Discaimer: Wait, that's no toad! That's a space station! Touhou belongs to Zun.
A/N: Last time, on Touhou Z- I mean... Ohh, never mind... On with the show!
A/N2: This chapter turned out a great deal larger than usual, huh?
High noon, Aya's house:
As the sun was reaching the center of the sky, Aya's eyes slowly fluttered open. Aya had awoken to her little bug wedging her face between the fleshy mounds that adorned her chest. Were they so comfortable, that the bug had to seek them out every time they slept in the same bed...? Not that it was an uncomfortable feeling, au contraire, it was a pleasant little snuggle. ...A snuggle that would be quite hard to escape from, realy. Wriggle had her face wedged between the crow's breasts, legs hooked behind the bird, and an arm around her back, and wasn't going to let go any time soon. She seemed dead set on not letting her escape, so Aya simply got up with the girl still glued to her, and began to dress as much as she could, which left her entire top half in a state of undress. Making her way to the kitchen, she started on yet another egg brunch. Aya made eggs most every morning, lest she run out of room to store the things. The ice box was the second best gift Nitori had ever given her. First prize goes to the camera. Aya could feel the eggs building up inside of her, as she hadn't had a chance to lay them in days. If she didn't let them out some time soon, she just might pop! ...Or, simply start to look like a pregnant human... Heck, her abdomen was already lightly swollen from no less than twenty eggs!
Aya began to let out a sneaky little smirk. If the bug was going to sleep through being carried around, perhaps she could lay them right now! ...But if Wriggle did wake up, the bird just might die or embarrassment. Yyyyeah, she would just wait untill she was atleast not stuck to Wriggle. Before she knew it, the eggs were finished cooking, and Wriggle's nose began to sniff the air, before she suddenly flopped to the ground. Aya had been proven right, it would seem! That would have been a horrible time to lay eggs, indeed!
"Owww... Ehh? Ohh, hey Aya! ...Why are you only half dressed?" Asked the groggy little bug, before a plate of eggs was shoved towards her, which she gladly took. Wriggle momentarily dug in before the draft she felt made her realise she was even less dressed than Aya, and still slightly sprawled on the floor after her tumble, which left her in a rather embarrassing pose. she flew quite zippily towards Aya's bedroom, and got dressed in an embarrassing little flash. Aya couldn't help but giggle to herself at her lover's shocked face, while doing so quietly enough so as not to alert the cute little bug in the other room.
"You alright in there, Wriggle?" Asked Aya with a shout, while trying her best not to laugh.
"W-w-why would you carry me about while I'm in such a state?" Demanded the little bug, who had just popped out of Aya's room.
"But Wriggle, you were the one latched onto me! Your legs were locked behind my back, an arm around my waist, all to keep your face within my modest bust!" Countered Aya, which made the bug redden with every detail. Had she realy... had her face between those huge things...? Wriggles cheeks reddened further, due to being able to imagine it perfectly, Aya's lack of a blouse only helping.
"A-a-aya, why are those still out, anyways...? G-get dressed!" Asked wriggle, while pointing to Aya's breats, while trying her best to look away, and failing, but it was the thought that counts, right?
"Hmm? Ahh, I guess you're right! Now that you've let go of me I can get dressed!" Replied Aya, before casual walking off to fetch the rest of her clothes. As she walked away Wriggle began to think about what had transpired the day before. What is Mugenkan, and why would the flowers talk about it? Flowers only talk to Yuuka, don't they? And even then, Yuuka had seemed to talked to them, while nobody else heard the flowers. Could it be that they had to shout to be heard by other? Or maybe... That's it! It was because they all spoke it once, wasn't it? Even with them all speaking, it was still like a loud whisper. If the flowers would try this hard to get a message across, something just had to be up!
Aya stepped out of her room, with a light blush on her cheeks, and a blanket full of eggs in her arms. Had Wriggle not been so deep in thought, she might have noticed Aya placing the two dozen still warm eggs in the ice box. Thankfuly, she had not, or she may have passed out at the realisation of why Aya had taken so long.
"So, shall we get going to the shrine? You must still be worried sick about Yuuka, right?" Asked the Tengu, who had a sticky blanket folded in her arms. The blanket was the one she used to dry off her eggs, time and time again, so one would expect such a thing from the blanket. Before Wriggle could turn around, Aya had her body pressed against the bug's back, and her free arm used to comfort the sad little bug with a hug. Wriggle began to cry anew, after such gesture of comfort was recieved. By the time she had stopped crying, she noticed that she had been picked up by Aya, and the Tengu had already flown them half way to the Hakurei shrine.
"I can't stand seeing you in such a state, you know... So I'll do my best to put a smile on that pretty face of yours, alright Wriggle?" Promised Aya, before she wiped the tears of Wriggle's eyes away. Before they knew it, they had arived at the shine. But something was off. The grounds had not been swept all day, and it didn't have any sign of the voices of Reimu, or Marisa, the latter of which visited at about this time each day. Reimu was lazy, but she would motivate herself to atleast keep the place in order due to the belief that 'nobody will donate to a shrine in disarray.' Something wasn't right, at all. They searched the grounds for about twenty minutes, but found nobody, not even the drunken moocher.
"A-aya..." Said Wriggle, who had a terrified look on her face.
"Yeah, I know... It's just like the garden... There are no signs of any life, beyond plants, in the entire area..." Answered the bird, while deep in though. They would have to check more locations to be sure, but she hadn't noticed anyone at all, the whole flight. Usualy there were atleast a few fairies that would try to take her down. Not even a single fairy had confronted her.
"W-what do we do? Who else could we ask to look into the matter?" Asked wriggle, who kept looking around, as though expecting to be attacked by whatever it was that could spirit away the shrine maiden.
"What else can we do? We begin to look into this, ourselfs. First, lets start with places that are close by. You take the forest of magic, I'll take Moriya shrine, as I'm faster, and we meet at Eintei. If one of us has yet to arive, perhaps whatever took out Yuuka, and the Maiden, had taken out one of us. I'll look for you, and you look for me, if either of us doesn't show, alright?" Ordered Aya, before looking to Wriggle for confirmation. Wriggle nodded, and with that the both of them split up to look for anyone that might be around.
Wriggle's POV:
I flew around, looking through the forest of magic for a bit, before coming upon one of the two houses that were within it. Knocking on the door of the puppeteer's house, I opened the already unlocked door after having waited a good minute. The walls were lined with hundreds of dolls, all staring towards me. As one, they began to speak. 'Help mama,' was all they said, before they slumped back to un-life. I took that fairly startling event as a sign that Alice was missing as well, and began to look for Marisa's home.
After a fairly long time I gave up on finding the other home, and took off, with Eintei as my destination. Not once this whole time had I heard the sounds of the local insect life saying their usual greetings to me. It would seem that even the insects are missing. Just what had the power to spirit away millions, if not billions of insects? This was starting to seem hopeless, but I kept going, in hopes of finding someone, anyone at all would do!
Before I knew it, I had arived at the bamboo forest, and began my search of it from above, so as not to get lost myself. I heard the sounds of life! It was small, but it was still there! There was someone here, whether that was good, or bad, was far less easy to tell. Was Aya already here? Or, maybe another? Could it be the culprit? I began to fly towards the sound, looking for sugns of anyone being around, while being as stealthy as can be.
Suddenly a rain of fire balls began to pelt the area next to me, and I looked up to find the one who I was attempting to sneak upon, glaring at me from above, and was not at all happy.
"You... have five sh-shecondsh to shtate... your cashe, before I... incinerate you, youkai." Spat out the guardian of the forest, Fujiwara no Mokou. She looked quite angry, and just as drunk.
"W-w-well, I'm l-looking for anyone th-that hasn't vanished! Yuuka, the Red-white, the Black-white, a-and the puppeteer all seem to have. Next, I figured I would check Eintei...!" I shouted with a hint of fear to my voice, while stuttering and backing away from the immortal girl slowly.
"Ohh... W-well, don't... don't bother with Eintei. You can... add them to the lisht of those mishing, I've been... looking for that bitch, Kaguya, since the early mornin... I'll join up with you, help you look for othesh..." Stating the drunkenly slurring Mokou, who looked about ready to vomit, and she did just that, before looking fine. It would seem that she had forcibly expelled the toxins from her blood... How... useful, yet disgusting.
"Alright, my next destination is meeting up with my partner, Aya, at Moriya shri-." I stated, before I was interupted.
"First we check the human village, won't take long. Just a quick once over." Stated the now sober Mokou, who couldn't simply desert the helpless humans. The one time she had tried, five of them got lost in the forest, and nearly starved to death. If what I had said was true, the human village was bound to be empty, though.
"A-ahh, okay." I said, with hesitation in my voice. To delay any longer could cost Aya her life, but If Aya couldn't fight off something, neither could I, especialy without being able to call upon the bugs for help. The short fused immortal would be vital, if I wanted to stand a chance.
As we did a once over of the human village, the streets were completely empty of the usual hustle and bustle of life. All that remained was the buildings. Mokou quickly flew into the school, just to be sure history wasn't being hidden, before she came back out.
"Alright, let's go, bug." Said the visibly irritated Mokou, who was now quite motivated to help out by the lack of one of the few people alive that she looked forward to seeing. With that, we began to fly towards youkai mountain, and the Moriya shrine, near the summit of the mountain. By the time we had arived, the sun was already beginning to go down in the sky. We heard voices from within the shrine, so we kicked off our shoes and entered the shrine. Within was Aya, who was being forced to dress in one of Sanae's spare outfits, by a pair of crying gods. Aya looked as miserable as could be.