Grey Eyes:
Since I was a child my parents taught me that I should not wander far away the village for too long if I'm alone and more if it's starting to get dark, but I was so curious that their warnings didn't stop me. You know how big the stupidity and curiosity of a teenager is.
Now I believe in their words…
After all they say that the curiosity assassinated the cat (or something, I really don't remember well) for nothing.
As I scratched and marked the bark of another tree with a rock I can't help but hope to see those little crosses when I get back, and the thought that I only have a pair of hours (if lucky) to do so until its completely dark send childs trough my spine. I'm starting to think that it's not good to be in this place at night.
But I can't go back now. Not that I'm so far.
I have been following this path since I left the western exit of the village for some time now, and even if it's a straight one I'm not taking risks. At the end, this land is full of dangers and surprises, some of them are very, very nasty ones.
When I was changing the position of my camera's bag from one shoulder to the other, one of the brushes on my right starts trembling. I froze on the spot as soon as I heard that only to found that it was just a wild rabbit that jumped back from where it came when it spotted me.
Letting my breath go slowly I cursed those idiotic dudes from the village. They're just a bunch of cowards. Big chickens who taunted me to do this. Now... why not them? Go and take it they said. It'll be fun they said.
Yeah, maybe it's awesome being outside here for once but still… the atmosphere at the moment, so silent, is strange.
My trip went almost uneventful only avoiding the fairies and some small youkai that were dangerously near me. The only thing that freaked me out was that I almost got caught on a ridiculously giant spider web that appeared from nowhere and almost got me. It was so strong that I couldn't even break it with a stick so I just passed next to it.
Mental note: I have to be more careful with each step or else I will end as a thing's supper.
Five minutes. Ten minutes. Twenty minutes.
Now I was starting to get bored and I'm just toying whit my kappa-made camera pressing buttons and stuff meanwhile I'm taking a little break on a rock. Isn't the outside more dangerous? Wasn't it supposed to be near the paths of the village? Well maybe my parents' and the old ones are overreacting with the dangers of the wilds and they just fear it because they were told to.
I mean, I have been outside the village for what seems to be like an hour now and I'm currently in what I think is the youkai forest and I still haven't been attacked, scared to the death (the spider's thing doesn't count!) or eaten as the others said it would happen to any innexperienced human that dared to get out the village or protected zones for more than twenty minutes.
With a loud sigh I just get up and keep walking and looking at my surroundings. This place is beautiful and breathtaking with all those colorful wild flowers, and with the yellowish glow of the twilight the view is more amazing than anything I can dream. And you know… I don't regret disobeying the rules. The sight it's completely worth it, but it would have been more appealing to me if I weren't so hungry and thirsty.
Damn! I should have taken some peaches with me... Oh well, what's done is done. Not complaining now, maybe I can find something non-lethal here.
Looking around I founded a healthy bush with some fruit and (surprisingly) completely alone. There was no treat near that I couldn't see on time so, why not?
Quietly I approached said bush and grabbed one of its fruits and took a big bait of it, to my surprise those where gooseberries but rather big ones.
I couldn't believe it! They were so tasty and juicy that I get satisfied quickly, but of course I completely soaked myself in fruit juice in the progress although that wasn't the major of my problems now.
While I was devouring the food I didn't notice that the faint light of the twilight light vanished and now I'm in the dark.
Althrought I'm not scared as I should be, I really think it's to go back now, I really need a good plate of food and my nice warm bed to relax from all the walking I've done today. I slowly take my oil lamp and quickly get light arround me while I clean on my clothes the sticky juices from before.
Hey! But maybe I can bring some photos from my trip to the village as I return. Yes! Show them that it's not as dangerous as they believed and that we can expand ourselves more witho-
ROOWL!
There is a piercing chirping sound from above the trees that scared me a lot for a second, but thinking about it I figured a little what could cause that sound. Just as the blood was drained from my face, a small tought passed my mind. I have been wandering outside for a long time where youkai, ghouls, foul magicians and stuff not human-friendly live so technically I should be dead by now, but then again nothing have happened. Still, the strange atmosphere is rather unnerving...
At the end of my small quarrel with myself, my final conclusion was that the thing that made the sound was probably just an owl or something just hunting near me. I have heard their cries at night on the streets and thet sound like that so I don't have to worry about it.
I don't feel secure in the forest anymore. Since the chirping noise I'm hearing things from the crowns of the trees behind me, like something is following me and worst of all is that the forest now is ominous quiet that not even the cicadas can be heard, this is so creepy.
But still, I don't dare to look back so I just press forward miraculously avoiding annoying fairies, even when one of them managed to make me drop my lamp leaving me completely blind. But I don't look back nonenthless. I fear if I do I would see an onryō, waiting for me to look at her and then curse me, thus cursing the whole villa-eek
A noise… no a voice is breaking the constricting silence of the forest. It's more like a soft chant from nowhere. Then I saw a light, a very dim one but a light is a light and if there is one near… then there has to be someone! Oh my God! Maybe that person would help me to get out of this forest for once, or at least pass the night safe!
I started to run faster trough bushes and trees, following a small path that would leading to where (I think) is the source of the voice; and I felt a little relieved as the thing in the trees started to act wildly, jumping to one tree to other in a crazed manner not following me anymore. Good, must be a person who is cleaning the area from the evil spirits. Probably the shrine maiden but I thought she was too lazy to do even an exorcism as the past maidens. Well maybe I was just prejudging her and her heritage…
Left and right, right and left. The voice is like anywhere, so weird but I don't care. I'm getting near it, I can tell because the light is getting brighter and I hear the voice more loudly than before so better continue to look for it.
But, now that I think about it, the light is not very strong. Rather a fainth glowing, like the one produced by fireflies... and now the voice I mistook for some kind of chant sounds more like… singing?
That did it. What was the reason for my little trip on the wilds in the first place…? The answer came a little too late. Shit.
I found it.
There it was, sitting on a branch comfortably and surrounded by those bright insects. It was with its eyes closed meanwhile singing a very vibrant and full of energy song with all its might.
The Night Sparrow was the only think crossing through my mind. What else could it be? The profile matched almost perfectly.
A terrible creature that uses screaming and singing as their attacks to blind a person completely, thus making said poor human a perfect target to other youkai (the carnivore ones) to stike... or just kill it with its claws opening deep and painful gashes while one is still alive and... Ugh! I shrugged at the possibility but still, instead of running the hell out of there I stayed on place like glued or something.
Stuck from the momentum I couldn't help but notice that it wasn't as physically terrible as everybody thought, quite the contrary. It… (Or I should say she?) Had a humanoid form, more like a girly one but it was so dark now I couldn't see anything else beside the frame of a human child thanks to the fireflies' light. I don't know why or when, but smehow I slowly reached for my camera and aimed it at her.
A short brief after I get astonished from the sudden scenario the song stopped. I was petrified now that I got concious again of my situation. What is going to happen now? Is she friendly? Will she kill me? Should I run? Lots of questions raced through my mind so fast that I thought I was going to pass away for an instant. Cold sweat started to cover my body and my clothes sending chills to my completely being.
The youkai didn't move from her spot, her frame was still sitting in that branch, but she opened her eyes. Those grey irises. I will never forget them; she was looking directly at me and I could swear she smiled at me too. A vile one.
I panicked a lot that the finger that was resting in the flash button pressed it accidentaly.
There was a flash, a horrible and piercing scream and in the next moment I found myself running like a mad through the forest whimpering in the way, with the scream of the creature never ending behind me.
Holy mother of God! I blinded a night sparrow with a flash! Nobody will believe this! Oh no, here she comes!
As I ran away I heard a great commotion behind me, like a predator chasing its prey in a bloody rampage while screaming like a mad child scratching and impaling the barks of the trees with what sounded like little knives.
I followed the path I think is the one from where I come from since the other thing that was following me with the fainth light of the fireflies that were oddly following me, but I couldn't see the marks on the trees. Even the temperature got lower. FUCK!, Just what I needed! Now I'm lost!
The screams of the youkai only increased in madness as I slowly started to get my vision darker, but I never stopped, maybe I crashed some trees but I got up very fast (God bless what addrenaline does to you) and never looked back. Not even when the screeches were getting near and near me. I don't know why but I could swear I could hear small faint child-like chuckles under the inferno the Night Sparrow was throwing at me.
Blood, gore, screams… Damn it! My grip on the camera tightens a lot that I remembered the existence of said item. I was about to use it to blind the Night Sparrow again but a root of a tre that suddenly appeared on my way made me drop it.
"No!" I screamed desperately. "The proofs!" I whispered almost without breath and felt tempted to go back for it but as soon as the idea stuck my mind, the faster it vanished when I was half blind. And the now growing chuckles didn't stop.
'I'm going to die; oh please I don't want to die!' Now completely blind, that thought acted like a mantra that gave me the will to continue running until the source of the screams reached me. Warm... I didn't felt pain or something else; I just lost conscious short after I hit the ground.
The sun's rays of the morning liked through my pain-filled body. The heck happened yesterday? As I slowly get up from the ground I notice something else aside the pain in almost every part of my body.
The first thing was that my clothes were scratched or torn badly, that I was all covered in mud as in injuries and that I was in the middle of what looked like a small garden.
No really… what happened? Did I go to one of the Osaka's parties or something? I groaned and hughed myself when I slowly got up to stop shivering. Man, sure it's very cold today.
As I looked at a small house something shiny on the corner of my vision caught my attention. Looking at it I inmediatly knew what it was as a familiar dread crepted to my heart and soul. It was… my camera.
"How… how did I survive?" I whispered flagbastered. Taking the camera from the floor I slowly check the compartment where the taken pictures stay storaged. I gasped when i saw small scratch marks arround it.
This is unreal!… I- I have to go home! My mother ought to be dying for worry. MY MOTHER! Holy... they're going to be veeery mad.
Walking through the village's streets with new clothes (thanks to the owner of the garden who gladly accepted to help me when I told him what happened to me) and after being badly chewed on by my family, I started to think about the facts while poking the camera again.
First I was being pursued by a deadly angry Night Sparrow youkai who caught me in the end... only to woke up in the backyard of a house near the west exit in a bad shape and with the camera that was supposed to be between bushes and trees' roots in the youkai forest's ground next to my body… so strange. It doesn't make any sense at all.
As deep in thought as I was I didn't notice the bunch of human-chickens that headed toward my direction. And even when they were walking by my side I didn't still acknowledge them until one of them took my beloved camera away from my reach.
As angry as I was starting to get, I got the feeling of recognition that I was willing to see in their faces whan i first accepted the bet. They will respect me from now and ever when I tell them about how I encountered, "saw", blinded and (for some reason) escaped away from a real night sparrow.
With a little cough I caught their attention and I make them sit down in circle on the floor while I was in the middle of said circle.
They didn't believe the story as expected so I took my trusting camera (again in my possesion) and I opened the compartment where the picture was. Slowly taking it from the compartment I show it first to them.
Their faces got all pale and their faces twisted so funny I couldn't contain a chuckle, and shortly after that they decided to leave me alone with a lame excuse. Ha! Take that chikens! Who is the coward now, hmm!?
That really helped me cope with my current situation, but now I was curious about what they saw to make those faces. And so I did the terrible mistake of look at the well illuminated picture for the first time. I would have preferred not to.
Here she (yes, definitely a she) was, fully exposed thanks to the flash of the camera.
She was indeed in the body of a young child with pale skin and hair with the color of a deep pink and she had small cute pink wings sitting on a brench on a tree. She was wearing a weird brown dress with some pink ribbons attached onto it as crossing it side by side, and with a silly hat included that had two little brown wings too.
She also had sharp-as-knives-nails that were so large that they were more like little daggers attached on her fingers; disturbingly, she was also smiling. It was a cocky grin more than anything that showed a small but sharp canines on the right upper front of her mouth; and finally there where her eyes, those grey shining cat-like-eyes that looked at me like the last piece of meat on a buffet even now framed on a picture.
And some other things apeared in the photo too.
Being her, looking just like a mere shadow, was the frame of another girl. This one was smaller and the only thing weird about this one (appart from being behind a Night Sparrow like flying with gleaming blue eyes) were some sticks that appeared to be on her back... and also there appeared to be a pair of two red and green orbs; one on the the crown of the tree and the others under it, almost in front of me. How I couldn't see them is anybody's guess.
I just gulped a very big one and walked home without another thought. I really needed to rest… and forget about going out the village ever again.
DISCLAIMER: I don't own anything of Touhou Proyect. It is from Team Shanghai Alice and this story was made up by me using the characters and places without persmission and has to be treaten as a piece of fiction.
The only thing that is mine is the nameless human.
(5/1/13) A new year need new beginning of things, or in this case new corrections.
After some months I decided to check this. My first fanfiction ever and to my surprise it was still kind of ambiguous so I read it all over again while adding things, correcting words and stuff. I may dare to say that this is one of my finest one-shots yet.
Well now, I added a small cameo of Team (9) [minus one...] because the "another bird-like youkai" from the scene of the fruit didn't satisfied me anymore, and all the… ahem… adventure our friend here had was just a prank gone wrong is a better way to explain how the human survived without having to add the: It's a Moriya Shrine's conspiracy, Yukari is fooling again and stuff.
I suppose lots of you already know but a"onryō", it's a type of ghost (usually a woman abused from his husband when alive) that seeks revenge and will cause illness, earthquakes and all those things to complete villages (the husband is not included almost every time) until the completely banish of said place or that there's a special ritual performed.
Heh… I still want to thank the people who leaved feedback back then when this was first published. Even if you don't ever read this again I still want to leave these thanks. You helped me in correcting the story's flow and lifted my spirits.
That's all, from me. If you want to leave a review or something to correct the story is up to you, but I would be very grateful if you do.
Well, see ya'.