The Reflection of Sunrise

Once, long ago

There was a Shogun who believed himself the mightiest being in all the land.

He towered over the peasantry, struck fear in the merchants, and put the samurais’ swords to shame.

Yet there were those that yet stood above him, and he could not accept it.

They were the gods.

In his rage and madness, he and his followers sought to raze a sacred temple to Amaterasu, the all-mother, she who illuminates Heaven.

Her worshippers defended her honor, as well as her envoy who had arrived from Takamagahara to stay at that shrine among mortals.

But monks could not stand against sword-steel and bloodlust, and so the shrine burned.

Through the blaze, one lone monk carried with him a sacred gift from the Mother Goddess, in the vain hope of having his wish granted.

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You take your arms off your keyboard and stretch them out, before glancing at the digital display of the clock on your desk. It's nearly time to punch out for today.

So far, the project has been rolling...relatively smoothly all things considered. New product launches were always stressful, and it was part of your job to make sure everyone's teams were working and communicating well with each other. You cross off another day on your calendar. December 3rd, 2029. Even if the deadline is in February of next year, you can feel it creeping up on you.

You'd better start gathering your things. Thankfully, your desk is pretty barren since you only arrived about a week ago.

What will you collect first?

>Your employee ID

You pick up your plastic ID from the desk. The Vanagandr-Mous Foundation's logo dominates its background, and in the foreground is a bunch of text.

Employee Name: Michael Murakumo

Species: Human

Sex: Male

Age: 25

Title: Systems Integration Engineer (Tier II)

Security Clearance: Green Level

A picture of your face is next to that. Dirty blonde hair and hazel eyes from your Chicagoan mother, and the overall facial structure befitting a young Japanese man inherited from your father. All capped off with a pair of glasses that looked fashionable (at least in your opinion).

In all honesty, your mixed heritage causes you to stick out like a sore thumb here. You've caught gaggles of high school girls peeking at you whenever you pass by the local "hip-and-happening" hotspot in town, mainly because you look like a washed-out J-Pop lead singer.

You try to hurry past that place whenever you go, which is hard considering the newly-built grocery store is there, which is the closest you'll get to a Kroger here.

Sigh. You miss home.

What will you pick up next?

>Car Keys

The keys jingle in your hands as you pick them up, the red Pontiac arrow shining in the florecent light cast from the ceiling.

Before you moved from Chicago to the small coastal town of Rausu, you ran some calculations on how much it would be to pack and send your belongings. Since you lived in a studio apartment, it turned out to be fairly cheap. You only really bought things when you needed them, and compounded with your small living space you didn't actually have that much to send.

This left a sizable amount of granted moving funds left over. So, you decided to take your car with you as a last memento of the United States.

You can see it from your office window. Down in the parking lot among the Toyotas and the Hondas stands a sleek, sunset orange Pontiac Fiero. You made sure to ship it off well in advance before you actually arrived, since automotive import customs and registration was a bitch. Still, you were able to successfully get it cleared and registered.

The Fiero was a gift to you from your late grandfather on your Mom's side. Well, that's not entirely true. Grandpap gave the Fiero to Mom when he got too old to drive it, and she taught you how to drive manual with it. He told her to keep it within the family, as something that each young'n would keep working on.

While Mom may have been an accountant by day, she was a serious gearhead by night, teaching you all about how to maintain the car yourself in the garage of your suburban Chicago home. Dad tried to join you two during your "tune-up time", but his forte was teaching college students about differential calculus, not understanding how to place the timing belt on correctly.

You and Mom kept the old Fiero going for a long time together, until... Well, you maintain it yourself now, and have been for the last eleven years. Like hell a small thing like changing countries would force you to get rid of it. The keys disappear into the pocket of your khakis with a final "clink".

You pick up the last item: the letter.

You wonder why you're still holding onto this thing. Maybe because it has your computer login and password, which you still haven't memorized.

It's strange, really. Such a small piece of paper changed your life in such a big way. For better or worse. You unfold it and read it again for the umpteenth time.

"Greetings, Mr. Murakumo,

You will be pleased to learn that you are being granted a promotion to Systems Integration Engineer (Tier II), effective immediately. We here at the Vanagandr-Mous Foundation have noted your interpersonal skills as well as your technical skills, and in the six months after your hire you have shown leadership qualities that are highly valued in this company.

Please note that this promotion also comes with a new project. As you know, the Vanagandr-Mous Foundation is expanding into the network communications industry. We are currently opening a new branch office in RAUSU, JAPAN. We need people with your expertise to help make the development of this new branch a success. Given your soft skills in FLUENT JAPANESE and GOOD PEOPLE SKILLS, we have selected you as part of the team that will be helming this new branch.

Your move will be completely funded by the Vanagandr-Mous Foundation, and you will be given a stipend for finding housing.

Best regards, and we expect great things from you!

Brynn Vanagndr-Mous

Chief of Human/Faunae Resources"

This was the letter that showed up in your tiny Chicago studio apartment's mail slot a few weeks ago. While the promotion was nice, you were a little shocked about being moved to Japan. Sure, your dad was from there and you visited every so often as a kid, but you're a red-blooded American at heart.

You had no intention of ever leaving the country. Fate, as it seems, had different ideas for you.

When you told Dad about the news, he was pretty happy for you. He even went out of his way to pack you a "Japan survival kit" filled with a guide on Japanese formalities, a road map of Japan in case your Maps app went down, and of course some good-ol' American food like Lays Classic potato chips and some Ovaltine.

He even helped you narrow down your living space, telling you what were reasonable deals and what were scams. A little doting, but you had come to expect it. He'd been like that ever since Mom...

You halt that train of thought in its tracks. You quietly slip the note into your briefcase.

You lock your workstation and step out into the hallway from your office. As you're locking the door, a familiar voice calls out from behind you in heavily accented English.

"Ah, Murakumo-san!" You turn around, pushing your glasses up. Behind you is a middle-aged Shiba Inu Faunae, clutching several USBs and a stack of papers.

"Please, Ito-san. Call me Michael." You smile reassuringly. While there were several others who came with you to Japan from the US, the majority of workers here were natives. While you naturally gravitated to your Star Spangled kinsmen, you tried to mingle with the other folk as much as possible to smooth out relations. Mitsuhiro Ito, the department head of IT, was one of the first to warm up to you. Forty-two years old, three kids and a wife, he had invited you and your co-workers to eat yakiniku at his home earlier in the week, which you discovered was basically barbecue.

"Ah, my apologies, Michael-san. I keep forgetting. Are you leaving for the day?"

"Yes, I finished the task list for this week. Currently, we're still on track to launch the lastest router series despite some...minor setbacks with the software and hardware teams."

"Ah, that is good to hear. Please, have a restful weekend!"

You bid him your thanks, and make your way to the parking lot. Slipping inside the Fiero, you crank the key to hear the engine hum with power behind you. You lower the windows and press the clutch, shifting the car into gear. You could head home but...it's Friday, and there were mountains nearby that you've always been meaning to drive on. You direct the Fiero out of the lot and onto the tiny road and set off.

...

Man, that was worth it. You found a rather secluded mountain road after a bit of driving, which you had a gut feeling would be good. Lots of turns, no cops...yeah, that was a good drive. It even brought you to a clearing near the peak of this particular mountain. You grabbed your leftover bottled juice from lunch and had sat down on the Fiero's hood. You're thankful that the car was mid-engine.

The sun was beginning to set, dipping down beneath the horizon. As it begins to make the final descent, you hear footsteps behind you.

"あなたは何か変わって いますか？" <Pardon me, sir. Do you have any change?>

Uh oh. You…don’t really carry that much cash with you, just enough to buy a soda at a vending machine. Personally you prefer the security of your bank card. Still, you’d like to give her something. It’s the onset of winter and it’s getting colder, so anything given is better than nothing.

Maybe you have some stuff in your car? There is the half-drunken bottle of juice in your hand as well…

The woman in rags, on closer inspection, has a rather bushy stark white tail behind her. You can make out the tip of a white muzzle through the shawl she has wrapped around her head. She’s a Faunae woman, a fox maybe?

私は冷たく、空腹です。<Please sir, I am cold and hungry.>

She pleads with you in a hoarse voice. At first, your Chicago instincts nearly kick in, and you think about turning a cold shoulder to her and getting back in your car. But at the same time, this isn’t Chicago.

What the hell, soda is bad for you anyway. You clear your throat, preparing to speak in Japanese.

“Here you go, Obaa-san. It’s not much, but it should buy you…something at least.”

She takes the coins graciously.

“Thank you, young man. It has been ages since I was given a gift like this from hands such as yours…will you indulge this old woman and tell her your name?”

Your name? Uh, alright.

“Michael. My name is Murakumo Michael. I’m an engineer who works in the town below.”

She cranes her neck, and a soft white ear pokes out from the shawl. You swear it looks…radiant.

“I see, Murakumo-san. I thank you for this offering. You have a warm spirit, you know that? Warm, like the first rays of dawn. Yes, I think you are the one after all this time…”

Without warning, she snatches the keys to the Fiero right through the open window and darts off into the forest.

“H-Hey! Wait, those are mine!” You run after her, stumbling in the soft dirt.

…………

Darkness is quickly encroaching, causing you to lose sight of the trail she’s running on. She’s bobbing and weaving through the trees at uncanny speeds, and you swear that white fur is getting a little hard to look at. As if you glanced at a lightbulb for too long.

A voice echoes through the forest.

“I have judged you, Murakumo-san. Perhaps you are what she needs most right now.”

You stop, trying to catch your breath. You’re a lean guy, but by no means a runner. And what was that just now, a hallucination of your out-of-shape mind?

Actually, where are you right now? The air is cool and still, and there’s a strange sense of…stillness.

As if you’re treading on something you shouldn’t.

You look around, resting your hand on a tree trunk. Wait, not a tree trunk. It’s a burnt out Shinto gate. You’re at the entrance of a long-forgotten shrine. Vines grow through the rotted wood, which is blackened and burnt.

You step forward, and your shoe hits something. The Pontiac’s keys are right at your feet.

You have no idea where you are, and twilight is approaching. The forest is growing darker by the second. “Hey! Where am I? Why did you leave me here?”

Only the wind through the trees answers your questions.

You take out your phone and…no signal. Of course, there would be no signal. This situation has gone from zero to Blair Witch Project in seconds.

Well, if you’re lost in the woods, all alone with no contact with the outside world, you sure as hell aren’t going to play the part of a horror movie protagonist.

You pick up your keys, and open Maps. Your phone auto-caches your location, so triangulating the way back to the lookout should be a cinch.

….

Okay, it’s been thirty minutes. Its cold, it’s fully dark now, and your Boy Scout skills are nowhere as sharp as they used to be.

You look at the entrance to the shrine again. The idea of exploring it is…tantalizing to say the least.

No.

NO.

Bad Michael. You’ve seen enough B-Movies to know how that song and dance goes.

…

Screw it. At least moving around is better than staying in once place and freezing. You get up, and with some annoyance brush the dirt off your slacks. Yeah, those’ll need to be dry cleaned. The phone has about 30% battery left in it, plenty enough to use the flashlight at full intensity.

The shrine is completely wrecked. Time hasn’t been kind to it, and what you assume were once grand halls and rooms are blackened and decayed. Adding to the unsettling factor of this place are the skeletons. Human. Faunae. The first one you crushed underfoot by accident while walking through a collapsed door frame.

Several more were found in what you thought was a courtyard. But then you found the main hall. Rusted blades were embedded in the ground, and there were several skeletons in praying positions while there were others tangled around each other, as if they died in a scuffle. You walk forward, making sure to avoid desecrating anyone’s remains. Strangely enough, all of this feels…familiar. Like a sense of déjà vu you can’t pinpoint.

Your ruminations on what happened here come to an abrupt end when you hear the floor beneath you creak. Loudly.

“Oh shi-“

You barely finish your curse before the floorboards give way.

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Okay. Ouch.

You raise yourself up from a pile of rubble and rotten wood. Your work clothes are completely streaked with dirt and mud. You shakily get to your knees and adjust your glasses, which managed to stay put during the fall.

You’re in some sort of basement…a ritual chamber? You pick your phone up from the ground (no cracks on the screen, thank goodness) and whirl the light around the room. No monsters, you’re still alone. Moonlight streams through the floor you fell through from a hole in the shrine’s ceiling.

The moonbeams land on a small object in the center of the room, covered in what appear to be prayer tags. You walk up to it.

It’s a traditional Japanese mirror, perfectly circular. It must’ve been made out of copper, as its rusted green like Lady Liberty herself. You reach down to touch it and a primal, cold sensation runs through you. Like you got caught with your hand through the cookie jar. You’re not meant to touch this object. But at the same time, curiosity and another sense of strange déjà vu burns within you. You want to, no, NEED to hold that mirror in your hands.

Kids caught with their hands in the cookie jar went ahead and ate those cookies. You’re no different. Overwhelmed by a sense of curiosity, you reach to rip the prayer tags off the mirror as if you HAD to do so. As your fingers brush against the parchment of the first tag, you stop yourself. Someone put these here for a reason. You take your hand back and (you assume this is the right thing to do) put your hands together.

Dad wasn’t what you would call a practitioner of the Shinto religion, and Mom was atheist. But he still held some reverence and belief in it, and made it a point to teach you a few basic prayers.

You offer up one that, if you remember right, is a prayer of absolution.

The prayer tags ruffle a bit, then disintegrate all at once. Oookay. You cautiously walk over to the mirror and gingerly grab it with your hands. You brace for something, to be hit by a curse or attacked by some evil mirror monster from another dimension.

But no, nothing happens. No curses, no monsters.

You breathe a sigh of relief.

Tracing the surface of the dirty mirror with your thumb, you rub some of the dirt off. The mirror catches the moonlight and you can see your own reflection in it as another pang of déjà vu runs through you.

Looking back at the hole in the floor, you notice that some rope fell through with you, dangling at a height where you might just be able to pull yourself out. Let’s hope your upper body strength is better than your endurance.

Holy SHIT.

You’re lying on your back, wheezing. You really ought to work out more. Or at least paid more attention during Rope Day in high school Phys. Ed.

Still, you’re out of the hole. You retrace your steps through the shrine and eventually find yourself back at the entrance. But something’s off.

The oil lanterns at the edge of the shrine trail, long-dried and wicks eaten by time, are fresh and lit. They illuminate a path back to the lookout.

If you had a small hunch something strange was going on before, it’s now an alarm bell ringing in your mind. Clutching the mirror close, you make your way back to your car.

Ah, home sweet home.

It’s not much, but you have to admit it’s a definite upgrade to your old apartment. You’ve got a living room with a small flat screen TV, a traditional Japanese bed (which your back is still getting used to), a full kitchen and even a little backyard.

You throw your dirty clothes in the laundry hamper, and take a quick shower. Everything kinda aches. While you’re showering, you bring the mirror in with you. Might as well clean it off now and save water.

You dry yourself off, and slip into some nightwear. Placing the mirror at an angle on your windowsill, you watch some TV and knock back some cheap canned beer before turning in for the night.

Mmph. Morning already?

You stretch and yawn, sitting up. As you do, you notice something. You’re at the edge of your bed, which is weird since you normally sleep right in the center. You look over, and there’s a Faunae woman sleeping in your bed.

Huh.

Wait, what?!?

You blink several times to make sure you aren’t hallucinating. No, nope. There is a fox woman in full kimono garb right next to you on your bed. Okay. Don’t freak out.

Maybe you’re dreaming. That’s right, this is probably a lucid dream. You just need to close your eyes and think about how you’re NOT awake, and then you’ll wake up. You’re not awake. You’re not awake. You open your eyes.

She’s still there. Gingerly, you reach out and touch the tips of her ears and WOW they’re soft.

Also, is it just you or is it getting a little warm under the sheets? You slowly lift the sheets off her and…she’s on fire. Well, at least the tips of her six tails are.

Small, candle like flames flicker on each of their tips. Oddly enough, your blanket doesn’t seem burned at all. Six tails…you thought they only existed as myth. Dad would tell you stories about them as a kid.

Kitsune. Trickster fox spirits, and messengers of the gods.

Okay, so you’ve got a mythical Faunae woman snoozing to your left. Let’s just…carefully extract yourself before trying to figure out what to do next. You slowly move yourself out of the bed, freezing when her soft breathing pauses. Eventually, you get one foot off the bed. Nice. Then the other one gets caught in the folded-up blanket, sending you right into the wooden floor of your home with a crash.

You shakily get up. Now everything is hurting again. Somehow, she’s still asleep.

Okay. So you’re out of bed. You walk across the room to get a better look at her. Her fur is light brown and white, and her hair extends all the way down to her lower back. It’s black and a dark red, and it cascades down her sleeping form off the side of the bed. You notice something on her back as well, tugging at the kimono slightly. On her back fur is a symbol of a rising sun over water, and it’s just as soft as the rest of her. Realizing that you look a little like a pervert, you step back and give her space. You need to know who she is, and more importantly how she got in here. You’re a careful guy, all of your windows and doors are locked.

You go to your kitchen to brew up some tea. Maybe the smell of that will wake her up? You brew up some Sencha tea like Dad used to show you how.

After the tea is ready, you pour two cups and bring one to your bedroom. You place the cup meant for her near the nightstand. Her vulpine nose twitches a bit, catching the scent of the distinctive Japanese tea.

名前：ああ、里さん、朝のお茶の時間はすでにですか？ <Ah, Satori-kun, is it time for morning tea already?>

She slowly rises, yawning and opening her eyes. You stifle a gasp as small hazy flames manifest at the ends of her outer corners of her eyes. She blinks slowly, her warm orange eyes looking around the room before finally focusing on you.

待って、あなたは悟りくんではありません。あなたは誰？どこですか？ <Wait, you are not Satori-kun. Who are you? Where-where am I?>

The kitsune woman looks at you with an indiscernible expression. She looks you up and down, clearly confused by your sleepwear. Granted, you're equally confused by her classical kimono getup. Another thing you noticed; she spoke in a very, very antiquated form of Japanese.

Christ, you hope she understands the strange American-Kansai dialect you've got. You clear your throat.

"Ah, hi. My name is Murakumo. Michael Murakumo."

She continues staring at you.

She slowly gets up to her feet, the kimono's long robes flowing across the rumpled surface of the bed like water. Every move she makes has a certain elegance to it as if each motion was measured.

"Murakumo Mi-cha-el. Michael." She spends a minute pronouncing your name, rolling the foreign syllables in her tongue. "What an odd name. I don't believe I have heard anything quite like it."

She stands roughly at your height, if not a few inches shorter. Her six tails fan out behind her. Oddly enough, you swear she has a light glow to her, separate from the small flames on the tips of her tails and the edges of her eyes. The kimono seems to radiate the same soft glow, warming up the room.

She scans the room. "This...this is not my shrine. How did I get here?" She rubs one of her ears. "I...the last thing I recall were the shouts of the soldiers, and Satoshi-kun taking me to the safety of the inner sanctum..."

"Actually, you're in my house. I live here. Actually, if I'm not being too rude by saying this, who are you? And how did you get here?"

She does a quick bow. "I apologize, I did not realize I was in the domain of another. My name is Hinode." As she speaks her name, you feel that same familiar warmth again. Just like when you watch a sunrise across the horizon.

Wait a sec. Hinode.

The Japanese word for Sunrise.

"And as for how I arrived at your abode...I am afraid I do not know."

Hinode walks out of the room and into the living room, still wide-eyed at the interior architecture of the house. She feels the plastic table, runs her dark furred hands across the surface of your television, then peers out the window at the road. She turns back to you a little confused, but at the same time excited.

"This is certainly a new experience for me! I was not often allowed to leave the shrine grounds as to not meddle with mortal affairs, but now I'm in the home of a mortal man!" She walks back over to the flatscreen.  "How interesting, never have I seen a decorative style such as this. Tell me, are you a noble? This black mirror is of a very unique quality, I don't believe I've seen anything like it before! Surely, you must be a retainer to the daimyo to be able to afford such luxuries."

Daimyo? Oh man, what era is she from?

"Ah, Hinode-san, this may seem like a strange question to ask, but what is the last major event you recall? Anything at all that happened in this country?"

She taps her chin with one of her claws. "Hmm, I would have to say the most recent news I've heard is that the daimyo Hideyoshi Toyotomi passed away due to illness. Although I never got to see it myself as I was in Takamagahara at the time, he unified a great portion of this land from the raging warlords."

Ooooh no. You recognize that name from one of Dad's old Japanese history books. That guy died in 1598. That means...that means she's over four hundred years old.

"Hinode-san...I'm not sure how to break this to you. But he died over four centuries ago."

She looks at you, then starts to giggle.

"You have quite a sense of humor, Murakumo-san. How can that be? Why some of the priests were informing me of his death not but three days ago."

You look at her dead in the eyes.  "Hinode-san. According to the calendar we use right now, the year is 2029. Hideyoshi Toyotomi died in 1598."

She looks at you, and from her expression, you can tell she sees the truth in your eyes. Her ears fall.

"That would make it...four hundred and thirty-one years. No. No, that isn't possible!" She sits down on your sofa, staring into her lap.

She crosses her arms across her chest as she looks down. The warmth previously emanating from her body dies down considerably, and the flames on her tails and by her eyes flicker down to barely-lit embers.

"What of the shrine? What has become my friends?" She murmurs in a barely-audible whisper.

You've only really known this girl for a few minutes. Hell, you're still not sure where she even came from. But damn it, you aren't going to just stand around slack-jawed as she deals with the shock of suddenly appearing 431 years in the future. She barely notices as you slink away to the kitchen.

You open your fridge and rummage around. Teriyaki sauce...no. Fruit juice? Nah. Leftover pizza from the local "American" food place? You don't even know how she'll react to something like that. What to give her, what indeed. Your mind flashes back to Dad's stories. He told of how kitsune would continuously play pranks on those that offended or slighted them until the offenders paid a tribute in Inari sushi and sake.

Food and alcohol. The great pacifiers in any country.

You don't have anything fancy like sake, but you've got a few cans of locally brewed beer. As for sushi, you've got a pre-made bento box from the grocery store. It's not much, but maybe she'll appreciate the sentiment?

Feeling a little less confident about your idea now that you see what you actually have to give, you walk back out to the living room.

"Hinode-san, I don't know if it's any comfort to you, but I'd like to make an offering."

She looks up, tears welling in her eyes. One falls, dripping down her cheek until it suddenly evaporates in a small wisp of steam. "O-offering?"

"Yes, I give you the best food from my stock..." you give her the bento box, heated in your microwave. "And I give you the finest alcohol that I currently have in my possession." You speak with a theatrical flair in an attempt to match her own elegant, if archaic Japanese.

She gently takes the store-bought bento and the can of beer from you. She opens the plastic lid, and with the pair of supplied chopsticks, takes a bite of the reheated sushi. She then fumbles with the beer can, until you show her how to open it. She raises the aluminum can to her lips and takes a dainty sip before setting it down gently.

"Murakumo-san, that was the first meal offered to me by anyone in their own home."

"So, ah, was it alright?"

She lets out another light giggle, followed by a small sniffle. "No, the sushi was strangely stale and the liquor was bland, but that is irrelevant." She smiles at you, clearly grateful. "I am lost in a new era, I do not know the state of my shrine nor my retainers. And yet, the first thing anyone does is welcome me into their home with food and drink. And for that, the meal was incredible. Thank you."

She takes a few more bites of sushi and washes it down with more beer. "I believe I'm ready to hear this news now. The shrine to Amaterasu...how is it?"

You hesitate, unsure of how to break the news. Despite her brave front, she's obviously distraught and being to blunt about the fact that her shrine is a burnt out ruin won't do her any favors. But at the same time, you can't just dance around this subject. You decide to tell her the truth but in a gentle manner.

"I will not lie to you, Hinode-san. The shrine is no more. It's been abandoned for...who knows how long. I'm sorry."

She stares at the beer can, then sighs. "I see. So, has Shinto died out as well?"

"Oh, no, not at all. It's still practiced by many people around the nation."

Hinode gives you a smile at that, but you can still see into her eyes. She's doing her hardest not to look dejected.

"I am glad, Murakumo-san. It would be a great dishonor to the divines to be forgotten. To be forgotten by mortals is the worst thing for a divine being. Why, I remember Her Holiness being concerned about a trickster spirit long ago, but when I asked Her about it, she simply waved my question off. She said it was a "sight from another time, and did not affect the present". I still ponder what she meant by that." Hinode launches into another tangent about the Shinto gods or something, but you recognize this behavior.

It's the same thing you do when asked about Mom; launch into random tangents. How can you comfort her?

"Uh, excuse me?"

She looks up at you, shaken by the interruption to her story about some kind of "divine prank" that got a minor deity banned to the mortal realm for the rest of their existence. "Yes, Murakumo-san?"

"Please, just call me Michael." You sit down next to her. "Listen, Hinode-san. I understand how you must feel, really, I do. I know what it is to lose something...very close and dear to you. One moment they're here and the next..." you trail off. "The next moment, they're gone." You sigh, taking off your glasses and rubbing your temples.

"Look. I'm just trying to say that it's okay to cry sometimes. Putting up a strong front all the time, it eats away at you. So, if you want to let it out...please do."

She looks at you, then starts to giggle. "Upset? Me? No, while I am taken aback that my shrine, entrusted to me by Mother Amaterasu as my trial here in the mortal realm to ascend to a high Kitsune, has been neglected and forgotten, I am not sad. I take solace in the fact that there are others who worship Mother Amaterasu and her brothers and sisters. Ha ha ha!" She laughs.

"Hinode." You say, dropping the formalities.

She continues laughing, but the laughs slowly morph into sobs. "What...what happened to the people that ran the shrine with me? All the work we put into it, all the friends that I made? What of them? Are they forgotten by time as well, like me? And if I am here, does that mean..." she looks at you through tears with terror in her eyes. "Does that mean, nobody remembers me? I...I will start to fade! Michael-san, what cruel fate is this? To be forgotten by all, left to the wayside to rot?"

She's full-on ugly crying now. You've got to say something.

"Hey, hey. Look, I know it's not much but I'm here, right? You talking to me here right now, that means I'll remember this conversation. And that means you're not forgotten, right?"

She looks at you, then hugs you without warning. Realizing what she's done, she lets go of you just as fast.

"I...I'm sorry. It's just that your kindness reminded me of another human I knew so long ago..." She sniffs, and her gaze is directed to the beer can.

"May I have another, please? Sometimes the worst of sorrows can be drowned in drink." You grab her another can from the fridge, which she cracks open with a single claw.

"Thank you..." She raises the can to her lips, and without another word chugs the entire thing.

"Ahhh...." she lets it go from her lips, "that is truly an awful drink." She giggles a few times. You smile too. "Yeah, it's not that good. But you know what, it does its job."

She raises the can in the air. "No doubts about that, at all."

"Say I haven't even shown you around. Please, allow me to show you my home." You rise from the couch, extending your hand to help her up.

"Ah, what a gracious host." She takes your hand in hers, and you try not to think about how soft her fur feels. Divine is the only adjective here. As she rises, her six tails fan out, and you back away from one of them as it swishes past your face.

"Are they always lit like that?" You gesture to the candle-like flames burning at the ends of them. Hinode smiles at the question. "They are the flames of my very being, Michael-san. As long as they burn, I will continue to be here." She notes your fascination with them. "Please, touch one."

You look at her incredulously. "Go on, it will not burn you. Do not take this lightly either, this is an act of trust towards you for your treatment of me. My flames obey me, and as long as I tell them not to damage they will not."

"Alright then, if you insist..." You tentatively reach out with a few fingers and hover them over a flame. Hinode gestures to lower them, and so you slowly do. To your amazement, like she said the flames don't scorch the skin right off your bones. Rather, you feel a gentle warmth flowing around them.

"That's...incredible! Simply incredible!" Other words fail you as you're taken by the sight in front of you. Hinode simply watches your amazement with a satisfied smile.

You keep trailing your fingers down, watching the flames coil around them. In your awestruck fervor, you keep traveling down...and down...until you grab a handful of her tail. It's the most wonderfully soft and warm thing you've ever felt, like an extremely fuzzy heated blanket. Hinode gives off a small yelp and smacks you with another one of her tails, which brings you back to reality.

"I...I'm sorry! I didn't watch my hands."

She looks at you, flustered. "It's okay, just...you need to ask permission to touch my tails. To kitsune, tails are a symbol of their divinity. And for a mortal to touch them, well, it's something that needs to be earned. I will let this incident pass, but please know this is the first and last warning."

You do a traditional apology bow, feeling like she'd appreciate that. "I'm really sorry about that..." An idea pops into your head. She was enamored by your TV before. Why not show her what it could do when actually powered on?

"Watch this." You pick up the remote and hit the power button, then the "talk" button. "Open YouTube. Search for...traditional shamisen songs."

Hinode lets off a small gasp when she sees the TV flare to life, then opens up the YouTube app. She slowly approaches the TV when a shamisen player dressed in traditional garb shows up on screen and begins playing. At that moment, she falls back on the floor.

"A moving image? That can't be, it's as if there is a musician right there!" She gets up, then moves to look behind the TV, feeling how thin it is between her fingers. "A mirror that looks into the lives of others...what sort of divine instrument is this?"

"It's not magic. It's called a television, and we developed it." She looks at you.

"Mortals made this? And it does not utilize divine energy? Incredible, simply wonderful!" She sits in front of it, mesmerized. A few times, she reaches out, her hand resting on the screen.

"I'd like to show you around some more. I can leave the television on if you want, though." She gets up. "Please, do that."

"Here we are." You show her the small, slightly cramped kitchen.

You've tried to keep everything neat and organized since you hate messy cooking spaces. Cooking is a bit of a hobby and a learned survival trait for you. Chicago taught you a lot of things, and how to not get mugged and cooking were the two biggest life lessons you took away from that city.

"So, this is my spice cabinet, here's where I store dry food..." You're not really sure why you're trying to build up to the appliances, but you figure a lead-up to them will make her more impressed.

"And here we are, the cornerstone of modern convenience in cooking; the microwave." You proudly show off the LG branded box to her, but she simply stares at it with a look of confusion.

"I'm sorry, what is this?" She asks you, one ear crooked up and the other lopsided as she tilts her head. You could explain how it uses radiation to energize the water molecules in food, causing them to heat up food from the inside out. Or, you can save her the scientific spiel and give her a demonstration.

"Think of it as an accelerated cooking oven. Here, let me show you." You grab a packet of popcorn off the shelf and into the waiting microwave. You set it to the recommended time setting and let it do its thing. Hinode leans into the glass, watching the paper bag spin around.

Then she jumps back, fur ruffled as the popcorn starts to "pop".

"What...what is it doing?" She asks you, slightly alarmed.

"It's a popular snack food, I think you're going to like it. It's called popcorn." The microwave dings, and carefully you extract the steaming hot bag. "Careful, this thing vents a lot of hot steam when you open it." You tear the bag open, letting the buttery aroma waft through the room. Hinode sniffs the air a bit.

"That smells...interesting. Yes, that's the word for it." She looks into the bag and takes out a single popped kernel. She rolls it around her fingers, feeling its texture. Unfortunately, she presses too hard, and it shatters in her hand. "Ah, it's very fragile. May I have another?" She asks.

"Sure, I made this bag to share." She reaches in and draws out another. She gives it another tentative look, then pops it into her mouth. Her expression is inscrutable, but then her ears pop up. "It's wonderful! Pop Corn, you said? What a simple, yet curious food!"

You smile. "I'm glad you like it. Come on, I want to show you the next room."

The next room being your bedroom, and the only room left in the house. She's particularly taken by how large the bed is for one person and even asked if you had a spouse (you laughed the question off). Now, she's going through your closet and looking through your clothes.

"Such interesting garments! So this is what is fashionable in this era. The fabric quality is very nice on this one, Michael-san. Which tailor made it?" She holds up one of your formal suits.

"Joseph. A. Bank" You say, hanging it back on the rack. Hinode looks around the room some more, playing with the light switches. Then, she sees the mirror, propped up on the windowsill.

"Anon...where did you find that?"