It was 3 in the morning but the lanterns were alight at the residential entrance of Myouren's temple. From the woods nearby, Kyouko could see Ichirin and Hijiri, standing outside.
They seemed to be waiting for somebody and Kyouko got a seriously bad feeling about that. The girl did a 180ยบ turn, suddenly willing to take her chances in the woods (maybe I can get to Misty's house and crash there, she thought). But instead the expected and by now comforting darkness, after turning around Kyouko found herself facing a pink cloud wall.
Unzan matter-of-factly picked the girl, dropped her before the duo at the entrance and then quickly escaped up. Ichirin's glare let the yamabiko know that they were in fact waiting for her. The nun angrily shoved a newspaper before Kyouko's face and of course it was the edition about Choujuu Gigaku's earlier show. Kyouko was covered in cold sweat and just stared at the older youkai in horror. Of course she hadn't changed her clothes after that night's show and was still wearing a metal studded, black leather mini-dress version of her normal clothes. Of course she hadn't washed the dark eye-shadow away yet.
Ichirin took the girl by the ear and the trio entered the temple. Inside, the scolding went for what seemed an entire hour. Kyouko heard the words "shame for the temple", "disappointment" and "absolute total disgrace" from Ichirin and "trouble for everybody" from Byakuren. Finally, that one sided-talk swerved into "severe punishment" territory, making the girl gulp down hard. Ichirin asked if Byakuren could take care of that, because the nun wasn't sure if she could do it and leave Kyouko in one piece. Byakuren told Ichirin to return to her quarters and meditate about how anger was one of the Three Poisons.
Byakuren turned to Kyouko and was about to take her to start the punishment right away when she noticed that Ichirin wasn't the only angry Buddhist in that room. Kyouko was trembling and silently crying, obviously cowed by the situation, but whatever her feelings were, she had a defiant expression.
Kyouko's mind was torn: By one side, she had loved the feeling of finally belonging to a group, something that she only knew after joining the Myouren temple. By the other side, being a punk rocker gave her a way of self-expression that was incredibly liberating for an echo spirit. Her friendship with Mystia and Choujuu Gigaku were less than one month old, but the yamabiko was sure they'd be forever.
Both the temple and Punk had been incredibly important in Kyouko's life, but she didn't know how they could coexist. Until that night, she had juggled her two lives with stealth and lies. But now the deception was over and she knew that she had to pick a path and abandon the other. A part of her life was surely dying that night, and that long, angry scolding had pushed her to make a choice: "If this is what they think of me, I'll show them!"
Byakuren cleared her throat and said: "Dear... Do you understand why I have to punish you now?"
"Yes! I do! It's unfair, but I'm powerless! Do what you want!"
If that aggressiveness coming from the usually sweet Kyouko startled Byakuren, the monk didn't show it.
"After causing all this trouble to your family, how can you still think this is unfair?"
"Just beat me until I'm all broken and then throw me away like you were planning to - FAMILY?"
The wall separating Kyouko's two lives cracked. Byakuren stared at the girl's confused face.
"Kyouko, nobody will throw you away. You're a precious member of the Myouren temple!"
"BU-BU-BU-BU-BUT AFTER ALL I DID!?" She pointed to the newspaper "HOW CAN YOU-"
Byakuren hugged her.
"You know... Murasa was a murderous ghost. Shou was dangerous to herself and others. Ichirin and Unzan bullied their way to power and richness. Nue is, well, Nue. If we were not serious about forgiving, we would not be together, today."
"Ichirin was so mad with me..." Kyouko still said.
"Indeed. But she's also the first here to forgive and forget. Tomorrow she may tease you after what you did, but her anger will be gone."
The two lives of Kyouko, that until a minute ago seemed separated by an impassable barrier, were very close now. So, the impression she had about these youkai was wrong, after all. They really cared for her. But there was a last hurdle:
"B-But punk music, Mystia and Choujuu Gigaku are really important to me! I won't abandon them now!"
"Well, I wonder if you can keep doing this, but all in a proper, Buddhist way..."
"I can't! Punk is the rebellion of the soul!"
Byakuren closed her eyes, inspired deeply, and tried to remember how she used to think when she was Kyouko's age. It wasn't fair to expect that the girl knew that not only 'rebellion', but also 'soul' were mere illusions. She said:
"Well... I think we can reach a compromise here, dear: You'll have to become very good at this, without allowing your temple duties to slide. I can't let certain people say that our temple is the home of lazy or inept youkai."
Then Hijiri opened her eyes, with a glare that made Kyouko sure that the mild-mannered monk before her was actually one of Gensokyo's main youkai powers, and raised her finger: "And you absolutely will find a proper place to play, because when you cause trouble for the others with these shows, this will happen:"
Facing the straw mat, draped over Hijiri's lap, Kyouko found quickly that Nue wasn't exaggerating when she described a spanking by Byakuren as "the worst goddamn thing in the universe." The punishment had barely begun and the yamabiko was already starting to cry aloud. At that point, Byakuren stopped and said: "Keep your voice down, dear. There are others still asleep and anyway, we don't want this room destroyed."
To Kyouko's credit, she took the rest of the spanking without rising her voice. Byakuren spanked her firmly, in her usual way (108 strikes) with her unpowered open hand. As Kyouko is a very young youkai, that was more than enough to reduce the girl to a sobbing mess. But even with all that stinging pain, Kyouko was happy, in a way that she didn't even considered possible. Her life was whole now.
Omake:
watch?v=3WyS4pE2YUk
The Stalin - bad quality recording of a legendary 80s japanese (all male punk) band, so beware.
Since Gensokyo mainly gets what we forgot or that entered the realm of legends, I went way back to find Mystia and Kyouko's references. I imagined the two girls first meeting at Kourindou, then finding a common interest in music, and then discovering moldy K7 tapes from The Stalin and The Star Club in a cardboard box labeled "OUTSIDE WORLD SONG RECORDS - (outside world magic required to play). "
The girls buy the tapes and take them to the kappa, who complain that those could be better used to record software (kappa's most advanced hardware are salvaged and magiteched late 8 bit / early 16 bit era computers) but build them a K7 player in exchange for free beer at Mystia's stand.
They head back to Mystia's hut and finally listen the music: And it completely blows their minds. It can be barely called music and it's completely different from everything they ever heard in Gensokyo. But still, they can't stop listening to it.
Do kids these days still experience this kind of discovery? Listening to music that's completely abhorrent for your parents is something like a rite of passage.
_cf
