11:01 PM – The Indefatigable Liver of Sakuya Izayoi
The thing that united Gensokyo, the thing that really tied it together, the thing that made it work, Reimu had once philosophized to Marisa after one of the shrine's many drinking parties, was alcohol. Humans and youkai were bitter enemies in the outside world, and even in Gensokyo, there were plenty of old wounds that kept them wary of one another. But everywhere humans and youkai spent time together, there was alcohol to ease things along.

Nowhere was that more obvious than in the human village. By day, only the occasional youkai visited. By night, though, the bars had almost as many youkai as humans, and sometimes Reimu suspected that half of the humans were just tanuki and kitsune in disguise. Tonight, the youkai had turned out even more than normal. At first, it was just the occasional familiar face peeking into see if the rumors about Sakuya taking a break were true, but nothing drew a crowd like a crowd, and soon things had taken on a life of their own.

The bar that Sakuya had chosen was now packed with easily forty guests... tanuki, kitsune, tsukumogami, beast youkai, hermits, and, somewhere in the mess, the handful of humans too reckless to be driven off by all of this. After a couple of hours of drinking, Reimu had retreated to a slightly calmer corner with Sakuya, but the place was still loud. In the center, somebody had started an impromptu arm wrestling competition, and it looked like the current match was Shou versus that damn Taoist's jiang shi.

A cheer went up through the crowd as the tiger accidentally tore the zombie's forearm off in her victory, and in the lull that followed, Reimu tried to rekindle the conversation. "So is this..." She gestured broadly at the room around the pair, and accidentally slapped a passing fairy in the face in the process. Reimu continued, undeterred, and the fairy sulked off. "Really what you wanted t'do with your night off? You never really seemed like the... the..." The shrine maiden propped her face up with one elbow and hiccuped. "The drinkin' type to me."

"There's nothing wrong with a drink now and then, but my duties usually require me to be sober."

"Seems like a... a weird... weird... weird..." Reimu trailed off mumbling and took a sip of her drink while she tried to remember how she'd planned to finish that sentence. "... weird way to spend your only day off in. In like forever."

"Perhaps." Sakuya sat back and folded her hands in her lap. She smiled as she looked out over the crowd. "But I can stop time. There's very little that I can't do at the mansion. I can pause time and take an afternoon walk. I could take a break in the middle of making dinner and read half of the world's literature, if I really wanted. ... but leisure time I can share with others, that is rare."

Reimu had been listening as attentively as she could, but now let out a strangled gurgle. "Might throw up."

"If you do, I'm not going to clean it up."

"Mmmdooooon'tcare," Reimu slumped down in her seat and rested her head on the table, smiling blissfully. Another round of shouts rose up from the center of the bar as another arm wrestling match ended, and by the time the noise subsided, her stomach was calm enough to speak again, albeit with her face smushed against the table. "How come you're not drunk? You had 'smuch as me."

As if to taunt her, Sakuya emptied her current glass before replying. To further delay things, a waitress showed up and sat a plate of yakitori in front of her. Even drunk, the sight of the maid being waited on struck her as bizarre. Only after she'd taken her first bite did Sakuya finally respond, "A maid should be elegant at all times."

In her current state, Reimu found the explanation hilarious, and laughed unsteadily as she grabbed one of the skewers from the plate. She waggled it at Sakuya as she spoke. "I 'unno how eleg... gele... lelegant," she tilted the skewer back and plucked a piece of chicken off, then swallowed it before continuing. "Drinkin' with a bunch of youkai is."

"Maybe living in Gensokyo has gotten to me," Sakuya conceded. The two sat in silence for a few minutes, just watching the crowd as the yakitori disappeared slowly, until Sakuya turned back to Reimu. "I need to be back by midnight, so I can't stay much longer, I'm afraid. … will you be okay flying home alone?"

Reimu snickered and stabbed a now-clean skewer into the air. "Isn't any youkai thassgonna... gonna pick a fight with me."

"I'd be more worried about flying into a tree..."

"'m fine, I'm fine," Reimu grumbled. She pushed herself up to sitting and did her best to act completely sober. She wobbled a bit too much to sell it, though, and Sakuya did not seem convinced. "... 'f I still don't feel okay before I'm ready to go home, I'll go to Kourindou, okay?"

Sakuya maintained her skeptical look for a moment, then accepted this argument with a slight incline of her head. "Okay. I guess it's no concern of mine if you fly into a tree, anyway." Reimu's head was already resting against the table again, but she could hear the clink of a stack of coins settling down next to her. "That should cover both of our meals."

"Mmhm."

"Thank you for the company tonight. Now then, if you will excuse me." Sakuya dipped a casual bow to Reimu, and with that, turned to pick her way through the crowd and back toward the mansion.

It was a warm night, and even more than she had on the trip to the village, Sakuya took her time and enjoyed the ambiance. A full moon peeked through the gaps in the trees above, and the distant sound of birdsong made the walk even more pleasant. Sakuya sensed a few youkai peering at her from the underbrush... but this close to home, most of them knew better than to antagonize her.

The first sign that something was out of the ordinary was when she reached the front gate. Meiling wasn't standing guard outside. Anywhere outside, and it was nowhere near her break time. Frowning, Sakuya slipped herself past the gate and made her way inside... and instantly realized that something was very wrong. The great hall looked like half of the mansion's items had been dumped in it. Dozens of articles of clothing were strewn across it. Somebody had splashed chocolate pudding up the wall. A morningstar was embedded in a watermelon in the middle. A pile of curtains sat near the entrance, and as Sakuya passed, it twitched. A fairy maid peeked out and, seeing Sakuya, shrieked and took off running.

In the blink of an eye, Sakuya was behind the fairy and holding the collar of her outfit. The fairy went sprawling to the floor with an 'oof!' and looked up, whimpering. "Th-they said you were gone!"

"I was. I'm back now," Sakuya said levelly as she hauled the fairy up to eye level. "... what happened here?"

"We were havin' fun, and, and..." The fairy trailed off, still sniffling in terror. "Everybody else did it! I didn't do nothin'!"

"I didn't say that you did. Where is everybody?"

"They're all in the library..."

Sakuya nodded and lowered the fairy to the ground. "I'm going to check on them... you get to work cleaning this mess up."

12:11 AM – 47 minutes after the explosion
The explosion had blasted out enough force to knock everybody to the floor and send drifts of loose paper cascading across the library, but it was ultimately designed to be nonlethal. Remilia and her fairies had ended up in a great pile outside the door, Marisa was sent skidding a dozen meters into the library, Patchouli and Flandre had fallen to the ground... but everybody was alive and in one piece.

Patchouli had tried to tell everybody to go elsewhere, but after the explosion the crowd—two dozen fairies, two vampires, a gatekeeper, and a shamefully unabashed human thief—had been too noisy for her to get anybody's attention. Somehow, they'd settled into Gensokyo's default response to excitement: a drinking party.

All of the tables of the library had been pushed together, and somebody had produced a dozen bottles of liquor from who-knew-where. At first, Patchouli had hurried around, trying to stop the fairies from using ancient tomes for coasters and napkins... but it didn't do much good. Now, at Remilia's insistence, she was seated at her friend's side, sullenly sipping at her own glass of wine.

Two fairies ran by, with one smacking the other over the head with volume 2 of Intermediate Principles of Cleromancy, and Patchouli reached over to yank it out of her hands. This was ridiculous, truly. Even Marisa, who had caused half of this mess, was somehow now seated at the table. As Patchouli watched, Remilia reached across to top off the magician's drink, and the pair settled into their seats, both laughing.

"Remi. Don't you think that this inappropriate behavior will only encourage the fairies in the future?"

"Huh?" Remilia cupped a hand to her ear. Or tried to, at least. In her current mostly-drunken state, she smacked the side of her head once or twice before finding the right spot.

Patchouli sighed. Those closest to the explosion had been left temporarily near-deaf, so the conversation was taking place at volumes usually reserved for screaming matches. It only added to her annoyance. "I SAID THAT THIS BEHAVIOR WILL ONLY ENCOURAGE THE FAIRIES IN THE FUTURE."

"HUH?!" Remilia strained forward, still cupping her hand to her ear.

Before Patchouli could decide whether this conversation was worth continuing, the library's doors swung forward with a loud creak. She was surprised that they could move at all—they were lightly charred, missing a chunk where the lock should be, and hanging crooked. But open they did, revealing Sakuya, now back in her maid uniform.

A combination of cheers and screams of terror went up from the group—the former from Remilia and Flandre, the latter from Marisa, Meiling, and the fairies, as they suddenly decided that they had other places to be. Like hiding behind bookcases or making a break toward the still-open skylight.

Remilia barely waited for the clamor to finish before she raised her glass. "Sakuya. A bottle of the 1923 American for myself and Flandre, and two bottles of the Malvasia Bianca for our guests."

Sakuya didn't miss a beat, but Patchouli still caught the hint of a smile at the corner of her lips. "Of course, Lady Remilia."

As simply as that, Sakuya resumed her duties. Within an hour after the first fairy straggler left the library, the mess from the impromptu party was cleaned up. By the next morning, the hallways were clean, and by the next evening, the doors to the library were replaced by a team of human craftsmen from the village. Barely missing a beat, normal life in the mansion resumed.