I was floating high above Misty Lake, looking for my friends, when I spotted a mermaid in the lake below. I swooped down to greet her, but by the time I had gotten to the lake's surface, she was gone and instead there was an enormous catfish with a wreath a spider lilies around its neck.
"Is this yours, my lady?" he asked politely, and nudged its head towards a red hooded cardigan floating next to it. I wasn't sure, and I said so, and then...
Then I was woken by bright sunlight hitting my face. I turned to my side, trying to return to the dream, not quite ready to rise from my grassy bed. The familiar scent of lilies-of-the-valley tickled my noise.
I finally gave up on falling asleep again and let my eyes flutter open. The sun was so high up it must have already been the afternoon. Not that it mattered: I had no plans for the day.
I sat up and looked around the Nameless Hill, my home. Spring had come, and with it came blooming lilies-of-the-valley. I was glad. Winter wasn't bad, but I have the feeling I was born to be a part of spring just like the flowers around me. Just seeing their leaves swaying gently in the breeze made my heart flutter.
As I admired the flowers, another person living on the hill, Medicine Melancholy, floated by, muttering something under her breath.
"Hello, Miss Medicine," I said, waving. I hadn't seen her in days.
Medicine glared at me. "Have you been to the south side of the hill lately?"
I shook my head.
Medicine sighed, and the winged doll always following her imitated the gesture. "Dandelions are invading again. Those good for nothing, poisonless..." she turned around and left, still grumbling.
I followed her with my eyes. Medicine can be pretty weird, but I still think of her as a friend. I had been scared during my first meeting with her, but in the end it turned out I didn't have to be: she had given me one judging look from top to toe, then shrugged and said: "You're one of Su-san's. You can stay." Now, we get along just fine. She doesn't talk to me much, and we usually hang out in different parts of the field, but when we do meet she's always very nice and civil. She gets a little cross sometimes if me and my other friends are being noisy, but in the end it could be a lot worse.
That is why I was sad to see her being so grumpy over something. I didn't really get why a couple of dandelions were such a big deal when we lived in a sea of lilies-of-the-valley, but even a hint of yellow made her see red. Maybe there were way more of them this year?
Maybe I could help? I had no other plans: I might as well go and pluck the dandelions away so that they would stop bothering her.
I stood up, stretching my arms and legs until I stopped feeling stiff, then took to the air and flew to the southern end of the field. It's the sunniest part of the Nameless Hill, but it has the least lilies-of-the-valley growing in it, so there's a lot of room for invading flowers. And sure enough, there were lots of yellow flowers mixed with the white.
I stooped down and got to work, plucking up every dandelion I could find, leaves and all. Maybe I could make a present of them to someone?
"That's quite the bundle you have there, Alraune."
I yelped and jumped back, spooked, clutching the flowers to my chest. Yukari Yakumo had appeared in front of me, or at least, half of her had: the lower half of her vanished into a gap decorated with ribbons.
"Hello," I said warily. Miss Yukari responded with a weird smile. I'm not sure I really understand her. Cirno and the others say she's very powerful and could probably wipe out the entire Nameless Hill if she wanted to, but she still shows up every once in a while, just to talk to me apparently. She never says anything mean, but something about the way she acts makes me nervous, even if I'm not sure why.
"Why are you picking flowers on a lovely day like this?" Miss Yukari asked, looking at the skies.
I held the flowers forward. "Miss Medicine doesn't like other flowers than lilies-of-the-valley, so I'm getting rid of them."
Miss Yukari raised her eyebrows. "You do realise dandelions can regrow from the roots alone? Just plucking away the visible parts of the plant isn't going to be enough."
"Oh." I frowned. How was I supposed to find the roots now that I had picked the flowers already? I'd have to wait until they regrew if I wanted to get it right.
"I know something else you might find intriguing," Miss Yukari said, that weird smile still on her face.
"What is it?"
Miss Yukari held out a closed fist. "Come closer."
I leaned in as Miss Yukari opened her fist. She was holding a glowing red orb the size of a cherry.
"Wow." I looked at her. "What is it?"
Miss Yukari kept smiling. Suddenly, she closed her fist and squeezed. There was a popping sound, and she opened her hand to show a glaring red light. I yelped and shielded my eyes with my hands when shutting them wasn't enough.
And then I opened my eyes. And stared at my hands. My tiny, so pale they were nearly translucent, and most importantly, wrong hands.
I looked up. Yukari was staring at me, keeping track of my every move, a malicious smirk on her countenance. My hands curled up into fists as if it was a primal reflex.
"You-" I lunged towards her, arms swinging, but she was no longer there. I let my arms fall to my sides. I had known it to be futile before I even moved a muscle. But futile or not, I had to keep trying. If nothing else, I had to make my opinion of her and her sick schemes crystal clear to her.
"Well, well," her taunting voice said behind my back. "it's nice to see you again too, Little Red Riding Hood."
I refused to respond to her and or to acknowledge the ridiculous moniker she had bestowed on me. Instead, I grasped the memories that were flooding into my brain, desperately trying to find an anchor in the sea of uncertainty. There had to be something I could hold onto no matter what, something safe from Yukari's caprice.
As hard as tried to ignore her, I couldn't help hearing her chuckle. "You look like a shrunken old lady with your face scrunched up like that."
"I don't care."
"I'm aware of that." I opened my eyes to see that Yukari had gapped herself right in front of me. "Now, is there anything new you wish to tell me?"
With a scream, I hurled myself at her, but I might have as well have attacked steam: I went through her like she was merely an illusion. I lost my balance and tumbled to the ground face-first.
"I'll take that as a no," Yukari said behind me. I heard a sound of a parasol being opened. "Can't say I didn't except as much." She sighed, in a mockery of a true concerned sigh. "Anything else?"
I remained on the ground, fighting back tears. It wouldn't even matter if I said something else. The whole endeavour was futile: whatever would happen to me next depended entirely on Yukari's whims, and what attempts I had made in the past to persuade her had always fallen flat.
And yet, I couldn't give up. My life was on the line, and I refused to discard it, even if the hill I tried to crawl back up to had been metamorphosed into a near vertical mountain.
I got up, wincing as I saw fresh bruises on my knees, and turned defiantly towards Yukari. "I want to go home."
Yukari twirled her parasol. "But you are already at home, Little Red Riding Hood."
My mouth felt dry. "My real home. My old home. The one you stole away from me."
Yukari tilted her head. "Why, don't you enjoy your life here? Immortality, new friends, no responsibilities..."
"I said, I want to go back!" I inadvertently screamed out the last few words. Yukari didn't as much as raise an eyebrow. "What about my parents? My sister? All my friends?"
"What about your friends here?"
Despite a slight twinge of conscience I remained adamant. "I don't care! This-" I gestured at the body I hadn't been born into. "This isn't who I am supposed to be! This isn't where I belong, even if you force me to think I do! I want-" Tears began streaming down my face. I really had tried to hold them back, but after a certain point, it no longer mattered. "Please, just give me my life back!"
I could already tell Yukari's response from her infernal smile. "It has been years, Little Red Riding Hood. The life you led then has long since passed."
"You can put me back where you took me from!" I yelled. "I know you can! Why don't you just do that?"
No response. I sank on my knees as tears blurred my vision. It was futile, futile...
"Why are you doing this to me?"
"You wish to know?"
I looked up and blinked. I had asked the same question many times before, probably every single time Yukari briefly returned my memories back to me before yanking them away once more. However, this was the first time she had even acknowledged the question.
"Of course I do!" I yelled, my voice by now hoarse from the shouting.
"At first," without a warning, she had appeared directly behind me. She grinned at me as I recoiled from her. "it was really just a whim. A test to see if I could turn an old game of mine into something longer-lasting. Naturally," she grinned at me like a cat grins at a crippled sparrow. "that is still a part of the game. And then..."
A chill ran down my spine. "And then?"
"I realised I could take this opportunity to more deeply investigate something I've been thinking about. An experiment of sorts, really. To see how someone who has had their humanity forcibly stripped from them copes under different circumstances." For a brief moment, her grin vanished. "And it seems to me you're far happier without memories of your past than with them." She opened her free palm. The red light from earlier was returning to it. This time, I knew perfectly well that it was, and what she was taking away from me.
"NO! NO!" I screamed and backed away as fast as I could as my memories were irresistibly plucked away from my mind once more. "Please, just take me back home! Don't do this!" I fell down as my mind collapsed and the world went black.
I opened my eyes. Miss Yukari was standing in front of me, her hand in a fist. My head hurt.
"I must take my leave now," Miss Yukari said, raising her parasol. I hadn't even noticed her opening it. "Say hello to your little friends for me, Alraune."
"Okay." I got up waved at her. "Bye bye, Miss Yukari."
"Indeed." For a weird moment, Miss Yukari stopped smiling, and she looked at me quietly, kind of like she was trying to see through me. I got goosebumps, but I didn't want to show her I was scared, so I didn't look away.
She slowly started smiling again, and she opened a gap under her feet and fell down into it. The gap closed behind her.
I shrugged. Miss Yukari had been bit weird like always, but at least she was nice. I looked around and saw all the dandelions I had picked so far had fallen from my hands and had scattered everywhere around. Oops.
I started collecting them again, but when I bend over, I noticed something strange: water fell down my face. I raised my hand to it, and noticed my eyes were watering, so much so it was like I had cried.
I couldn't think of any reason why I could be sad, so I wiped my eyes with the corner of my skirt and got back to work. Whatever it was, the beautiful day and pretty flowers would help me forget.