The rabbit-eared girl suffered a particularly rude awakening. She lay in a rather shallow crater, about twice her height in diameter, feeling as if she'd taken solid rock to the skull. She had, and at rather high speeds, but hadn't the presence of mind to recall this. Her clothes were charred by their trip through the atmosphere, though miraculously they were not even completely destroyed. All in all, she was in surprisingly good condition for someone who had just pretended to be a meteor. Her most pressing issues at the moment were severe bodily pain, a good deal of dizziness, and cluelessness as to where she was and what had happened.
She made an attempt to rise. She failed. Her body was about as compliant as a napping cat. Mustering the little energy she had left, the most she could manage was to drag her upper body out of the small hole in the ground, giving her a chance to properly check her surroundings. They were quite unlike anything she was used to seeing. She immediately noticed the ground was covered by a soft, green material. Closer inspection, which she performed easily while having her face effectively shoved in the stuff, revealed the material to be composed of a very large number of individual little green blades emerging from the ground. She vaguely recognized it as grass, something she hadn't much personal familiarity with. The smell of it delighted her, and in her daze she spent a minute with her face buried in the grass.
Remembering her predicament, she turned her attention away from the plant life to try and scan the area beyond what was immediately in front of her face. The most prominent things she noticed before her were thick brown shafts protruding from the ground, their tops covered with green foliage – trees, she reminded herself – and a towering mountain some distance away. Also of interest to her was the sky, which was a tint of blue and decorated with little white puffs and wisps. Normally a completely mundane sight, but the girl's eyes lit up with amazement upon noticing it. For a moment, pain and confusion were shoved aside in her mind to make room for feelings of wonder.
Her mind and body slowly kicking into gear, she managed to drag her entire body out of the crater, and even found the strength to roll over and lie on her back. The view was even better from this position: her entire field of vision was painted blue, and the glare of the sun hardly bothered her as she enjoyed the sight – until she noticed the humanoid figure floating directly above her. Had she the energy, she would've jumped in surprise, but all she could manage was a Squeak!
The airborne one, apparently having been waiting to be noticed, cautiously descended towards the prone rabbit-girl. The grounded one felt a sudden surge of panic – she wasn't quite in a position to defend herself if this stranger proved hostile. As the stranger approached, though, she didn't seem to be giving off an air of malice. Trying to muster up some optimism, the bunny-girl struggled to bring the upper half of her body upward so that she was in a sitting position. She studied the stranger as they touched down from their flight, and the stranger likewise observed her.
She – at least, the bunny-girl thought they looked female – was clad in a white vest with red trimmings, adorned with a ball of fluff near the collar, and wore detached sleeves of the same color. She had on a long skirt, still billowing in the wind caused by her descent, colored black at the top and red towards the bottom. On her head of short white hair rested a tiny red hat, along with a pair of canine ears – something the rabbit-eared girl failed to find particularly strange. What did catch her attention was the menacing blade sheathed across the stranger's back, which appeared large enough to easily sever a neck or two. She resolved to not be alarmed unless it was actually drawn.
"Uh… are you okay?" the dog-eared-girl asked, extending a hand to help the other girl up. She accepted, letting herself be pulled off the ground. She soon found that her legs weren't yet content with the idea of supporting her weight, however, and almost collapsed before the stranger caught her in her arms.
"Guess not," dog-ears observed. "Guess I should've expected that, considering how you crashed…"
The observation suddenly stirred a cog in the bunny-girl's mind, and suddenly thoughts began flooding in.
The moon. War. Comrades dead. Had to escape. Escape to Earth…
After a moment of silence, the bunny-girl had regained her composure. She slowly released herself from the embrace of the stranger, now feeling able to at least stand without her legs giving out.
"Is… is this Earth?" she managed to ask, her voice weak and strained.
The dog-eared girl blinked, perplexed.
"Um, yes?" she responded following a few seconds of confusion.
"Where on it?" the bunny-girl asked, wobbling a bit from physical weakness but her voice now carrying some hint of passion. The stranger considered her for a moment, and then began to answer.
"You're in a place called Gensokyo," she said. "I'm sure you must have a lot of questions – I'm pretty confused now myself – but I think we need to get you some help."
Once again, she offered her outstretched hand. As the bunny-girl warily accepted it, dog-ears gave her a recommendation to "Hang on tight," and proceeded to pull her into a bodily embrace. Before the bunny-girl had time to be surprised, she was lifted into the air as her carrier ascended to the skies again, moving with the speed of a powerful gale. She obliged and gripped tightly, having no desire to experience another fall from high altitudes.
"Who are you, exactly?" the bunny-girl almost screamed so that she'd be heard over the rush of the wind. High-speed flying has a habit of getting the adrenaline going.
"Name's Inubashiri. I'm a tengu of the youkai mountain," she answered. "Though, since you had to ask about what planet you were on, I guess you might not know what any of that means," she added. "Anyway, I'd really like to know who you are, but I'll hold the questions until you're all patched up."
The bunny-girl felt a vague sense of relief. It seemed that, at the least, she'd been picked up by a relatively kind person. She'd had a fear that she would've been captured by humans following her arrival – she's heard stories on the Moon of what they did with extraterrestrials. Given her relative security for the moment, she decided to drop her wariness. Despite the exhilaration caused by the flight, her body and mind remained fatigued, and she slowly allowed herself to be taken in by the maws of sleep as the tengu carried her towards the mountain she had spied earlier.
This time around, the bunny-girl awakened to the sound of scurrying feet and rushing water, feeling absolutely blissful compared to when she lay in the crater. She'd been asleep on a makeshift bed of leaves, on the bank of a river. Compared to where she'd been previously, the concentration of trees was much thicker. Looking at her own body, she noticed she'd been stripped of the top half of her uniform, with her torso and arms now being covered in bandages. She found herself able to sit up without immense effort or pain. Turning her head to survey the scene, she suddenly heard the sound of something dropping, following shortly by a young girl's shriek.
She tried to stand as she turned to face the direction of the noise, but the sudden motion produced a sharp pain in her side. She fell to one knee, wincing in pain and failing to get a proper look at her company as they dove into some nearby bushes. The object she'd heard drop – a hand-woven basket – lay nearby on the ground, its contents of herbs scattered around it.
Before the bunny-girl had time to be confused, she heard a rustling in the bushes, and a small head peeped out from the leaves. She was being stared at by a pair of frightened blue eyes, on a head the size of a child's. Adding on to the childish appearance were the pigtails into which her blue hair was tied, and the green cap she wore. The staredown continued for a few seconds, at which point the blue-haired girl began cautiously exiting the bushes. Now being able to see her entire figure, the bunny-girl thought she looked even more childlike: she wore a blue dress reminiscent of a kindergarten uniform, and even carried a backpack. Her height, or lack thereof, didn't help either.
Neither of them spoke as the blue-haired girl collected the herbs she had dropped and placed them back in her basket, blushing furiously as she did so. Finally, having gathered her things, she managed to face the injured girl and say,
"I-I'm sorry. I didn't expect you to be awake yet, so I was startled," her voice being at such a low volume that the other girl probably wouldn't have even heard her without her superhuman ears.
"Are you the one that patched me up?" the bunny-girl asked, looking back at the bandages on her body. The blue-haired girl nodded in confirmation, coming closer with her basket of herbs.
"Guess I owe you, then. You did a really good job, too," she started saying, but opted to stop when she noticed her praise was making the girl even more flustered. "Where's that white-haired girl from before? The one that carried me here," she asked, trying to change the topic.
Apparently happy to no longer be the subject of conversation, the blue-haired girl pointed towards higher up in the mountain, seemingly towards a waterfall.
"Momiji said she had to go report back to the other tengu, since she was on a scouting mission in the first place," she explained. "She asked me to take care of you until she could get back."
"I see," the bunny girl responded, slightly worried about what this "reporting back" might imply. She certainly didn't want to have a lot of attention drawn to herself in her current state.
The blue-haired girl had now awkwardly taken a seat beside her, and offered forth the basket she was carrying. The bunny-girl took them, and offered a puzzled look as she did so.
"Uh, I'm not an expert on this kind of thing, but those herbs should help your bruises heal if you make a paste out of them…" the blue-haired girl explained, looking at her own lap more than towards the person she was talking to. "I could apply it for you if you want, but I guess you can do it for yourself if you want, so, uh, just do whatever you want…" she continued. The bunny-girl was inclined to think she was embarrassed about touching her now that she was actually conscious. Earth creatures are strange, she mused to herself.
Grabbing a handful of the thin leaves, she began to press them between her fingers until the herbs became a green mush. She gingerly rubbed her fingers on any visible bruises she could find on herself, while the blue-haired girl watched from the corner of her eyes. Despite the shyness of her company, the bunny-girl felt it might be good to try and learn what she could from her.
"Are you a human?" she inquired. She resembled the humans she had seen much more closely than the dog-eared girl had, though for some reason, the vibe she gave off felt different.
"A human? N-no, you're not going to find any of those on this mountain," she said, her voice giving off a hint of sadness towards the fact. "I'm a kappa," she said, and her eyes suddenly lit up, a flash of enthusiasm suddenly dancing across her features. "Oh, that's right! Momiji said you're new here and need stuff explained!" She seemed to imply she'd be eager to give that explanation. The bunny-girl nodded slightly, slightly shocked that the blue-haired girl was now managing to look her in the eye.
"We kappa are water-based youkai," she started explaining. Realizing the bunny-girl wasn't familiar with that term either, she said, "Oh, youkai are… I guess you could say we're like spirits or maybe monsters… though we're not all monstrous!" Her face reddened a bit once more, and she flailed her hands around a bit. The bunny-girl hardly needed convincing that something that coy and cute wasn't monstrous.
"We mostly live up in this mountain, and we're known for being good with technology and stuff," she continued explaining, regaining her excitement. Suddenly, she reached into one of the many pockets decorating her dress. The bunny-girl instinctively coiled backwards in alarm, but the blue-haired girl failed to produce any dangerous-looking object. "Like this, for example," she said, apparently too eager to demonstrate her toy to notice the other girl's shock.
The device was nothing but a small remote, with one large red button on it. The kappa pressed the button, and her form began to fade into the background, until she appeared to be completely transparent. The bunny-girl looked at her in surprise until she pressed the button once more, becoming opaque again.
"That's my Opti-Camouflage Armor. Well, the actual armor is under my dress," she said. "You can see the effects, though. Pretty neat, huh?" She smiled for the first time in the encounter, a beaming expression of personal pride. She was clearly very enthusiastic about her "technology".
As if regaining her senses, the kappa suddenly began blushing furiously and lowered her head as she put away her remote. The bunny girl extended a hand and gave her a pat on the hatted head.
"I didn't realize Earth's recreational technology was already so advanced," she said sincerely, trying her best to look friendly to the deathly shy kappa. Actually, thinking about it, the bunny-girl realized how fitting such a device was for the kappa – given how shy she was, being able to become effectively invisible must have been pretty convenient. Her shy demeanor was making the kappa extremely endearing to her, though. She quietly suppressed the urge to knock the little thing unconscious and take her home as a pet, instead of opting to inquire, "Might I know your name?"
"N-Nitori. Kawashiro Nitori," the kappa said. "Um…" she interrupted as the bunny girl prepared to give her own, "You're Reisen, right? Your uniform had a name tag…" she said, eyeing the scattered garments lying a bit away from them. "Ah-! Sorry, that was rude of me, wasn't it," Nitori sputtered, pulling her cap over her face.
"I don't mind," Reisen reassured, "And it's nice to meet you, Nitori!" The urge to glomp the flustered kappa was becoming more pronounced in her head.
"Ah!" Nitori suddenly jumped up and pointed into the sky, providing an appreciated stop to Reisen's increasingly disturbing train of thought. Turning, she spotted a familiar red-white dot descending towards them.
"Yahoo~!" Momiji hollered, touching down near the pair. "I see Nitori handled you pretty well," she said, eyeing Reisen's bandages. The kappa seemed much more comfortable accepting praise from the tengu than from the bunny-girl, though Reisen still detected a slight blush on her face as Nitori giggled. Adorable kappa aside, though, Reisen had serious matters to confront the tengu about.
"Nitori said something about you reporting to superiors. Please don't tell me you came back to drag me to them or something," Reisen said, purposely making herself sound a bit more frightened than she truly was; nothing wrong with employing some harmless psychological weapons, after all.
"Oh no, nothing like that!" Momiji immediately replied, the tone of the response notifying Reisen she'd succeeded. "My job is mostly to help people away from the tengu. It'd be really something for them to have me escort someone to them."
"What'd you come back for, then?" Reisen asked. She had to make an effort to keep herself from staring at Momiji's sword – it was gleaming evilly in the sunlight. However, since she and the deathly cute kappa appeared to be friendly, Reisen dismissed her fear of the canine girl as silly rabbit instincts.
"I wasn't given any specific instructions. I'm essentially free to deal with you as I wish." Reisen thought this sounded menacing, until Momiji added, "Though I was told to make sure I stayed on your good side. Anyone who can actually enter into Gensokyo tends to be pretty powerful, so it'd be really to give you a reason to not like us tengu – Not that I wasn't going to be nice anyway!" she hastily added as she noticed Reisen's expression.
Reisen flashed her a smile. "It was already pretty nice of you to not let me rot in a hole and introduce me to your cute kappa friend," she said, prompting some furious blushing on Nitori's part.
"I see you two have gotten acquainted. I'm surprised Nitori didn't jump into the river once you regained consciousness, honestly," Momiji chided, patting Nitori's head – which only came up about halfway up the tengu's torso, Reisen noted with odd delight – with affection. Once again, Nitori seemed to take it better from Momiji than from Reisen, causing the latter to surmise that the two had known each other for a while. Strange, considering Nitori looked no older than eight – though considering the little she'd been told about youkai, Reisen realized that Nitori was probably a lot older than her appearance let on. Even Momiji was likely was likely to be beyond her mid-teens, which Reisen had figured to be a reasonable age-range for her based on appearance.
"Anyway, since I don't have any official orders, I guess now might be a good time to explain some things you might want to know if you're going to be staying in Gensokyo," Momiji said. "First, though, I'd really like to at least have some basic information on you. If anything, my superiors will want me to come out of this with something to report. Probably want to know how much you're going to upset the power balance around here. And, of course, I'm personally curious."
Reisen sighed, composing her thoughts.
"Well, I guess this is a good place to start: My name is Reisen. I'm a refugee from the Moon."