Written Rivers
A Home Amongst Rivers
Chapter 3: Something Troubling
Steam billowed around him as a man with chin length, moss green hair that flowed with the breeze he caused as he stalked down the aisles of bathing stalls. He could hear the screams of his destination from the upper levels of the Bathhouse and it didn't seem like the staff was handling the situation well. He was getting quite tired of this, this was probably the third time alone tonight that he had to come help resolve a problem and they hadn't even been open for three hours. He turned another corner and his emerald green eyes fell upon the scene of six yuna and two frog spirits frantically trying to gather thrown supplies and food while trying to ease the distressed spirit in the bath tub. The spirit had a long nose and old, wise eyes with years of bags under his eyes, the lower half of his red face covered in a white beard that matched the wings that sprouted from his back, a tengu.
"I have never been so mistreated in my life! Is this the kind of service you give to a loyal customer? I come down the mountain and come here before anything else to make sure I am ready to my work and this is how I am treated? I never!"
The man with green hair sighed incredulously and walked into the bath stall. "Daitengu-Sama, I can not but her that there is an issue. Maybe I can be of assistance?" His tone was calm and even in an attempt to dispel the rage of the normally calm tengu. He had seen this tengu around the Bathhouse in the past, he normally spent his time in the mountains and only came down to the Bathhouse right before and after he had business in the Human World or elsewhere in the Spirit World.
The tengu's disdainful gaze snapped to the man who stood before him. "YOU are in charge here?"
The man stood tall and confident, unfazed by the tone the tengu took with him. "Yes, I am the head of this department in the owner's steed. I am Kohaku, if you have an issue with the way we are running the Bathhouse, please take it up with me rather than terrorizing my staff."
Taken aback by Haku's approach, the tengu scoffed after a moment. "I will have you know Kohaku-San, that I have been a loyal guest at this establishment for generations now and I have never received such poor service in all my time coming here!" His wings gave a flap of irritation. "Not a single one of your staff have been able to attend to any of my needs properly, the water is far below the temperature I demand, and your staff have done nothing by disregard and shown arrogance since I arrived!"
Haku gave a side glance at his staff that said he was going to have a word with them later. He sighed inwardly, this was not out of the norm lately. The Bathhouse was hitting a decline in service ever since Yubaba started acting up. She was a tyrant before but now she was just impossible, and her greed was far more conspicuous than ever. The last ten years were peaceful, in fact Yubaba was rather tolerable, especially since now Haku was working alongside her instead of directly under her. They had made an agreement to allow Haku to continue working at the Bathhouse but under the title of more supervisor of staff if anything. This allowed him to work freely and have some control of the Bathhouse and allowed him to visit his river as he needed.
Now this wasn't the river in the Human World, as far as he knew, that part of him was gone for good. However, he had another river counterpart in the Spirit World that he had found in critical condition after recovering his name. The Kohaku River flowed through the mountains of the north, holding an assortment of fish and other spirits. It was all he had left of his river and he intended to never leave it again.
However, that wasn't the focus of his attention at the moment. Due to Yubaba's recent tyranny, he'd spent most of his time during work hours cleaning up after her. Yubaba had become very selective with who was allowed in the Bathhouse, denying lesser spirits and only allowing those with money and power in. Not only that but, Yubaba's greed and negligence was causing a bad influence on the employees and causing them to have attitudes around guests and driving them away due to their poor customer service. Guests that had been loyal for years were either being rejected or leaving after receiving such poor care. The Bathhouse was losing guests and money, fast. Just like the tengu in front of him was threatening to do.
"On behalf of my staff and the owner of the Bathhouse, I apologize deeply for the inconvenience in our service has been." Haku bowed deeply in great apologize. "This is not the kind of behavior we condone here and will handle it accordingly. We will provide a refund and the proper service that you require." From his bowed position, he glanced at the yuna and slug spirits to affirm this statement.
The staff bowed and apologized in unison. "We are deeply sorry."
"I do hope that we will see you in the future regardless of today's behavior and that you will expect the same hospitality you have received in the past." Haku stood up straight.
The tengu spirit calmed and considered him, his wings twitching behind him. "I expect the best from this Bathhouse and I should see it in the future, or there will be no next time." His tone was threatening and cold, his old dark eyes flashing with resentment.
Haku bowed once more with a thank you and left the bath stall. He stopped outside the stall and looked down to Aogaeru the frog spirit and told him that he wanted a list of every staff that was attending to the tengu spirit on his desk by the time he got to his office later.
Haku went about his usual rounds throughout the Bathhouse, checking in with different departments, seeing that the service was still up to par and attending to any other issues guests were having with the service. Not all his confrontations ended the way it did with the tengu, a lot of them got far more heated and would result in the spirit leaving with a promise to never return.
He made his way down to the boiler room where he found Kamaji slaving away over his bench. Here, Haku fell gracelessly to a make shift bed of pillows he left on the floor behind Kamaji. This was his retreat space when he was done with the insanity that was called his staff and guests.
"Another rough night, Haku?" Kamaji gruffed as he ground up a pile of herbs.
"It just keeps getting worse, Kamaji." Haku exasperated, covering his face with his arm. Finally able to take a breath, he was able to let his mind wander away from the hustle of the Bathhouse and think about other things. With the recent events of the Bathhouse he was starting to be glad that he sent someone ahead of him to protect his precious friend. He grimaced at the thought of his friend. He hadn't contacted her in all this time and it weighed on his heart that he was no better than Yubaba in the department of negligence. But it was for the best, humans didn't belong here. But the touch of her hand was still on his fingertips and a promise that said he'd see her again echoed in his mind. He had even allowed himself to age like a human in the off chance he did see her again.
The door slid open, a brown-haired woman with a slim face poking her head through. "I knew I'd find you moping in here!" She announced.
Haku peaked from under his arm and grunted. "Hello, Rin."
"Don't forget about me!" A young boy poked from behind the weasel spirit with a toothy grin. The boy had pale brown hair the color of sand, pulled back in a small ponytail with the bottom half of his head shaven, his round, bright hazel eyes leaning more towards the color of green smiling at the dragon spirit. He skipped into the boiler room after Rin, carrying a red, folded, wooden umbrella.
Haku sat up and regarded the boy with a small chuckle. "Hello, Ame."
Ame was Haku's apprentice. Not long after he took on his new role in the Bathhouse, he found Ame in one of the more secluded areas of the Bathhouse and saw a spark in him he hadn't seen before and took him under his wing. Ame followed Haku EVERYWHERE, and was often sent off to help Rin with her rounds about the Bathhouse just to give Haku a breather from the eccentric child. Rin was now a step below Haku on the totem pole, she help organize things and handle employees and guests. She helped put out just as many guests fires as Haku did nightly these days. It was quite tiring.
Kamaji turned to Rin and grinned. "Break time!" All the susuwatari came running out of their little homes and dropping coal as they came to the center of the room where Rin sprinkled little star candies over them. Ame retrieved Kamaji and Haku's meal from Rin and gave them to their respective owners. The both thanked him and started eating, Ame plopping himself on one of the pillows beside Haku, cross-legged and humming a simple tune.
After Rin dumped the rest of the stars out of her basket she joined Haku and Ame on the pillows, letting out a sigh. "How many for you so far tonight?" She asked, stretching her arms.
"I have started to lose count." Haku mumbled, slurping his soup. "At least seven tonight alone."
Rin blinked. "Seven? I had five and I thought that was bad."
"It is not a competition, Rin." The dragon frowned.
"Yeah, yeah, I know dragon boy." Haku's brow twitched at the nickname but didn't retort. "How long is Yubaba gonna stay up there? I haven't seen her amongst the staff and guests for several days, maybe weeks?"
Haku finished the last of his soup and placed the bowl and utensils neatly in a pile. "I would rather have her upstairs and away from the guests and staff than causing trouble down here and losing more guests."
Rin looked at the rafters, nodding. "True. But what's causing her to act this way? We went a while without any trouble, what happened?"
Haku looked at his empty bowl and sighed before rising to his feet. "I wish I knew, Rin. I wish I knew." With that he thanked them and walked out of the room, returning to the chaos of the Bathhouse.
A/N: Hello everyone! He has made an appearance! Our friendly neighborhood dragon has returned! There seems to be trouble going on at the Bathhouse, what could be the cause of Yubaba's change in behavior? We'll have to see. We'll be seeing more of Chihiro next time!
I'm also going to try posting once or twice a week from now on. I'm not sure which days yet but I want to start building up a stock of chapters so that I never really fall behind on updates. I'll let you guys know. ;)
Don't forget to leave a review! A lot has gone into this project and I love hearing from you guys! God bless, KawaChou
