Before I begin, thanks for the views and reviews (thanks so much you three reviewers!). I'm so glad to have my work read and (hopefully) enjoyed, and I hope I can continue to entertain you.
We now return you to your regularly scheduled story.
The Scout came to. His instincts kicked in, and he immediately jumped onto his feet and swung his arms in what he thought were karate chop motions, but in fact looked more like someone trying to swat a particularly tenacious fly, yelling with each swing. Then he cracked an eye open, realized no one was around him, and promptly dropped his hands to his sides, his cheeks reddening slightly. Looking around, he found he was surrounded by green. The ground, which should have been gray or brown, was green, there were small piles of green slightly above the ground, some more green off in the horizon as far as he could see and, looking up, he saw that even the sky, which he knew should be blue or grey, or, at worst, black, was also mostly green. Of course, had he ever set foot out of Gravel Pit, Teufort, or Kong King, he probably would have realized that he was not, in fact, in some weird place made of Merasmus' green magic, but in a forest. As it stood, however, he desperately searched for some sort of escape from the magical prison he had found himself trapped in. And by "desperately searched for escape," I mean he ran randomly through the trees yelling his teammates names.
"Hey Sniper! You there?" he tried, "Demo, Engie? Guys? Soldier? Medic? Heavy? P-pyro? C'mon, anybody!" He took a deep breath, and then whispered "Spy?," at which point he heard a rustling behind him, jumped about two feet into the air and whirled around. "Gah! Don't scare me like thaaa-," he began, before he saw what had made the rustling, and his voice trailed off.
It was not the Spy, as he had thought. It was, in fact, a woman. A woman with white hair cut somewhat short, a shield in one hand and a sword in the other, looking somewhat out of breath and panting, the wolf ears on the top of her head drooping down somewhat. Scout's brain, of course, had stopped at the fact that she was a woman and he was already trying to smooth his hair back into place and look like he hadn't just been scared out of his wits.
"Hello gorgeous," he said, putting on his winning smile, "I'm Scout, the fastest, most handsome guy in the world. And you?"
The woman looked at him with an expression of utter disbelief.
"Still in awe of me, huh? Yeah I get that a lot. Anyway, you want to go get some chicken?"
The woman simply stood there, her eye twitching.
"Uh…hello?" Scout said, waving his hand in front of her face. "You there? I mean, I get that I'm awe-inspiring and all, but this is kinda freaking me out."
Then she swiped at his hand with her shield.
"Whoa! Whoa," he said, recoiling. "Is that a no to the chicken then?"
"Yes!" she exclaimed, finally speaking. Her voice had a slight hint of a growl to it.
"How about a hamburger then?" Scout asked.
"No!" the woman yelled, "I don't want to get anything with you! You're worse than Aya!"
"Oh…well, is she up for chicken then? Wait, this Aya's a chick, right, cause that name sounds female, but there was that one time," he shuddered, remembering the embarrassment of it.
"Yes, I mean no, I mean…look, will you just shut up so I can question you already," the woman said, throwing her hands in the air.
"Question me about what?" Scout said, before his eyebrows rose in realization "Oh wait, I get it! You want to skip past the whole date thing and get right to it, good plan! So, I like-"
"No! Dear Gods no! I just need to ask you why you're trespassing in Tengu territory!" the woman said, desperately.
"Ten-what-now?"
The woman closed her eyes, clenching her teeth together. "You're an outsider, aren't you?"
"Of course not! Weren't you listening? Everyone loves me! Well, except Spy, but screw him, he's a dick anyw-"
"How. Did. You. Get. Here," the woman asked, cutting him off.
"Oh, well it's a great story, Y'see the other guys and I were fighting Merasmus, he's this wizard guy who used to be Soldier's roommate until Soldier turned their place into a raccoon sanctuary and got him evicted, and we were shooting him and he was casting spells and it was awesome, but I was being the most awesome of course, cause I'd just been running circles around him and he couldn't even try and hit me, I mean I was like-"
"Get on with it!"
"Alright, alright, jeez. Anyway, eventually he got fed up and used his magic book to summon this gigantic bomb, and it created some sort of weird vortex thing that we all got sucked into. And then I landed over there somewhere," he said, gesturing towards where he came from.
"So that high-pitched screaming I heard earlier was you?"
"Wha-no! I wouldn't scream at something like that," Scout said, chuckling nervously. "Musta-musta been one of the others. Yeah, I thought I heard Spy screaming before I blacked out on landing."
The woman was rubbing her head now, muttering something about why this had to happen to her. Eventually, she spoke. "Ok, I'm gonna have to take you to Reimu. She can deal with all this."
"Do you think she'll want some chicken?"
The woman slammed her forehead into her palm and groaned. "No. No she will not 'want some chicken,' as you so eloquently put it. Now let's get moving before Aya shows-"
"Hey Momiji, did you say my name?" asked a black haired woman, swooping down from the trees. Momiji sighed. "And did you see the sky recently, I mean that explosion was really something, wasn't it," the woman continued. "I started writing an article about it, but –oh!" She noticed the Scout for the first time. Then she got a mischievous grin on her face. "What's this here, Momiji? You sneaking off guard duty to be alone with some huuuman? The scandal, the scandal! I've already got a headline for it," she said, pretending to write in her notebook, "'Workaholic Tengu Caught Meeting Human for Romantic Tryst' and then underneath it: 'Friends and colleagues shocked and appalled by her secret.' Sounds good, right?"
"Aya," Momiji said, growling. "I am not in the mood for your jokes right now. And for your information, I'm doing my job. He was in Tengu territory, and therefore must be questioned and sent out. And now that I know he's an outsider-" she began, before getting cut off by Aya.
"Of course he's an outsider, don't you see those clothes?"
"Hey, some of us don't have time to go to the village to see what's 'in style'," Momiji replied, but Aya was no longer listening.
"Hey, you, outsider," she said, pointing at the Scout. "Can I get an interview? An exclusive with an outsider would sell like crazy."
"Aya! He needs to be taken to Reimu, so she can deal with him," Momiji said. "There are rules about this!"
"But an interview with him wouldn't even have to take that long. He'd get to Reimu eventually," she said, hovering in front of Momiji and leaning forward, hands folded across her chest.
Momiji got into a fighting stance and growled. "Get out of my way, Aya."
The Scout, who had been watching the whole time, decided that now was the time to step between them. "Ladies, ladies, there's no need to fight over me! You're both very…uh…beautiful chicks, and I'm sure we could just have a threesome or something."
Momiji stared at him blankly while Aya broke down laughing. "Oh man Momiji," Aya managed to say between laughs, "I like this one. He's funny."
"Only if you've got as strange a sense of humor as you do, Aya," Momiji said. She let out a sigh. "But I guess you'll never leave me alone unless you get an interview or something, will you?"
"Nope," Aya said cheerfully.
"Then you can interview him on the way, ok?"
"Alright!" Aya pumped her fist. "Lemme get a picture first, ok?"
"Yeah, yeah, whatever," Momiji said, waving her hand dismissively.
"Ok, Mr. Outsider, say cheese."
The Scout immediately jumped into his "flexing" pose, which consisted of him curling his left bicep (which did a good job of showing his lack of arm muscles) and smiling towards the camera. Aya flitted around, taking pictures from every angle she could. Every now and then, the Scout would switch arms or change position to standing still and looking off into the distance, which might have made him look thoughtful had he not ended up looking at the tree branch right in front of his face. "Ok, that's good," Aya said after a while, during which Momiji had gone from exasperated to angry and finally to resigned.
"So can we get going now?" Momiji asked.
"Yep!"
"Joy," Momiji said flatly. She got up and began to walk in the direction of the Hakurei shrine. Aya and the Scout followed after her.
"So, Mr. Outsider-" Aya began, before the Scout interrupted.
"You can just call me Scout," he said. "Or lover, if you'd prefer," he continued.
Aya laughed. "Ha, ok then Mr. Scout," she said, causing the Scout's smile to falter somewhat. "What's it like outside Gensokyou?"
"Uh, well definitely less green. I mean, what even is this stuff," he said, grabbing a handful of leaves off of a tree as he passed. He rubbed them between his fingers, then dropped them like he'd been stung. "Urgh, that feels gross." He shook his hand. "I mean, where's all the dry-ass dirt? And the dull brown buildings? And the cement, and the steel and stuff!?"
Aya was writing furiously. "So there are no trees where you come from?"
"If trees are these green things, then no, no there aren't."
"Interesting…and this 'cement' you mentioned is?"
"You don't have cement here? Then what the hell are your streets made out of?"
"Uh…dirt."
"Huh…weird."
"So, what do you do on the outside? Like what's your job?"
"Oh, I'm so glad you asked," Scout said, grinning widely. "I, along with my team, but they're not that important, help protect the world from the great evil that is Builder's League United."
"I see, I see. And how do you do that?"
"By killing all their dudes." Momiji stopped, and Aya's pencil stopped writing. The Scout, who hadn't noticed this, kept going. "And I'm like totally the best at it too. Much better than that freaking Spy. He's such a coward. I mean all he does is cloak and hide like a-" at this point, Scout realized that they'd stopped following him. "What? What'd I say?"
"Did you say you killed people," Momiji asked.
"Well yeah. I mean, they're trying to kill me, so I gotta kill them to protect myself. And it's kinda my job."
"And you took this job voluntarily," Aya asked.
"Hey, it's a way to make a living. And I'm not exactly uh…'qualified' to do much else. Besides, it's not that uncommon a job. And it's not like the deaths are permanent or anything."
Aya gripped her pencil tightly. "Wait, what do you mean, 'not permanent'?"
"Eh? You mean it's not like that here? There's a whole system Engie and Medic set up. Don't really know how it works, but if we get blown up or shot in the head or whatever, we just respawn."
"Respawn?"
"It's some machine Engie and the Medic made. I don't really know how it works, but basically if we die, we just end up in one piece back in the base, with memories intact. It had somethin' to do with 'jeans' or somethin'. Though I don't know what some pants have to do with anything. Anyway," he said, shaking his head, "it required so many samples! Skin samples, hair samples, blood samples, bone marrow samples, and, uh," he shuddered involuntarily, "other samples. Man, I never wanted to think about that stuff again."
Momiji and Aya stared at each other for a good few seconds. "Is, is that even possible?" Aya asked.
"Why the hell are you asking me?" Momiji replied.
"You hang out with Nitori all the time, right? She knows science stuff, so I thought maybe," Aya said, before Momiji interrupted.
"That she what, mentioned she'd found a way to beat death? Yeah, no."
Aya paused for a second. "Well, I don't think he's lying, at least not intentionally," she said, frowning.
"How would you know?"
Aya tapped her fan to her nose, smiling. "Years of doing interviews for my paper have taught me the telltale signs of a liar."
"What?" Momiji said, loudly. "Just last week you published a story saying that Marisa had been seen having a love affair with Alice and Patchouli at the same time. In the Hakurei shrine. On top of a sleeping Reimu."
"So?"
"So that was a complete lie, which everybody involved in the story personally came to tell you," Momiji said. "Or did the massive beating you took afterwards make you forget?"
Aya rubbed the back of her head and winced. "Well, I said I could tell if someone was lying. I never said I wouldn't publish it." Momiji glared at her. "What? I can't help it if the lies are more interesting than what actually happens around here most of the time."
Momiji shook her head in surrender. "Fine, whatever, he's not intentionally lying. Doesn't change the fact that he could be dangerous. I mean, he's basically a hitman," she glanced over at the Scout, who was looking at them with a leer on his face. When he saw hee look at him, he quickly tried to put on his biggest smile and reached out a hand to lean on a tree, but his hand missed the tree trunk he was aiming for and he promptly fell over. "Somehow," she finished, turning back to Aya.
"C'mon, Momiji," Aya said. "Do you really think he's a threat?" She pointed behind her at the Scout, who was hopping around in agony, having gotten up and kicked the tree in anger, only to injure his foot.
Momiji was silent for a moment. "Maybe it's an act to lower our guard," she said, sounding unsure, as the Scout, while hopping around, managed to trip on a tree root and fall face first into the tree he'd kicked.
"If that's an act, then he's the most committed actor I've ever seen," Aya said, as the Scout staggered back from the tree, clutching his nose.
Momiji sighed. "Yeah, you're probably right," she said. She turned towards the Scout, who was glaring at the tree with blood dripping down his face, baseball bat in hand. As she opened her mouth to tell him they were going to continue walking, he swung his bat at the tree, making a loud clanging noise. Momiji, whose ears are rather sharp, heard the loud ringing in her ears and felt her head begin to ache. Before she could fully recover, he did it again, and again, and again, until the loud ringing of aluminum meeting wood rand throughout the forest. Momiji's eyes began to water in pain, while Aya, who'd put earplugs in the second she'd seen the Scout begin to swing the bat, gave her a sympathetic glance. After around twelve hits, the tree began to creak ominously, a large indent made in its base. When the Scout swung his bat again, there was a loud cracking noise, and the tree began tilting towards them.
"Ha! Serves you right you stupid tree," the Scout said, looking pleased with himself. As he saw the tree begin to fall towards him, however, his expression slowly shifted into one of fear, and he let out a small squeak. Looking behind him, he saw that Aya had already grabbed Momiji and flown off to the left of the tree, and he hastily ran after them. He'd barely made it out of the way when the tree hit the ground with an enormous thud, and the shockwave threw him forward, causing him to slide into the base of yet another tree.
Momiji, whose eyes seemed to be bloodshot, staggered towards the Scout, sword in hand, before being grabbed and held back by Aya. "Aya, let me go," Momiji said, sounding surprisingly calm. "I just need to kill him a little bit. You heard him, he'll just respawn, it'll be fine. Right?" she asked, turning her head back towards the Scout.
"H-hold on," he said, holding his hands up and scooting backwards, the expression on Momiji's face reminding him of nothing more than the Heavy whenever Scout's pranks went perhaps a bit too far, like that time he'd put wasabi in his sandvich, or painted flowers on Sasha, or glued his boxing gloves onto his hands while he slept. "I-I was just teaching that stupid tree a lesson! I didn't know it would fall towards us," he said, figuring she was upset about the tree almost crushing them.
"Teaching a tree a lesson, huh?" Momiji growled. "A tree? Trees can't even learn, you goddamn idiot! All you've done is teach my eardrums what pain feels like!"
"Well," said a voice coming from the direction of the fallen tree, "I would have to disagree with you there, Ms. Momiji." At the sound of the voice, Aya and Momiji suddenly stiffened and turned around slowly. "Trees are capable of learning. Very few creatures would be able to last hundreds of years without being able to learn. In fact, I'd say this poor tree knew quite a bit before you knocked it down." A woman stepped out from behind a tree, swinging a pink parasol around in her hand. She was dressed in a plaid red dress and her shoulder-length green hair framed her face quite nicely. Her eyes were closed and she was smiling, but she radiated an aura of sheer anger. She came to a stop, and pointed her parasol at the Scout. "It certainly knew more than you at any rate, little human."
The Scout, naturally, was oblivious to the aura she radiated. "Well hello there, beautiful. Am I in heaven?" he said, attempting to sit up. Momiji looked at him in sheer astonishment, while Aya stifled a laugh.
The woman in the red dress, for her part, looked unfazed. "Not yet. Though the possibility is becoming more and more likely." She walked up to where the Scout was sitting, combing his hair with one hand and trying to stop his bloody nose with the other, and planted her parasol point first in the ground right in front of him, causing the Scout to flinch and instinctively cover his crotch. She leaned forward, and said, in a hushed voice, "I really wish I could kill you right now." Then she leaned back, and speaking slightly louder, said, "But that would cause problems for Momiji, here, who's really rather nice, as far as Tengu go," she nodded at Momiji, "And I guess for the flighty rumormonger here as well, who could go jump in the lake for all I care." Aya seemed about to say something, before the woman spoke again. "Though I must admit her paper does make some nice fertilizer."
Aya slumped over, looking defeated. "Gee thanks, Yuuka," she murmured, as sarcastically as she could muster.
Yuuka, as the red-dressed woman was apparently named, shrugged. "It's certainly not useful for anything else." She turned back towards the Scout. "The fact remains, however, that you have destroyed one of the most ancient and knowledgeable trees in this forest, and as such, need to be punished." With one fluid motion, she yanked her parasol out from the ground and held it an inch away from the Scout's (still bloody) nose. "Are you prepared?"
The Scout looked puzzled, before asking, "Is this some sort of S&M thing?"
Momiji covered her face while Aya buckled over laughing. Yuuka blinked, then shook her head, sighing. "I'll take that as a 'yes,' then," she said, and the tip of her parasol began to glow. "This probably won't kill you, so it's ok to use, right?" she asked, smiling, before the master spark went off.