Kappanda

It was a chore to carry everything she needed at once, but luckily, it wasn't far from the Senritsus to Kasumi's apartment. They lived right down the hallway from each other. Ultimately, Meiling decided on two trips; on the first, she deposited the groceries for that night's dinner on Kasumi's doorstep. Then she went back for her two gifts to Kasumi. She took a moment to put on her brightest smile before ringing the doorbell.

That's what greeted Kasumi when she opened the door: Meiling, beaming at her like Kasumi was the most glorious thing she'd ever beheld. That, and also the bouquet of flowers that Meiling held out to her. "Hey, beautiful, these are for you."

Kasumi opens the door, and Meiling gets to see that she's wearing a nice blouse and a nice skirt. She looks Meiling up and down as she takes the flowers, and quietly mutters a "thank you". Standing back, Kasumi holds the door open for Meiling to enter.

"Here's your Christmas present, too!" Meiling hands her a small box carefully wrapped in shiny paper. "You can open it after I've gotten dinner started!" So saying, Meiling grabs all the grocery bags and trundles inside towards Kasumi's kitchen.



"Wait. Dinner? What are you going to do?" Despite her complaint, Kasumi is more focused on looking at the wrapped present. Meiling's investigation of the kitchen shows that Kasumi... apparently doesn't cook much. Her pantry and fridge are mostly filled with stuff that can be eaten quickly or made in a microwave, with few ingridents for full dishes.

"Food! What else? You like food, right? You're not allergic?" Meiling unloads the various bags, setting things out on the counter according to some categorization Kasumi can't fathom. Many of the ingredients have labels Kasumi can't read - Chinese, probably.

"Allergic to food? I should hope you're kidding." Kasumi looks at the bags, but gives up quickly as she realizes she won't be able to read it.

Meiling rolls her eyes. "Yes, it was a joke." Her hands flew from task to task with little hesitation, a practiced ease. It wasn't long before she stepped back and clapped her hands. "Okay! Now we have some time to kill, so how about you open that present?" Meiling shoos Kasumi out of the kitchen and into the living room for now.

"Wait, what-" Kasumi tries to interrupt, but she quickly finds herself sitting down and with the gift in her hands. Meiling's next to her, waiting eagerly for Kasumi to open it, so the kappa simply goes ahead and begins to remove the wrapping paper. Seeing the box inside, Kasumi opens it, and her eyes go wide. She reaches into the box, pulling out a three-string necklace, and looking at the jade and pearl beads that make it up.

"I... How much did this cost!?" Kasumi sputters.

Meiling chuckles. "Nothing," she replies nonchalantly, putting an arm around Kasumi's shoulders.

"Wait, that doesn't- did you MAKE this!?" Kasumi doesn't even react to Meiling's arm, too stunned by the necklace and its origins. "Where did you even get jewels like these!?"

"I took apart some necklaces that I already owned and never wore, and I put them back together in a different way," Meiling shrugs. She smiles. "Will you wear it? Right now? For me?" Once Kasumi agrees (after sputtering a bit more in shock), Meiling helps her put the necklace on, doing up the little clasp in the back for her. Then she sits back and looks at Kasumi appraisingly. Her smile breaks out into a grin. "You look so beautiful."

"W-w-w-w-" A blush spreads across Kasumi's face, and she scrambles to her feet. "Yes! Well! Thank you! So when's dinner, don't you need to work on that and I'd just be underfoot in the kitchen, right?"

"I suppose I should." As if on cue, the kitchen timer goes off. Meiling gets up off the couch, but before she heads to the kitchen she steals a quick kiss.

"Ghhrgk!" With that incoherent reaction, Kasumi grabs a casebook off the shelf and immediately retreats into that.

Meiling’s laughter can be heard from the kitchen over the clinking of plates and pots.

The book helps alleviate the wait, at least. Kasumi’s stomach is growling by the time Meiling calls “Dinner’s ready!”

Strategically placed candles illuminate the dinner table, which has been neatly set. Meiling explains the dishes available, although Kasumi could not repeat the names if she tried; it’s more Chinese-sounding nonsense to her. Still, the food looks and smells divine, and the small variety is nice.

"MMmph." In no time at all, Kasumi has set upon the food, eating it thanks to how tempting it seems. The unfamiliar tastes are a new inspiration for her, and she looks over at Meiling with a newfound admiration. Trying to make smalltalk, the lawyer kappa takes a second to set aside one of the dishes and speak up. "And here I wasn't sure if it'd just be fake Chinese food. This is good."

Meiling paused with a soupspoon halfway to her mouth. She glanced at it and set it back in the bowl. Shaking her head, albeit in amusement, she said, “This is my mother’s recipe, and that was the rudest attempt at a compliment I’ve ever received.”

"Well, I mean, it's just..." Kasumi desperately tries to salvage the situation! "I didn't know if you were... actually Chinese or not?"

Meiling can’t help but laugh at Kasumi’s floundering. “As opposed to what? Wannabe Chinese? I’d have thought it would be pretty obvious that I’m actually Chinese, just from looking at me.” She doesn’t sound upset at all. “Yes, in case you’re still not sure, I’m actually Chinese. I’m about as Chinese as a person can reasonably get. I was born in China, I was raised in China, and even though I’ve moved to Gensokyo, my culture and my people are still very important to me. Unfortunately, China just isn’t a great place to be these days.” She gets a little serious at the end.

"That's more exciting than my story." Kasumi spears a couple more pieces on her fork. "I just came from the Pacific Ocean. That's about it."

“The... ocean? Oh, right, because kappa are aquatic... so literally just ‘the ocean,’ yeah. Huh, cool.” Meiling smiles. “So did you go to Ocean University, Bottom of the Sea campus? Was your law professor a pufferfish?”

"I went to Stanford University and followed it up with a stint at their law school."

“Stanford?! Isn’t that a college for, like, geniuses? You went there?! Er, um, n-not that you aren’t a genius...”

Kasumi frowns, but then smirks. "Hmph. I might not be human, but they were surprisingly willing to let me in... after some money, some testing, and a promise I wouldn't eat anyone. It's bad for the reputation."

“I wouldn’t mind if you ate me,” Meiling cooed.

Meiling gets a long sigh in return and a kappa silently returning to eating the food prepared for her. Kasumi stays quiet for long enough to make things a bit calmer, before speaking up with another question. "How did you find Gensokyo?"

"Family history!" Meiling puffs up like a proud bird. "My great great great great great...great...great great...great?...whatever grandmother was from Gensokyo! I came to Japan knowing I wanted to visit it. If I could find it, considering the map I had..."

She pauses in thought. "Well... maybe that doesn't make sense to someone like you. Uh... that sounded more insulting than I meant it... I don't know what your family is like, but, see, my family had this big thing about our legacy. Our history, our bloodline. I have this book... It's a family heirloom that traces our lineage all the way back to that original dragon, who married an oni woman from Gensokyo. It's old. It's so old it's hand-written on bamboo, like, the same manner of bookbinding as Sun Tzu's original Art of War. There's a few other copies... or there were. They probably belong to my sixteenth cousin twenty-times removed or something if they're still intact. Anyway, there's a map of Gensokyo and the surrounding area in it. This was right before they put up the Great Hakurei Barrier..."

Kasumi is nodding along to Meiling's lecture on her family history, doing her best to pay attention. She looks completely attentive, even if she's drifting off a little, but one thing comes to mind. "Why do you care so much?"

 "Why do I... care?" Meiling sounds totally baffled, as if the idea of not caring was alien to her.

"Well... I don't really know much about my family beyond my parents, and I've never felt something missing. I just have a hard time seeing why it's so essential and important to know everyone sixteen generations back. Maybe it's a Pacific Kappa thing, we don't live in large groups."

"I admit, it's not like I care about every single relative I have. Most of them are just names in a book, for me. But... growing up, I really admired my father. He was just a regular human, but he was an exemplary warrior. He was a soldier in the army. He was once awarded a medal of honor by the Emperor of China himself! I thought that was amazing. I guess... it really only makes sense to me, but... even when I was a kid, and I'd barely accomplished anything besides learning to walk, he was so proud of me. I wanted to be worthy of his pride. And I was fascinated by the gift my mother's bloodline granted me. She was a dragon who never bothered to use the power she had... She couldn't even turned into a dragon, like I can. I thought that was such a waste. So not only did I want to make my father, my family in general, proud, but I wanted to learn more about all that legacy and history..."

"Heh." Kasumi looks down at her food, stabbing her fork into it. "Sounds like it was nice."

"It was hard sometimes. This was a long time ago... When they didn't let women do things like... be soldiers, or go to college, or whatever. I just ignored stuff like that. I mean, I don't want to sound like I'm boasting that I'm some pioneer of equal rights, but... there were obstacles. And I fought my way through them, because... I was determined to be who I am, regardless of what anybody else says. I don't think there was ever a time that I believed I had any other choice."

Meiling watches Kasumi quietly for a moment. "You sound... a little bitter," she observes. "Why?" She tries to say it delicately - wanting to know the answer, but not wanting to press for it.

"I guess... what you said about your parents." Kasumi mulls it over, trying to figure out how to phrase it. "So amazing, so much to admire... meanwhile mine never wanted to be anything more than ocean goblins. I had the hardest time justifying why I didn't want to just lurk there and dine on fish every day for the rest of my life."

"I'm sorry to hear that. It's never easy when your parents don't understand the path you want to take. I was lucky to have one who understood... and the other came around. Eventually." She smiles sympathetically. "It's a shame, your parents don't know what they're missing. And they'd have a lot to be proud of, if they were just here to see it."

 "I've thought sometimes about visiting the Pacific to try and meet up with them... but I'm just not sure if I want to run that risk." Kasumi looks at her food for a bit more, before looking up. "I want to say, though... I admire what you've done. It's impressive."

"A compliment?! From Kasumi?!" Meiling hams up her shock and amazement, but her eyes are sparkling. She's genuinely touched.

"Keep that up and I'll take it back." Kasumi says, pointing her fork at Meiling. There's a slight smirk, though - seems she's not all that serious.

"Nooo! Have mercyyy!" whines Meiling. Then she laughs, and drops the act. "Anyway... You know," she muses, "you kind of ARE visiting the Pacific. I mean, that's where the Kuwahawi Archipelago is, isn't it? Don't tell me I was reading the pamphlet backwards..."

Kasumi looks up in surprise. "That's true... I guess I'd just never thought about visiting them. Kuwahawi is almost five hunded miles from where I grew up."

"At least it's closer than Vegas, though! It's a good opportunity. I think you should go for it." Meiling grins encouragingly. "Maybe bring a friend along to support you, since it sounds like you're nervous about it."

"Like who? You?"

"Don't you think it's a little early in our relationship for me to be meeting your parents?" Meiling teases.

"Ghhh- that's not what I meant and you know it!"

Meiling laughs. "I know, I know, sorry. Ordinarily I'd gladly agree to it if you wanted me to come with you, but... um... this is a trip to the bottom of the ocean. I have many talents, but breathing underwater isn't one of them. Well... unless you wouldn't mind me being a koi fish for the whole trip, I guess."

"Hmm... I'll have to think about it." Kasumi returns to quietly eating the food for now, focusing more on the recipe than on the conversation. At least she seems to be enjoying it a lot.

They ate mostly in silence for the rest of the meal. Meiling further impressed her date with the dessert, which Kasumi found to be even better than the main course. Afterward, Kasumi retreated to the living room to recover from the food coma, while Meiling insisted on washing all the dirty dishes that had been used so Kasumi didn't have to do it herself later. She washed the dirty dishes that had already been there before she came over, too.

Despite the quantity, she got them sparkling clean in no time. She did her best to put them away where they belonged, but the organizational system of Kasumi's china cabinet wasn't as clear-cut as Sakuya's. At least she probably wouldn't get as upset as Sakuya if Meiling fucked it up.

Finally she returned to the living room to find Kasumi killing time with some TV. Meiling approached the couch stealthily. Before Kasumi knew what was happening, Meiling had insinuated herself into Kasumi's personal space with a cry of "Ninja cuddle attack!"

"GAH!" Kasumi flails at Meiling, weakly and ineffectually trying to shove the surprise gatekeeper off of her. "Do you always pounce like this?"

"Yes!" chirps Meiling. She snuggles up close to Kasumi and pretends to purr like a cat.

"Geez..." Kasumi grumbles, but gives up and lets herself be cuddled. Meiling gets prime viewing seats for... a rerun of Matlock, and Kasumi sinks deeper into the couch a she watches the courtroom drama. "Season 4 was always the best one, anyway."

Meiling has no idea what they're watching, or what's currently going on in the show, but she doesn't really mind. She gets to find out what kind of TV Kasumi likes to watch and cuddle her while doing it! She rests her head on Kasumi's shoulder, continues to purr, and plays with Kasumi's braid. "Hey, can I unbraid your hair?" she asks cheerfully.

Meiling pouts. "What? Why are you looking at me like that? I'm not plotting anything devious! I just wanna see what you look like with your hair down. And it'd be easier to play with!"

"I... hmph. That seems ridiculous. ..Fine, as long as you're careful."

"Yayyyy!" Meiling happily got to work carefully unwinding Kasumi's braid. Then she gathered up the hair in her hands and snuggled her face in it. It was very soft. She breathed in the smell of it (minty!). She pretended to wear it as a mustache. She ran her fingers through it. This she did for an impossibly long time. She spent what must've been a solid twenty minutes, just running her fingers through Kasumi's hair, stroking it, twirling it and whatever else. Meiling is easily entertained.

"...How long do you intend to keep doing this? Is this a weird fetish you didn't tell me about?" Kasumi slowly begins to gather back her hair, waiting for the right moment to get it back from Meiling and move to the other side of the couch.

Meiling relinquishes the hair immediately, without protest, but she looks stung when Kasumi moves to the other side of the couch. "No, it's not a weird fetish. I just like your hair, okay? It's beautiful. You can ask me to stop without accusing me of being a freak in the same breath, can't you?"

"Most people who compliment my hair don't feel the need to play with it for twenty minutes."

"Of course random strangers aren't touching your hair, but I'm dating you. And I just... like the way it feels. And I want to..." Meiling frowns, looks away. "I... want to... touch you, but you're not... comfortable with physical intimacy, and touching your hair is still... it's nice, but it's not as personal as... other stuff. Sakuya used to let me braid her hair for her. ...Nevermind. I'll keep my hands to myself from now on, then."

"Sakuya, too? I remember hearing about her... so what, do you always date your friends?"

Meiling froze. For the briefest moment, her eyes were wide with shock and... pain. But quickly her expression hardened into impassive stone, and she looked away from Kasumi. There was a slight twitch in her clenched jaw. She said nothing in response.

Kasumi looks at Meiling, now very confused by the sudden silence of the normally talkative gatekeeper. "...What? What did I say?"

Meiling doesn't reply immediately. But after a moment she says, "Nothing. It's fine." Her voice betrays the lie; she sounds cold, stiff. "It's getting pretty late. Maybe I should go."

"Ah, uhm, well..." Realizing that she's made a mistake, Kasumi tries to find a way to keep Meiling around. "Only if you want to leave?"

I think I do," Meiling replies flatly. "I don't feel like talking anymore."

"Uhh... well... we don't have to talk! We could just... sit here and watch something, maybe? That could work!"

"I guess..." Meiling sighs and leans back into the couch cushions. She's not really interested in what they're watching, but she tries to pretend. Finally she can feign it no longer and turns into a red panda instead. It's a lot easier to provide pleasing company when you're fluffy and adorable.

Kasumi decides to not say anything, instead just inching over slightly. It's a slow and gradual process, but eventually she manages to get close enough to be within cuddle range of the panda... although she doesn't make any motions to do so just yet.

The panda just sits there, or rather, lays there, looking like a big red poof ball. It seems like her mood has improved somewhat, but it's difficult to tell when she's too cute to look upset. Carefully, gently, Kasumi reaches out to pet the panda and cuddle it. She acts like she's touching a live bomb.

Meiling doesn't mind at all; being petted feels nice. That was why animals liked it, after all. Inwardly, she's a little amused by Kasumi's trepidation, but she supposes it's somewhat justified due to her earlier mood. She nuzzles the hand encouragingly. Inspired by the relatively positive reaction of Meiling, Kasumi slowly lifts up the panda and places her on her lap, She continues to gently pet Meiling, quietly watching the show and trying not to say anything that might upset her date even more.

By the time the program's credits roll, Kasumi's eyelids are drooping. Meiling, still in panda form in her lap, is outright fast asleep. Kasumi is too reluctant to uproot the panda for risk of waking her, so she stays put. She eventually falls asleep, too.

 Kasumi wakes up the next morning bleary-eyed and stiff. Sleeping slumped over on a couch isn't very good for the neck. At first she's confused, both about being on the couch instead of in bed, and about the warm, soft heaviness in her lap. Once the gears in her head work their way back up to speed, she remembers that the warm thing is her date, who is currently a small, fuzzy animal. (This relationship is weird.)

She still doesn't want to wake Meiling, still feeling guilty about whatever it was she'd done wrong the previous night. Her mouth is dry and she rather wants to get up and get a drink, but she decides she's okay here for the time being. Maybe Meiling would wake up soon. To keep herself occupied, she turns on the morning news. The sounds of the TV are what eventually rouse Meiling. Her panda ears twitch. She blinks her eyes open slowly. She yawns. It's painfully adorable. At last she looks up at Kasumi, then lazily rolls herself off of Kasumi's lap. The panda turns back into a Meiling.

"So, um... do you want breakfast here, or are you planning to leave?" Kasumi awkwardly asks. She's not sure whether or not Meiling still wants to be around her right now.

Meiling rubs the back of her neck. She looks sort of guilty herself, for some reason. "Err... well, I usually don't have breakfast until after my morning exercise, so it's a little early for me to be hungry yet. Um... sure." She fidgets. "I'm, um... I'm sorry for getting upset at you."

"It's... it's alright. Not the first mistake I've made."

"I meant it, though. You couldn't have known that...it'd upset me." It sounds as if she revised the ending of that sentence at the last moment.

"Of course," Meiling says, and smiles. It's like the sun finally breaking through on a dreary day. "You didn't think I was going to dump you over that, did you?"

"...I kind of did."

Meiling clucks her tongue at Kasumi scoldingly, but she's just teasing. Then she leans forward and kisses her. Kasumi is still too self-conscious to truly show it, but Meiling can tell she enjoys being kissed. Meiling keeps it brief, though; she doesn't want to push it.

After a quick pop in over at Chiharu's for a shower and a clean change of clothes, Meiling goes out for breakfast with Kasumi - and Chiharu and Mitsuo, after having to needle Kasumi a bit before she would agree.