Next Gen Journalism

"Braiinssss..."

“Bowl of candy for the trick-or-treaters... bowl of sake bottles for the inevitable rampaging humans of doom...”

“Okay, I’m ready now. But like, what costume should I go with?”

“H-Hey, there there. Just another day in Gensokyo, eh? Then again, we haven’t had days like these in a while, so it’s… refreshing, in a way.”

Yeah, better than the next yuri lesbian #643 around Gensokyo or something. Still, writing an article of Dos and Don’ts, huh?

“Uhh… I don’t want to tell you this, but… I think it’s a little bit too late for that. Lots of people in Gensokyo have already been bitten, and putting an article about that is… kind of a bit of a moot point…-”

It’s like writing a help guide of how to drive a ship, when said ship is already sinking to her-

“But hey, you’re the first victim, so why not write how it all started, or even a horror story column? That’ll definitely have a few eyes looking at it. Of course, you might want to talk to the incident solvers regarding this… which I have no idea who they are, can’t help you there.”

“I mean sure, lots of people have been bitten. But like, not everyone? This would still be timeless advice all-year-round? You don’t just avoid doing anything about since it, like, already happened? Besides, it could still happen again! Jiangshi are hungry bastards, they’ll bite you twice, guaranteed.”

“Besides, I totally guarantee you that the Bunbunmaru already has a few dime-a-dozen horror stories ready to go in their Halloween paper. I wanna offer something better. Something useful! Something my dearest readers can take home and hang on their wall for years to come! And everyone likes list articles anyway, so I still win in readership!~”

“I… Huh. So that’s how it is.”

Wow, that sudden outburst made even the hell fairy surprised. But her reaction shows that she isn’t surprised at her story, no, but it does confirm her suspicions the moment Hatate spoke about her story. A few things off from her initial guess, but most of it is laid in place.

“Sounds like you’ve got a hell lot to write when this settles over, huh? I still suggest to get that bite treated in case of any lingering effects in your body, Hatate. You’re not as… ‘long-living’ as us fairies.“

Another bottle. Something tells her that she’d need it.

“I’d like to see how much you can drink, but all I’ll say right now is… right after you got bit, other people were bit too, notably, from what I heard from Eri, a bunch of humans, along with others such as Reisen, Komachi, Reimu, among others. I’d help, but all this is so amusing to watch from the sides.“

IT’S THE KIND OF THING SHE LOVES. Finally, SOMETHING.

“… Which reminds me, Eri also said he found a set of peculiar feathers with a very familiar scent which he can’t pin down. I think you know what that means?”

“...so that happened.” Hatate is skipping the dish and drinking straight from the bottle. She wipes her face clean afterward, setting the bottle aside and sighing as she leans her head on a palm.

“That only makes sense,” she admitted, sighing again. “They’re more like vampires, these Jiangshi. One bite from them and you find yourself hopping about and biting others. And indiscriminately, too!” She shakes her head at herself, thinking about the big names she apparently bit after that night with Yoshika. Not the brightest among Jiangshi converts.

“Can you blame me, though? For all the bites, I mean. Obviously I’m smacking myself for trying to interview a fucking corpse in the first place, but all the stuff afterward? I didn’t choose that. The bite made me do it -- literally!”

Yup, mild sake for Hatate, who’s a bird. Too potent, and she could be poisoned. Sitting on the other side of the counter, Crescent gave another bottle to her. She’s one thirsty bird, ain’t she?

“Yeah, I get you. In other words, you’re pretty much one of the earliest people who got bit, and was out for it for a while. I get you.”

A small pause, before it felt like something struck the back of her head. A really long pause, before…

“… Hmm. I see.”

So that’s how it is.

“Well, I’m sure you’ll find your culprit, Hatate. By the way, if you’re bitten, you might want to go to Eientei to get that checked. Maybe you’ll figure out where you’ve been bitten from there.”

“Wait, hang on. ‘Bit’? You can’t be say--”

...

Hatate rubs the back of her neck again, blinking. A lightbulb appears over her head that only Crescent can see. Literally only Crescent. It disappears once Hatate starts talking again.

“Geez, I’m an idiot!”

“I remember now!” Her valley girl speak has exited the building. “I was brainstorming article ideas for the Halloween edition of my paper when I got the thought to do an interview/exposé with the one girl who’s always a Jiangshi year ‘round! I figured it appropriate of course because zombie, spooky, scary, skeleton, blah blah blah. So I went down to the graveyard where she’s always hanging out and I saw her playing with her umbrella friend, then I waited until umbrella girl left to do whatever so I could have a one-on-one chat with her as you’re supposed to do as an honest and honorable journalist. I even had questions lined up to ask her, too! ‘How long have you been a zombie?’, ‘How do you keep your hunger in check?’, ‘Have you stopped gnawing on Kogasa?’, things like that. Anyway I hopped up to her and introduced myself like we’d never met before because of course we hadn’t I don’t spend all day hanging out with zombies, but then she screams out some elaborate haiku about fake news like I write for the Bunbunmaru (VERY insulting!) then just bites my neck out of nowhere and leaves! Just like that!”

“I would have chased after her but of course I had a bite to nurse, which I did by heading home and chugging three bottles of my spider sake as I usually do. But apparently that didn’t work because my latest memory before waking up a day or two ago is me passing out on my balcony. That HAD to have been from the bite, I NEVER black out from drinking my spider sake!”

“You jog your memory by being drunk? Mistaking hallucinations for facts there, are we? But Spider Sake… you know there isn’t anything like that, right? I’ll see what I can find for you, come on in. ”

And off Crescent goes, going inside the cafe. Don’t mind the number of zombie fairies inside doing… zombie fairy things.

“Still, no leads, huh? Feels like a cold case at this point. I wonder what’s the whole motive at this points, besides, in Seiga’s words, ‘shits and giggles’. Eri told me that the patients are half zombified and not full zombies, but it’s still a giant medical condition.”

Pouring a mild sake on the glass along giving the entire bottle, a small idea came on her head.

“Hatate. Answer me this. Where were you at October 25th, or before that? Anything would do, tell me.“

“...ah, right. I homebrew that stuff myself. Whatever, just get me something you think’ll hit the spot for a Tengu.” Hatate follows her inside, a little wary around the zombie fairies but otherwise well-composed.

“But like, I must’ve been out of it, for like, a LONG time? I don’t know a thing about all these, like zombies popping out of of the woodwork you keep talking about! The fact that you keep mentioning it though... it seems really familiar, but at the same time, like, not in the slightest? Does that make sense?”

“I may or may not have took a look at it, Miss Hatate Himekaidou. Not that there’s anything incriminating, is there?~”

Wink wink, NUDGE NUDGE.

“That said, it was around Eri’s cafe, on the grass. I thought it was Eri impersonating you at first, but he’s not the kind to leave things like that behind. Really, did you get in a fight around here, or did you accidentally drop your phone? You’re fortunate nothing's damaged, you know how fragile tech like these can be. So… your turn. Any leads about this whole zombie outbreak thing?”

“Why would there be, news is like, never incriminating on the one writing it? Unless it’s Aya in which case it’s always fake.”

“...just sitting around in the grass, though? But like, I always like have such a tight grip on it?” Hatate scrolls through the notes on her phone, trying to refresh her memory with some of the potential article titles. She goes back to the most recent one she had planned for the KSN Halloween Edition.

“Dammit, if I remembered anything over the past week, that would be nice for both of us!” She holds the back of her neck for a moment before leaning against the wall.

“EEP!”

“...”

“Can you, like, not scare me like that? I mean, like, I know it’s, like, Halloween? But at least w--”

She swipes the phone out of Crescent’s hands the exact moment she sees it.

“First of all where’d you find this second of all thank you for finding it third of all you better not have looked through it or I’ll smack you fourth of all thank you for finding it fifth of all--”

“...I don’t even remember where I was last time I had it.”