, accentuating her point with an impromptu, and downright disturbing pelvic thrust that caused both magicians to stare in wide-eyed horror.
"Oh for the love of...go and put some clothes on you lecher!" Alice shouted, gesturing at the nearby staircase while her cheeks burned. Patchy remained silent, and was trying desperately to hide her face behind one of her books.
"Fine," Marisa drawled, and made a point of stomping her way upstairs. Alice could imagine the blonde shaking her bottom the entire way, which brought on an impromptu nose bleed.
"If the two of you are going shopping, then might I suggest some more aspirin?" Patchy asked, "If you are going to be throwing around that much sexual tension, I will need many more drugs than we have stocked."
"Oh drink your damn coffee, you shut-in," Alice snapped, just as the coffee maker shut off.
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She was doing it again, Alice noted with a small growl. The same thing she did every time the two attempted to go out for a drive anywhere.
Marisa's fingers tapped absently against the side of the car as the pair drove downtown, getting on the seamstress' last nerve, which she had a sneaking suspicion Marisa knew, and took pride in.
Daring a glance over at her partner, Alice noticed the relaxed way the girl was sitting, with her legs spread out in a pair of black bike shorts, hidden by a black mini-skirt, with a white tank-top and her beloved black vest. A well-loved cowboy hat hung from her neck, and a pair of black sunglasses were hooked into the neck of her shirt, which Alice knew she had just to make her look "cooler" while she fought off Youkai.
"Could you stop?" The seamstress asked, referring to the other girl's incessant tapping, but the Herbologist simply smiled in her direction as the tapping got louder. "I am warning you only once Marisa, if you cause another scene, I will..."
"You'll what?" Marisa challenged, "You only bring me along on these trips because you need someone to carry all the groceries because you're too weak."
Alice bit her lip and turned back to the road, refusing to admit that the blonde was right. As good of a markswoman she was, Alice was physically frail, and couldn't handle many of the heavy equipment some of their other operatives could, such as a sniper rifle, which would have complimented her abilities.
She spent the rest of the drive stewing in her annoyance, as Marisa continued to tap on the side of the car, leaving fingerprints on the paint, with a victorious smirk that she had one-upped one of the smartest girls in the company.
"One of these days you are going to get your due for being such a smart ass Marisa," Alice warned, focusing her blue eyes on the road.
"I know, just won't be today," The Herbologist replied casually, still grinning in that all-knowing way that she knew would get on Alice's nerves.
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"Marisa, you know how we never complain about your luck?" Alice shouted to her partner, who turned to regard her.
"Yeah?" The blonde replied, grinning as she pushed her sunglasses back up her nose and adjusted the position of her hat.
"I'd just like it known for the records that your luck has the absolute worst timing!" The Doll Maker replied, as she combat-rolled behind a produce stand to avoid being eviscerated by a set of sharp claws that had been swinging at her.
Of course the pair had been jumped while at the supermarket, and it wasn't just a lone Youkai attack.
This was a pack. An entire pack of werewolves, which were most likely related to the three Marisa had hunted down the previous night, now out for revenge for their brethren, and looking to turn the two girls into lunch.
"This is ridiculous!" Marisa cried, holding her hat tight as she danced out of reach of another wolf, between the shelves of several cleaning products "We have never seen a pack of Youkai attack such a high-traffic place, they are always preying on the weak."
"Maybe something happened that we haven't been informed of?" Alice suggested, upturning a table full of watermelon onto three wolves, thankfully distracting them for long enough for her to regroup with her partner.
"On the plus side," Marisa grinned, "At least all the normals bailed out the minute that first poor cashier got sliced and diced."
"Please don't make light the death of someone Marisa," Alice groaned, "and focus on us getting back out to the car."
"You won't get the chance, Youkai hunters!" one of the wolves growled, as four jumped down from shelves on either side of the pair, preparing to kill them.
"Rule #1 of dealing with Youkai hunters dog breath," Marisa said with a lazy grin, as she turned to regard her partner, who gave her a nod as they intertwined their fingers and Alice bent down, "Don't announce your attacks!"
Marisa was incredibly light, to the amazement of the rest of the company, and was easily moved around by much bigger, much bulkier members. Therefore, it was easy to do simple manoeuvres with even someone as physically weak as Alice.
Grabbing Marisa's wrist with her other hand, Alice used all of her weight to send Marisa flying in a wide arc, with the blonde's foot outstretched, and sent their attackers flying away, the pair grinning as one crashed into a tower of sugar bags, which exploded into a cloud of white crystals.
as the sugar cloud fell around the part of the store the pair were in, they took their chance. Landing easily from their impromptu manoeuvre, Marisa grabbed her partner's wrist, and led her outside, where the sun shone overhead tauntingly.
Noting the police had yet to arrive with some annoyance, it was only her intuition that saved Marisa's neck from a set of claws gunning for her, as she managed to roll out of the way of the largest wolf, obviously the pack leader, and took stock of the situation.
None of the wolves appeared injured, though one had sugar matting it's fur, and almost all of the pack had already managed to chase after them out into the parking lot, where cover was already scarce of all but a lone red car parked on the other side of the lot.
"I bet you regret not taking that spot closer to the store now, eh Alice-Chan?" Marisa teased, but was ignored as the pair began another mad dash towards their car.
"I will not let you get the chance hunters!" The pack leader shouted, and gestured for four of his mates to chase the pair, quickly gaining on them.
"What a day for me to not carry at least my handgun with me," Marisa groaned as the wolves caught up and prepared to feel the warm blood run between their claws.
Thankfully they didn't get the chance, as one wolf howled in pain and disengaged, a hole burned in where his ear used to be, causing the rest to falter for the moment.
"Who dares?" The leader growled, beginning to look around wildly, his nose high in the air as he tried to find his prey.
"Youkai Exterminator Co, at your service Okami-Chan!" a confident voice announced, causing all eyes to turn to the top of the supermarket.
First noticing the helicopter that someone had managed to land up there with some amusement, Marisa quickly made note of their support.
Standing with a long-range assault rifle resting against her shoulder was the Companies director, Reimu Hakurei, with her hair in...of all things a side-tail, in a Red-and-White sun dress that clashed with the high impact weapon she was cradling.
"Reimu, I have never been so glad to see you!" Marisa shouted, causing the brunette to grin in response.
"I'm hurt!" Reimu replied jokingly, "guess six years of friendship means nothing to you."
"Oh it means more than ya'll ever know!" The blonde replied.
"It doesn't matter how many you send, Youkai hunters, we will kill you all and make this city ours, for the blood of our fallen!" The leader growled, and once more charged the pair of magicians, but were suddenly stopped by a girl appearing in the way.
"Please Youkai-San, give me a reason to pull the trigger," A smooth, sophisticated voice asked, belonging to a silver-haired woman with twin braids, levelling a pair of handguns at the pack. beside her was a younger girl with matching hair, that had a sword strapped to her back, and was carrying a submachine gun.
"Hah, you believe your puny weapons can kill us!" One of the wolves said, stepping forward to regard the pair. It's fool head exploded as smoke and the smell of gunpowder wafted from the older girl's gun.
Taking their chance while the wolves were distracted, Marisa and Alice slid into home at the trunk of their car, and after fumbling with the keys for a moment, Alice got it open, revealing several black cases of varying sizes.
Casually unlatching the smallest case, Marisa popped it open to reveal two blue tooth headsets, which she plucked out of their foam holders. reaching over with one, she gently slipped it into her partner's ear and got it set up, while Alice made nice with a much larger case.
Revealing a close-range Assault rifle, Alice grabbed two magazines, ignoring her partner, and slid one in with practiced ease, and finished it's prep by turning off the safety.
In her ear, the familiar voice of Patchoulli Knowledge went through the teams normal testing phase, while Marisa got herself set up in the same manner as the blonde.
"What the hell is happening out there?" was the first question Patchy asked once she was sure the three were synched up.
"Got jumped by a pack of nasties at market, looking for revenge for their buddies the other night," Marisa explained, as she popped the locks on a very special case, with a magical array engraved upon it.
"Is that gunfire I hear?" Patchy's exhausted voice asked next, "You didn't leave Alice to deal with an entire pack by herself, did you?"
"Hey, what kind of partner do you think I am?" "Not a very good one." "No, we got a little angel on our shoulders, by the name of Red-White."
"The chairwoman showed up to bail your asses out of the fire?" the spotter clued in with exasperation, "How did she know to bring a team?"
"I'm assuming we'll find out once we get rid of these wolves," Alice said, taking over for her partner while she made final checks on her baby, sliding in a special magazine with a magical array inscribed onto it into the gun, before doing her final checks, "I'm sure that Hakurei-Sama will want a full debriefing before she returns to Gensokyo."
"Hai, just remember to keep safe you two, I would hate to have to break in two new friends," Patchy warned, and Alice noticed the stupid grin Marisa was now sporting as she pushed up her sunglasses and tipped the brim of her hat.
"Always a pleasure to have you as our guardian angel, Patchy-Chan," Marisa replied, before the two charged out from behind cover into the firefight, where the other girls had been making a mess.
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In the end, the two magicians hadn't really needed to get set up for the fight, as by the time the pair were ready, Reimu's team had already been mopping up the rest of the pack.
Now the group were driving back to the building in an awkward silence, the two silver-haired girls sitting in the backseat, the elder with her hands in her lap and straight backed, looking refined as ever, while the other was wringing her hands and taking nervous looks out the window.
"Geez, calm down Youmu-Chan," Marisa mumbled from under her hat, which she'd slid down to cover her face after a few minutes of reclining back in her seat, "It's not like we're going to get into an accident with Alice-Chan driving."
"Forgive her, we all know that Youmu-Imouto has always been a bit intimidated by the machinery of the new era," The refined older girl explained, making Marisa snort.
"Sakuya-Chan, despite you being from different timelines, we all know you are the better acclimated to this world."
"Indeed," The girl replied, and the rest of the trip passed in silence.
Marisa groaned as she got out of the car, and found her best friend waiting for her at the Garage door, hands on her hips and looking frustrated.
Obviously she had already checked in with Patchy, and the girl had informed her of the origin of this little blood feud.
"Before you say anything," Marisa began, but was startled when the brunette simply put a hand on the girl's shoulder, and gestured with her head into the building. Groaning and knowing that she wouldn't be getting out of this lecture, Marisa did as ordered, and marched back into her office, followed closely by Alice and the time-displaced sisters.
Knowing where the girl wanted them to go, Marisa lead the charge up to the girl's meeting room, where she could hear many voices, much more than the small strike team her friend had led could make.
'Oh joy,' Marisa thought, 'a full council meeting.'
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Is this a new series...err...I don't know yet. To be perfectly honest with y'all, this was not the story I originally set out to write. What I intended was a relatively simple RW AU romance between Marisa and Alice, with Patchy providing snarky comments. I don't even know where the Youkai busting came in.
For those of you that might be able to draw the parallel, yeah, this is relatively similar to monster hunter Gensokyo, by Achariyth1. But I will defend myself by saying it was not an intentional similarity. I was not in any way trying to copy that story, and what I came up with just ended up with the same base plot. There, I have now protected my ass from flak...theoretically, but I digress.
I would highly recommend reading that story too, since I found it fairly enjoyable, just be wary of the rating.
Anyways, besides a relatively short scene that I was hesitant to keep in (but ultimately did, because the humour outweighed the embarrassment), I think this made a relatively strong base for a new universe for me to work on in my free time, and left enough questions for you guys to ask to turn it into a full story when I feel like it.
No this will not be replacing Gensokyo Tenshi as my current Active story, I just wanted to write something different as a break, and seeing as how I'm ahead of schedule in regards to chapters of that story, I took the chance.
Feels nice to take a break once in a while from a scripted universe. Ja Ne!