“I’m Winston Sloan,” said Wiki. “Uh, human expert on Gensokyo and its youkai. Cheesed to meet you!”

He did finger guns. Nazrin tilted her head, but she didn’t say anything. Wiki turned a shade that nearly remanifested Maroon on its own.

“Jake Thorne, danmaku student,” I added.

Nazrin glanced at Hijiri, her expression cool. It occurred to me that we might seem rude by not waiting for the saint to introduce herself first, or by not stating our purpose for visiting. Everyone who visited the temple could be expected to know Byakuren Hijiri, of course.

“We’ve met already,” Hijiri told the mouse. “I think it is abundantly clear that these temple visitors are here to speak to you, Nazrin, so please let me be an observer!” Hijiri seemed delighted that the attention might not be on her for once.

“Okay.” If anything, the mouse woman tensed up more. “I’m Nazrin. I find lost things, and command an army of mice.”

“I know,” said Wiki. “Thank you for squeaking with us!” That idiot had decided to double down.

“How did you know I’d be here?” she asked.

“You come here from Muenzuka to help Toramaru Shou find something every once-and-awhile,” said Wiki. The mouse youkai was taken aback at his apparently supernatural knowledge of her activities. “Well, actually, Remilia Scarlet manipulated fate to bring us here. I’m, uh… I’m sorry if it’s not a gouda time!”

“Okay,” said Nazrin. She had a distrustful expression. I didn’t imagine that the mouse youkai was used to having fans, or that someone who was used to fans would be used to interacting with people like Wiki. “If you want my attention, you must have misplaced something? What have you lost?”

Wiki looked at me, as did the two youkai. “The fairy Maroon has stopped manifesting,” I said. “We are here to find a way to help her remanifest.”

“Oh dear,” said Hijiri, a look of pity crossing her features.

“Can you use your ability to find a way to bring her back?” I asked, before their expressions could shame me any further.

“No,” said Nazrin. “I can’t find things that don’t exist. Any other questions?”

“Wait, how do you know it doesn’t exist?” asked Wiki.

“My ability is for searching for physical objects that I can clearly imagine. A way to restore a lost youkai isn’t that.” She shrugged. “Sorry.”

“Can’t you also find people?”

“If they have physical form, yes.”

“Mister Thorne,” said Hijiri, “I can sense the sorrow in your heart, and the misunderstanding it has wrought. You are not the first to beseech Nazrin for guidance during a dark time. I suspect that you are more likely to find peace if you speak with me after all.”

I didn’t know what to say to that. I didn’t expect the result of this trip to be a flat denial and an offer for spiritual guidance. I hadn’t been to many temples, to be fair. Were we ‘finding Maroon’ in a metaphorical sense?

“No, I’m quite confident we are here to talk to Nazrin,” said Wiki. “Remilia Scarlet said it was her specifically,” he added under Hijiri’s gaze, which was simultaneously benevolent and terrifying in its rigidity.

“Youkai are even more subject to impermanence than human beings,” said Hijiri. “It is possible that this Maroon has managed to remanifest once more on her own, and is merely missing. Nazrin?”

“Very well,” said Nazrin. She pulled her set of dowsing rods from a long pocket in her dress. They were black metal with hooks at the end, like question marks on sticks with handles. “In order to locate a person or item, I have to visualize them closely. Do you have a picture?”

“I don’t,” I said, frowning. Cameras weren’t a big thing in Gensokyo.

“Describe her to me.”

“She’s a fairy. About this tall,” I said, holding my hands two or three feet apart. “She has insect wings and dark red hair that goes down to her shoulders. She always wore a fairy maid uniform. Her eyes were also dark red, or maybe brownish.”

The rods didn’t move. The mouse shook her head. “This isn’t working. You’ll have to describe her more thoroughly than that, if you want me to find her.”

“Okay…” I said. I exhaled. I hadn’t spent much time contemplating the fairy’s appearance as we’d worked together. “Her cheeks were round, like a child’s. Her eyes were very large and they had a sheen. She was tense. Maroon was always surprised and excited about things, and a bit hyper…”

Maroon wasn’t energetic like the other fairies. She was worried about doing things ‘right,’ and about earning Patchouli’s approval. She was like a dog that always wanted to be in front of her master.

“...hyper-vigilant, anyway. She focused on doing her chores, but she was shy and faded into the background most of the time.”

“Like a mouse,” said Nazrin with a nod. She closed her eyes and slowly moved her dowsing rods around. “Keep going.”

“She always ran and hid if another fairy came by to bother her. She didn’t ask questions, at least not at first… she was afraid she’d say something wrong or annoy someone.”

Maroon had been afraid often, I realized. She was afraid of a world she didn’t understand. But she had tried to understand it, and had disappeared while leaping at the chance to learn more. Did it matter whether the motivation was intrinsic, or a desire to make Patchouli happy? Or myself? My eyes started to water.

“She smiled a lot, although I’m starting to learn that she didn’t always mean it. She cared about doing what was right, and not very much about herself… she even forgot who she was, you know? And maybe, I didn’t even know who she really was either.” I was so focused on learning to fly that I’d pushed her harder and harder without ever understanding.

Hijiri put a hand on my shoulder. One of Nazrin’s rods bent and pointed up into the sky, the other spun and pointed toward the earth.

“That worked,” said the mouse.

“Where–”

“She is somewhere where we can’t reach her,” said Nazrin. “Unphysical. I’m sorry.” My description of Maroon had been enough for her system to return an error, if not run to completion. I tried not to cry.

Hijiri squeezed my shoulder and prepared to give me a canned spiel about closure, or something, but Wiki spoke first.

“Wait just a moment,” said Wiki. “Let’s try munchkining your power before we give up. I’m a Fontina good ideas!”

“Look man, just stop,” I said.

“Why?” asked Wiki. “Cheese puns are great!”

“It’s insensitive!” Nazrin was looking between us with a concerned look on her face. “We get it, she’s a mouse, mice like cheese–stop judging her by her appearance!”

“That’s not–I didn’t–” sputtered Wiki. He wrung his hands. I’d never seen him at a loss for words.

“Mice like cheese…” Nazrin said slowly. “Is that a stereotype?”

“It is in the West,” said Wiki, facepalming.

“Wow, you’re rude,” she said. “I suppose I do like cheese. I just hate puns.” Wiki cried out; the knowledge physically hurt him.

“So you weren’t offended?” I asked.

“If he wasn’t trying to offend me, I guess not. I just thought this guy was an obsessive weirdo.” She’d somehow found her way to the correct conclusion. “Is a ‘munchkin’ a kind of cheese?”

“Actually, yes,” said Wiki, morosely. She peered at him. “You can locate places as well, correct?”

“That’s right.”

“Well, imagine that Gensokyo is a grid with one meter spacing.” Wiki pulled out a map of Gensokyo, which is how I learned that he had taken to carrying a map with him despite never leaving the village. “The grid is numbered on each axis, for about ten thousand points on each side. That’s about how many words there are in my Japanese dictionary, by the way.” He pulled out the pocket dictionary.

“Where did you–” I started.

“Kourindou. The square meter we are searching for corresponds to a two-word phrase that describes a way to make Maroon return, if the numbers of the grid points are also positions in my dictionary. Can your power guide us there?”

We all stared at him. Nazrin spoke first.

“That’s amazing,” she said.

“Thank–”

“You’re the dumbest person I’ve ever met. I can’t imagine such a plan, so what makes you think I can locate one? And that my power is willing to work within an arbitrary grid?” She laughed. “If I could just point to a spot on a map instead of going there myself, my job would be simple indeed!”

“The map isn’t important,” he said. “It’s just for explaining, and for measuring–”

“I don’t normally go searching for dumb people, but if I did my power would lead me straight to your house!”

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Wiki leaned back. “Arnold’s likely at the bath right now, actually.”

“I don’t care.” Nazrin started toward the temple entrance. “I think I should be going now. It’s late.”

“Wait,” said Wiki. “Have you ever tried to locate anything amorphous?”

“Well, no,” she said. “I’m a youkai with magical abilities and no imagination.”

“It’s worth at least five minutes, isn’t it?”

Nazrin grumbled.

“Please?” I asked. “For my friend that people forget about?”

“I’ll try, but only if you pay me,” she said. “And I want payment up front. And I’ll keep it even if we can’t remanifest your friend.”

“I only have a few hundred rin…” I pulled out my coin purse, and the mouse youkai snatched it.

“Not enough,” she replied, tossing it back. “Do you have anything else?”

“Nazrin and her subordinates love food,” suggested Wiki. “Right?”

“Who doesn’t?” she asked, somewhat defensively.

“Would a few hundred turnips suffice?” I asked. I imagined Patchouli would understand and approve. If she didn’t I might get sent on yet another errand to compensate, but I’d deal with the possibility later.

“As long as it isn’t potatoes,” said Nazrin. “We’ve had enough of them. You have hundreds of turnips on you? If I have to ask ‘where’ then I’m doubtful…”

“Well, I don’t, but I do know a way to get them to you.”

“I said I wanted to be paid now,” said the mouse youkai while shaking her head. “They are both idiotic beyond belief.” But she did seem interested in my offer. “What guarantee do I have that you aren’t just making up the turnips?”

“Can’t I just make it a promise? A deal?”

“I’m not a vampire,” said the mouse. “I can’t mess with fate. I will accept something of value as a guarantee of payment, however.”

“Like what?” I asked.

“Anything that you’d be sad if you lost,” she said, smiling for the first time. “I have explored some of the limits of my powers, so if you try to give me something without value I won’t be fooled… and if you fail to pay me in a timely manner, I’ll find you, of course.”

“Something of value…” I repeated. I reached up for my hat that wasn’t there. It had blown away earlier that day during the flight over the forest. I stuck my hands in my mostly-empty pockets. My notebook was there, so I offered it, but after a moment with her dowsing rods she shook her head.

“Not valuable enough. Sorry. It’s not that I don’t trust you to try to repay me. I just don’t trust your ability without extraordinary motivation.”

“Maybe my pants?” I’d spent a lot of money repairing them. It occurred to me that clothing repair was more expensive than organ repair in Gensokyo.

“They wouldn’t fit me.”

Wiki sighed. “I didn’t want to resort to this. I assure you, these are extremely valuable to me.”

He pulled out five of the trading cards from the village. They were all Nazrin and were reskinned cards from five different games. I cringed so hard that I nearly broke my teeth. Nazrin wordlessly took the cards with a flat expression on her face.

“I’ve changed my mind,” said the youkai. “I don’t want the turnips.”

“I’m so sorry,” I said. “He means well.”

“I want the cards.” Her eyes had lit up. “I had no idea that all the humans thought so highly of me! Is the Mouse General so famous in the human village that Miss Yakumo had to make five versions of her?” She looked to Hijiri. “Could I become a Human General?”

“Let’s not get carried away,” said the Buddhist nun.

“They do, though!” said Wiki. “You are famous! I had to trade for weeks to get those. Everyone wanted one!”

“Me too,” she said. “I’ll take these as payment, please.”

Wiki opened his mouth, glanced at me, then back at Nazrin. His face fell. “Okay,” he finally said.

I hugged him. I wondered if Remilia had brought him just for the cards. After a moment, I thought maybe it wasn’t the cards, but the fact that he’d give them up for me–the fact that he was my friend, and we were in this together. That was the sort of person you’d bring with you to solve a problem.

“I owe you one,” I said.

“You owe me five,” he replied. “And this might not even work, so don’t get all happy about it.”

“Alright,” said Nazrin. “Let’s try some munchkin or whatever the thing is.”

—

The square meter plan didn’t work. Neither did trying to locate ‘an object that would inspire us to solve this problem’ nor ‘someone who could solve this problem’. The last was the closest, Nazrin said: she’d felt her powers trying to latch onto it at least.

Nazrin gave each munchkin attempt several minutes of thought before she gave up. She asked Wiki clarifying questions, and helped him understand her power better. We learned that although she could only locate physical objects or people, all descriptions and memories of objects are inherently non-physical, so sometimes non physical things like the personality of the person or the sentimental value of a thing could help her find it.

Wiki was trying to induce the right mindset in a mostly-skeptical youkai. At least Nazrin was professional and thorough once she’d been paid. She did tell Wiki to stand well away from her as she closed her eyes and focused.

After an hour I was bored out of my mind.

The sounds of battle from the gate had long since ceased. There was an interesting moment when Raghav had shown up with a defeated Ichirin to ask Hijiri to let Remilia in, but the nun had politely refused. After that Byakuren had bowed out, and Raghav had returned to the gate to talk to Remilia. It was just Wiki, Nazrin, and I sitting under the starlight.

Some random youkai with a trident floated overhead for a few minutes, but I couldn’t identify her and I didn’t want to interrupt Wiki. Nazrin and him were going strong even as I started to doze.

“Alright,” said Wiki. “Now look for the first step in the most efficient six step plan to recover Maroon.”

“If five steps wouldn’t work, why do you think six might?” asked the mouse youkai. She set down the basket she held with her tail, then yawned with the tail covering her mouth. She was still holding the dowsing rods.

“It might be that five steps isn’t enough, not that all plans are impossible to locate.”

“Steps in plans aren’t even a physical thing.”

“Actually they are,” said Wiki. “Often the first step to a plan is talking to someone, or acquiring something that you need. The later steps might not even become clear until after you've talked to them, or until you have the catalyst in hand, but the start is almost always a physical thing, isn’t it?”

“Maybe,” said Nazrin as she closed her eyes to focus.

If you thought about it, Remilia had simply executed a plan like that herself. She’d tried to get the right people in the right place, and then have them solve her problem for her. Now we were doing the same. I wondered how many levels down it could go.

“Fine,” said the mouse. After a moment she shook her head. “Nope, I can’t locate ‘the start of the most efficient six step plan to recover Maroon.’”

“Seven?” Again she closed her eyes.

“N–actually yes,” said the mouse, her brow furrowed. She walked forward three steps and her rods crossed each other. “It’s right here.”

“No way,” I said.

Wiki jumped up and down. “So Nazrin must be the first step in a seven step–”

“No it’s actually down in the… wait a minute.” Her rods were turning. “It’s gone.”

Nazrin wandered forward. She took a step left, then a step right.

“It’s now… now it’s at the gate?”

“What?” asked Wiki. Nazrin walked away toward the temple doors, which were shut, but suddenly she stopped and turned back around.

“That’s odd,” she said. “It keeps moving.” The mouse youkai’s tail swung back and forth as she walked toward me and the rods twisted as she approached. She stuck them toward my crotch–no, toward the coin purse at my hip. The rods crossed. “It’s in your bag?”

“Maybe the most efficient plan keeps changing?” speculated Wiki. “Except, you’d think it would change far more rapidly due to thermal noise…” He was going off on some tangent, I felt sure.

We stood still for a moment. The rods didn’t uncross. With a trembling hand, I pulled my coin purse off my hip and held it up to examine it. It was a simple thing made of soft leather. It looked normal enough. I opened it.

A single miniscule eye stared back out at me from a tiny void. Then the eye winked shut. The rods separated again, and with a sound a tall purple-clad youkai stepped out from a gap in reality in our midst. She fluttered her fan in the still night air.

Nazrin stepped toward Yukari Yakumo.

“No thanks,” said Yukari, gently pushing the mouse back with a finger. “I’ve no interest in rods, especially ones that have interest in me.”

“Miss Yakumo is step one,” said Wiki, his voice flat. “What the heck does step two look like, then?”

“I can see why you are confused, Mister Sloan,” said the gap youkai. “Usually one step is enough for me to go literally anywhere. But don’t worry, there’s a good explanation!” She fanned herself.

“Do you care to provide it?”

“I haven’t decided. First I’m going to talk to Nazrin.” She smiled at the diminutive youkai. “I know you think you’re clever. I know you’re greedy. And I suspect that many ‘most-efficient’ plans in Gensokyo go through me, right?”

“I–”

“That was rhetorical. It’s tragic, really.”

“Why’s that?” she asked. I felt my back tense. I knew I wouldn’t like the non-answer.

“Because Nazrin’s power doesn’t work on me anymore.” She snapped her fingers. Nazrin frowned, and shook her dowsing rods up and down. “And I’m probably screening off all kinds of intriguing and convoluted plans that don’t go through me, necessarily, but would admittedly work even better with my help. Oh well.” She turned toward me. “Can’t have everything, can we?”

“Can’t have anything really,” I said bitterly.

“Not for free,” replied the youkai while nodding. She frowned. “I was hoping it wouldn’t come to this, but I think I’ll do you a favor and just let it happen even if I don’t want it to. You’ve done an awful lot of that for me, after all.”

I sighed. “Please explain.”

“If I must,” she replied. “There’s something I want you to retrieve from the depths of Former Hell. It’s a human artifact that endangers all of Gensokyo.” I found myself instantly missing the good-ole-days when Yukari was merely incomprehensible.

“A retrieval mission?” asked Wiki.

“Can’t I just fucking learn to fly!” I whined.

“I’ve been trying to think of who to send on this mission, and how much I would reward them–and ‘lo! The Little Mouse General’s rods pointed you toward me, even if you aren’t the most capable, or even if you aren’t someone I’d seriously considered for the job. Her power did this just because it thought I could help you.”

I gave up and waited. Wiki was muttering to himself, and surprisingly, so was Nazrin.

“A seven step plan for allowing me to sell plans,” said the mouse youkai under her breath. Her rods didn’t move.

We waited some more. I realized I could not outwait a god–or worse, I could, and she’d just leave.

“Are you going to help me or not?” I asked Yukari.

“I think so. Most of the youkai and powerful humans are so busy these days that you might really be the only person we can spare.” She tapped her chin. “What if I accepted Nazrin’s guidance as well?”

“But what could be the other six steps…” said Wiki.

“Oh, that’s simple enough. I strongly suspect six people will stand in your way. That’s how it usually goes.”

“Oh my God,” said Wiki.

“Jake Thorne, I will help you get Maroon back as long as you resolve a little incident for me.”