~Author's Note~

I wrote this story for days four and five of the Gensokyo Festival, combining two prompts into one: "humans" and "youkai". The first half needed extensive rewriting, but all I really did to the second arc was give Kosuzu's mother a name. She is now Suzume, getting a bit of a naming theme going between herself and her darling daughter. She's a pretty good mother, all told.

~Tsukumogami Tshowdown~

"Ladies, my plan is beautiful and elegant in its simplicity." With a solemn frown on her face, Rumia jabbed randomly at a few scrawled chalk images on her battered old blackboard. "Firstestmostly, Kagerou jumps out of the reeds while one of the campers is having a bath. Secondestmostly, Sekibanki gets all her extra heads out and herds them back to the camp, where Wakisaki will decsend upon all the humans while wearing her kraken costume!"

Sekibanki, Wakasagihime and Kagerou shared a worried look.

"Thirdestmostly," continued Rumia, "once the humans' socks have all fallen off-"

"Eh?!" cried Sekibanki. "Uh, how…?"

"Because Wakisaki will have scared them off, silly," said Rumia, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "Anyway, with the humans de-socked, we chase them back to their village and force them to hide under their beds all night!"

"Excuse me, I can't hide in the reeds! I'll get dirty!" protested Kagerou.

"And my name's Wakasagihime," Wakasagihime pointed out.

"Is that so?" Rumia's brow furrowed. "Wacky… Saggy… Theresa May? No, that doesn't sound… Look, Kagerou, it won't be that bad! Reeds are usually clean."

"I'm talking about all the horrible, soggy mud under them!" Kagerou shuddered.

"So? Wear waders! Or just go naked." Rumia rolled her eyes.

Kagerou gasped. "N-n-NAKED?! They'll see me! All of me!"

"Well, with waders, maybe," began Sekibanki.

"They'll chafe!" wailed Kagerou.

"Not if you wear some nice cotton tights under them!" insisted Sekibanki.

"Or maybe I could hide in the reeds instead!" offered Wakasagihime.

"Would you?!" cried Kagerou, so relieved she could have died happily in that very moment.

"Or we could just naff off and read manga in Rinnosuke's shop." Sekibanki smiled naughtily.

"C-c-could we?!" gasped Kagerou, on the verge of fainting.

"Come on, will you?! I came up with a perfectly good… decent enough plan!" Rumia bristled, her lips pressed together in a fierce pout. "We can do this! You're the Grassroots Youkai Network, blood sisters who have sworn an oath to do all sorts of cool stuff together! And I am Rumia of the Night, she who brings the dusk and eats people! Sometimes with mustard!"

"I know, but… It's such a lovely day! I don't want to get covered in mud or beat people up! All I want to do is take a walk in the forest, curl up with a good book and maybe go out for a meal…" said Kagerou pleadingly. "We don't have to scare people every day, do we?

"That is NOT so! If humans stop being scared of us, we'll die, and that would ruin my day!" snapped Rumia, levelling an accusatory finger at Kagerou. "I can't believe you, Kagerou. You're a werewolf! I thought that stood for something!"
"Rumia, ease up on her, will you?!" Wakasagihime had been compared to the British prime minister more times than she could take. "The Grassroots Youkai Network isn't all about scaring people! We do some of that, sure, but sometimes we just like to chill out."

"Yep. I'm not even a member, they just let me hang out with them 'cause I bring peppermints," Sekibanki pointed out.

"I don't believe this!" Grief and anger collided in Rumia's heart. Tears welled up in the corners of her earnest eyes. "D-don't you have any pride?! You're youkai! The terrors of-of the night! You can't j-just… You can't!"

Rumia ran out over the dewy meadow, howling with misery.

After a few minutes, Sekibanki broke the silence. "Do you think the plan might've worked?"

"Maybe," said Kagerou. "Could've just hovered above the mud…"

Rumia trudged through the Forest of Magic, kicking at every stone or discarded piece of cardboard she found. She was soon left without a single toe unstubbed, but she was beyond caring.

What was the point in being a youkai if you didn't devote yourself to terrorising humans? All of Rumia's instincts told her there was none. By their very definition, youkai were the rivals of humans. To be anything else was to be a not-youkai.

Maybe the Grassroots Youkai Network weren't real youkai after all. Maybe, deprived of fear and conflict, they had turned into weak spirits of nature who couldn't hurt a fly. Maybe they all secretly wanted to be patted on the head(s) and informed, by humans, that they were good girls! The very thought of it chilled Rumia to the bone.

But then, what had become of the humans? They'd been getting bolder lately, and she apparently wasn't allowed to eat them any more. Rumia had only vague memories of her past, but she knew the golden age was coming to an end. What had become of Gensokyo? What had become of the ferocious monsters who once roamed freely from the Road of Liminality to the steps of the Hakurei Shrine? What had-

THUNK!

"Owwww…" Rumia staggered back from the tree she'd walked into. It wasn't a rare occurence for her, given that she cloaked herself in darkness all the time, but it still hurt.

"Um, hello? Are you all right?"

Rumia started. A young woman with short green hair and a cyclopean umbrella was walking towards her.

"Um, yes, thank you! I'm fine!" said Rumia, amazed. "What are you doing here, though?"

"Just taking a walk, plotting my next Incident…" said Kogasa casually, somehow managing to talk and lick her lips at the same time because it looked cute. "I was thinking I might make some tsukumogami dance along the walls. No-one gets hurt, but everyone gets nightmares!"

Rumia's eyes were sparkling. "Nightmares…? R-really?! You'd go to all that effort?!"

"Of course! I haven't scared anyone for days now. Got to pick up the pace," smiled Kogasa. "Do you want to come along? I could use someone with the power to control darkness…"

Rumia threw her arms around Kogasa's lower torso. "I love you, Kogasa! Please marry me!" she sobbed, nuzzling the karakasa's tummy. "Oh, this is going to be the best Incident in history!"

Kogasa stared for a few tense moments, then burst out laughing. "That it will, you funky little youkai, that it will!"

"Guys, guys, guys, watch this! Floating sake inside a floating glass!" Marisa clambered up onto the rustic pine table, stepping in Kosuzu's cheesecake and kicking over a couple of empty cups. She focused intently on the pint glass in her hand.

An awed hush fell over the table as the glass rose from Marisa's hand. The clear, faintly green drink rearranged itself into a thin cylinder and rose from the base of the glass.

"That'sh… That'sh amazhing!" slurred Reimu, wobbling on her stool. "C'n you… Ish it drinkable?"

"Sure. Open wide!" Marisa floated the cylinder of sake down to Reimu, who swallowed it and licked her lips.

Suzume Motoori rolled her eyes and took a steadying sip of tea. "You know, if I was a witch, I'd be doing a lot more than just drinking all day."

"Won't you give them a chance, Mummy? These are Gensokyo's greatest heroes!" said Kosuzu fervently. "They do a lot more than just drink."

"Well, yeah," nodded Marisa. "I train for, like, two hours a day, make magical gear, hunt for treasure, fix things for people, fight youkai, cook, go swimming…"

"An' I shometimesh take napsh," Reimu added, hiccupping loudly. "An' shweep the floor!"

"Fair enough," sighed Suzume. "By the way, Little Bell, your father might be coming home this weekend."

Kosuzu's face lit up. "Really? Did he get any new books?! Or sell any?!"

Suzume sighed. "If I know him, he'll have run out of books and money. I know he wants to spread the joy of reading around, but…"

"I know…" The cheesecake Marisa had stepped in represented a whole month's pocket money for Kosuzu. Her parents would probably have given her an actual wage if she'd asked for it, since she practically ran the shop, but she didn't have the heart to cut into the roof repair fund.

"And for my next trick," said Marisa loudly, "I'm going to do the impossible!"

"You mean buy my daughter another slice of cheesecake?" Suzume gave Marisa a very motherly look.

"Maybe." Marisa shrugged. "No, what I'm gonna do is make this table dance!"

Reimu, Kosuzu and Suzume grabbed their drinks and took a few steps back.

"Good thinking!" Marisa grinned. "All right. By the power of-"

"Hey, ishn't that… ishn't that hat-shtand danshing?" Reimu pointed a wobbling finger towards the doorway. A curvy wooden hat-stand was dancing a stiff jig, its three legs clattering on the floor and its crowd of hats fluttering like a ballerina's shoulder-pads.

Marisa yelped. "M-my hat! Oi, stop! Give me back my hat!"

As if it had heard her, the hat stand leaned back rammed its "head" through the door. It ran out into the street, trailing hats and splintered wood.

"Damn it… Come on, Reimu, follow that tsukumogami!" shouted Marisa, charging out of the door with hakkero in hand.

"You heard her! Let's go!" Kosozu grabbed her mother's hand and shot out of the pub.

"Ughhh… Night, everyone." Reimu curled up under the table and fell asleep.

On all the rooftops in the village, hundreds of tsukumogami were dancing up a storm. Pots and pans clashed together, brooms duelled with hoes and pitchforks, dolls danced with metal figurines and rode on toy trains, and at least one entire house was bouncing hard enough to shake the earth.

The noise was deafening, the crowds too curious to run away and too scared to ask any questions. Marisa elbowed her way through the throng until she came to the laughing karakasa and the generic darkness youkai at the centre of it all.

"Kogasa Tatara! I should've known it was you." Marisa whipped out a spell-card. "How dare you threaten the peace of our beautiful village?! You will pay for this!"

"Well, well, if it isn't the Ordinary Witch!" Kogasa laughed cruelly. "Do you really think you can stop me, Marisa?! All the powers of the night are with me!"

Marisa's eyes narrowed. "We may live in fear of you, but our hearts are pure and our spell-cards are strong! The Human Village will never give in! Kosozu, you deal with Rumia. I'll take the umbrella girl."

Kosozu gasped. "R-really? This… This is…!"

"Kosuzu, you don't have to. We've talked about peer pressure." Suzume took her daughter by the hand. "Come on, we'll get the guards-"

"This is SO COOL! My first spell-card duel, and the whole village is here! Kogasa and Rumia are scaring everyone, we're going to kick their arses, thereby fulfiling the need youkai have for conflict…! This is what Gensokyo was built for!"

"Um," said Suzume, "what?"

"Yeah, what are you… What are you babbling about? There are some things you don't exactly just say…" said Marisa shiftily.

"Uh…" said Kosuzu. She gave a quiet, nervous laugh. "Charge?"

Marisa nodded. "CHARGE!"

"Just get home safely," sighed Suzume.