Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Everything was planned out for the summer. With university breaking up in time for the warm weather to settle in, she wanted to go back home and visit family for a few weeks before returning at the end of September to continue her final year. 

Waking up in a strange dream-like world and attempting to fix everything was not on her to-do list. Maybe her grandmother was right, sometimes the right path is the one you least expect. Her grandmother probably didn't think that the 'right path' would land her in a fictional universe, but the world wasn't about to stop to let her question it. 

Sayako had been waiting for summer to roll around for the latter half of the year, anticipating it, wishing for it, begging the universe to let her leave. It's not like she hated university, but the coursework had piled high in her second year, and she hadn't gotten the chance to go home and visit anyone over winter, let alone during spring. 

With the summer finally coming along, and the three and a half (technically four) month long break from university was going to be a welcome experience. 

The moment she was blessed with the go-ahead to leave, Sayako was already on the train back home. She had everything planned out, visiting family, seeing friends and getting to sort her life out before returning for her final year. It was meant to be an important summer, where she would figure out where she wanted to go in life. 

And yet, as wonderful and exciting as all of that sounded, she really did not want to do it. 

She was doing well in her course, she was making friends, and everything seemed to be going great. Her parents were supportive of her studies, of her chosen career paths, and yet she couldn't go to them. Not yet at least. 

How was she supposed to tell them she had no idea what she wanted to do in life? 

Hence why her wonderful and perfect plan to visit her grandmother for a few weeks before heading to her parents seemed like a fool-proof plan on getting her life back on track. 

Sayako's grandmother was an odd person by most standards (probably why the two of them got along so well), who made windchimes in her retirement and liked collecting fireflies during the summer, she made home-made jam every year and would camp under the stars in the mountains. 

Sometimes Sayako wondered how she did it all, how she lived in her retirement so comfortably, how she knew what she wanted to do and how she wanted to do it. 

And sometimes, Sayako couldn't help but feel as though her grandmother knew about something the rest of the world didn't. Like a secret that brought along so much happiness with it, that if someone were to pull the curtains back and see what was truly going on, they would find that the joy escaped through a little window and was now flying far away into the sky before anyone could catch it in a jar again. 

The train station was smaller than the one in the city, less used and the overabundance of moss on the walls embodied the age and abandonment almost too perfectly. It looked the same as it had when Sayako last visited. 

The same old pages were stapled to the notice board, the same old wooden bench that had sat there for at least forty odd years had been given a new coat of paint, the swallow nests still sat up in the wooden rafters and the little cabinet where the tickets could be bought was empty as always. 

The cabinet wasn't technically always empty. That was an exaggeration, but the old man selling the train tickets liked to have his lunch between 12:35 and 13:25. So between those hours, you'd have some real tough luck getting a ticket (hence why most people bought their tickets the day before travelling.) 

Thankfully Sayako hadn't brought many things with her, her school backpack was enough to store everything she'd need for the summer. Spare change of clothes, her chargers, laptop, sketchbook and pencil case were all neatly placed inside with plenty of space for her water bottle and a few extra items she wanted to bring along. 

Not that she would need a lot of things this summer. 

As she descended the stairs of the train station, the homesickness was beginning to settle down and take root inside her heart. She'd spent most of her childhood living with her grandmother in this village and seeing it the same as it had been filled her with an indescribable ache in her chest. It wasn't a terrible ache, but it still ached. 

The village sat directly beneath a pair of mountains with a handful of houses scattered up the mountainside on the left, most of them looked like they were being swallowed up by the thick forest that spread all across the mountains. The trees lower down on the mountains were various species of oak, cedar and lilac trees. Higher up where the air was colder even on the warmest summer days sat the pines, tall and undisturbed in their peaceful existence. 

Sometimes, Sayako wondered what it was like to be a pine tree up on that mountain, looking down at all the tiny little homes and little people going about their lives. 

She often visited them when she was younger with her grandmother, searched under every rock and peeked behind every tree, ran through the rivers and streams as if they held a kind of magic to them, and yet the mountains never failed to amaze her, no matter how many times she looked at them. 

Did the trees remember things? Did they remember the faces of those who walked through them? Did they remember her? Would they welcome her after leaving, or would they turn their back on her for having left, refusing to give her the wonder that made them so special to her back then. 

On the right beneath the mountains were a large handful of fields and rice paddies. A small bubbling river ran down between the village and the fields, separating the two from one another with four main bridges reaching across to allow farmers access to the fields (as well as the occasional group of youths running around the place), with several smaller bridges built from scrap wood and rocks that the older children found in their spare time and thought it to be the greatest adventure to build something like that. 

Sayako had built her fair share of them when she was little. Most had been washed away by now. 

Rushing past the station and going beneath the metal bridge that held the trainline up, the river eventually faded into the distance along with the rest of the fields and trees. 

The village was quiet as she walked down the main street, not too surprising given it wasn't summer break for the students yet. Everyone was either working or in school. Nobody would see her just yet. 

"Saya-san! Is that you?!" She couldn't even get past the first house without someone recognizing her. That was the singular thing most small villages and towns were known for, the uncanny ability for everyone to know and recognize everyone. 

She cursed herself for thinking she could sneak back home without someone immediately waving her down to ask her how she's been. It was sweet, in a way. 

Turning to face someone she most certainly would not recognize just based on how long she hadn't been there, Sayako was pleasantly proven wrong as she saw an old blue truck slow to a stop beside her. That truck belonged to one person, and one person only. 

"Tanaka-san! It's wonderful to see you again, how have you been?" She beamed up at the old man, waving to him as he leaned out the window to get a better look at her. Tanaka was an elderly farmer with a bald head (which he desperately hid underneath the most ridiculous hats) and an impressive grey moustache that could rival the most well-constructed brush in all of Japan. 

"My word, you've grown! Last we saw of you, you barely reached up to my waist." The old man pushed the glasses on his nose up, adjusting them to see her better. The words shouldn't have had much effect, and yet they made Sayako wince inwardly. 

When her parents moved to the city she went with them, and unfortunately, she didn't have a lot of time to come back and visit. The fact that she hadn't seen anyone in such a long time was almost like a gut-punch to an already bruised stomach. Painfully reminding the individual of the injury that has yet to heal. 

"I'm surprised you still recognized me; I would've thought I could sneak through, and nobody would bat an eye." Sayako attempted to chase away the feelings threatening to spew out of her with a lighthearted joke. 

"Goodness, no! You are the spitting image of Kana-san when she was younger, I think if you walked around half of us old bats would think Kana-san had died and her ghost was haunting us." Tanaka let out a hearty laugh, hitting the side of the van door as he did. 

'He did always have a concerning sense of humour. I'm glad that hasn't changed. ' Sayako gave a smile to the old man. 

"Is that all you've got with you?" He gestured to her backpack, filing through his moustache to scratch it. 

"Yes, I'm only staying for a few weeks." She replied. "I wanted to have enough time to say hello to everyone." 

"I can give you a ride up to Kana-san's, it's a long way up the mountain, and I'm sure you are tired from travelling so far. Besides, I was heading that way anyway, I'm delivering some parcels to her." Tanaka continued to chatter away as Sayako rounded to the other side of the vehicle. 

"Parcels?" She asked, opening the door to reveal several small boxes labelled ' Fragile ' and ' Handle with Care '. She hopped into the truck, carefully piling the parcels onto her lap as she closed the door, not bothering to take her bag off her shoulders. 

"Oh yes, she's been getting quite a few recently." Tanaka started the vehicle again, driving down the road. 

"They've been the talk of the town recently. She's so secretive about what's inside." He continued, taking a left turn in the road. The drive through the village was too familiar, it was as if Sayako had never left. 

A few of the houses had been given a new coat of paint and a handful had replaced their fences or fixed up their doors, but nothing new had been added. No new houses built, perhaps a few smaller extensions (potentially for families that had become bigger during the years) at most, but everything had stayed almost the same. 

Sayako wasn't sure if she hated it, the fact that nothing had changed. That the village was like an ornament piece, a painting, stood still in time with nothing to show for its age except the people within it. Or if she loved it, the magic it held back in her childhood was contained in this small village, and if it changed, the magic would certainly be gone. 

Not everything was shabby and falling apart though, most of the houses were built sturdy and anything that was damaged in storms was rebuilt stronger and made to last. 

"The ladies down by the shop think it's from her secret lover." Tanaka spoke, taking another turn that led them out of the village onto a dirt path. Sayako looked away from the village and glanced up at the winding road, it would only be a short while before she reached her grandmother's house. 

"I was always under the impression he died." She stated plainly, knowing just about as much about her grandmother's mysterious 'lover' (as the village had so lovingly called him) as the rest of them did. 

The 'ladies' Tanaka had referred to was the group of older women, about the same age as Sayako's grandmother, who loved to gossip about anything and everything. They always had a knack for starting harmless rumours, and it would seem that even in her old age, her grandmother's love life was still a big mystery people wanted answers for. 

"Well, it may not be from him, but they don't have a return address or a name so I suppose us old bats can't help but be curious. We've got nothing better to do than snoop about in other people's business." Tanaka smiled as the treeline came closer and closer. 

The shade from the trees made little patterns zigzag along the hood of the truck as they headed further up the mountain, and Sayako couldn't help but roll the window down to take a deep breath of the fresh air into her lungs. It smelled so new and yet so old, it smelled fresh, and it had the smell of a memory she'd long forgotten, something beautiful. 

"It's good to be back." She said, leaning her head out of the window a little to get a better lungful of the air. 

"It's good to have you back." Tanaka replied, slowing the truck as a house came into view along the road. It was in a small clearing, filled with lush green grass and various flowers that were just coming into bloom. 

The house itself looked the same as it had always looked, a few small repairs were done here and there, but nothing major had changed; the same old wooden bench was out by the front door, the windchimes were still hanging on the rafter beams above the steps, and the windows were open to allow for the fresh air to travel through the house. 

Although there were significantly less pairs of shoes by the door, it all looked the same. 

The biggest difference was the amount of flowers and various plants in the pots both outside on the front veranda and on the inside by the window. Half of them were already in bloom, the other half simply looked green and thriving. It was like she never left. 

"Thank you for the ride." Sayako opened the door of the truck as Tanaka pulled up to the house, making sure she had a good grip on the parcels before hopping out of the truck. 

"It was lovely to see you again, and if you can, please ask Kana-san who the parcels are from. I reckon we will all be indebted to you if you find out." Tanaka grinned at her, filing his fingers through his moustache for a moment before waving goodbye and starting the truck again. 

Sayako waved as best as she could with the parcels in hand, watching him until his truck disappeared behind the trees and she could no longer hear the engine running. He was gone. 

She wasted no time in turning around and running up to the house, kicking off her shoes before stepping onto the wooden floor in her socks and quickly placing the shoes onto the shoe rack to better explore the home without dragging mud and dirt everywhere. 

The house itself looked similar to the hazy memories of her childhood, warm and inviting, a place that was hard to leave behind. Most of the furniture was the same as it had been when she left, a handful had gotten a new coat of paint or varnish, with more decorations her grandmother made from the things she collected out in the forest. 

Little charms hung from windowsills that were meant to protect the home from spirits, small wooden figurines that had leaves and various rocks tied to them could be found in every room, in every nook and cranny. They represented something so unbelievably home to Sayako, it made her want to gather them all up into her arms and hold them as tightly to her chest as she possibly could. 

After making a thorough sweep of the house, it became rather clear that her grandmother was nowhere to be seen. If Sayako could guess correctly (and she absolutely could), then her grandmother was out in the mountains collecting more rocks, mushrooms and whatever other small treasures she could find up in the mountainside. 

That might be the thing she missed the most, out of everything that she left behind. The feeling she would get after climbing across the heights with her grandmother, and just looking out across the forest that lay on the other side of the mountains. It was one of the most mesmerising things Sayako had ever seen and ever will see. 

No wonder the villagers loved hiking and camping over the mountains, it was like the forest had been untouched by mankind and it was allowed to thrive to its fullest. The trees, the ground, even the air itself felt different over the mountains. Like there was some kind of magical barrier that stopped all of the negative things that would want to destroy it. 

Sayako couldn't wait to explore them again, see how much it changed in the time she was gone. Would the trees remember her? Would the ground greet her? Would the air embrace her like an old friend? 

All in due time, she would get her answers. However, for now, she settled for placing the packages on the kitchen table, carefully setting them down to avoid accidentally dropping one (goodness knows what is inside them, it could be irreplicable), and making her way to her old room. 

The further she made it into the house the more it felt like she was walking back in time until finally, she reached her room. The door slid open as smoothly as it always had, and her room greeted her with the warm rays of the sun casting themselves in through the open window. Her grandmother liked to air the house out in the summer, all the windows that could possibly be opened were opened. 

Sayako took in a deep breath and stepped inside. The room was warm and spacious, with little paper stars on the wall that swirled around in various patterns. The tatami mats beneath her feet felt comfortable, and it was impossible for her to not let out a quiet laugh. Of all things to miss about a home, she never imagined it would be the mundane things. 

There was a small desk by the window with a pillow tucked underneath it and a lamp on the corner. It housed various art supplies, amongst which were paint brushes, pencils of every colour stuffed into three different jars and an empty little box where her rubber used to sit. The rest of the art supplies were safely tucked away in the cabinets on the left side along with her futon and clothing. 

The plants that used to line her windowsill are no longer there, although it was probably easier to keep them alive in a room where her grandmother had easier access. 

It's still bizarre to see everything almost perfectly the way it had been. 

"Goodness Saya! You're all grown up now!" When her grandmother returned the first thing she did was give Sayako a bone-crushing hug. 

"Look at you!" She squished her granddaughters' face between her hands and plastered a kiss to her forehead. "Oh my, the photos you sent me can never live up to what you look like in person, you've grown into such a fine young woman." She kissed Sayako's forehead again and finally released her. 

"It's good to be back, it feels like I haven't been here since forever." Sayako smiled, doing her best to look like the time away hadn't affected her. It did, but her grandmother had more pressing matters to worry about. "Do you want some help with that?" She gestured to the backpack Kana had (no doubt stuffed full of mushrooms, leaves, sticks and shiny stones). 

"Yes, could you be a dear and put these in the kitchen? I'm making us soup tonight." Kana proudly declared as she handed the backpack over and turned towards the kitchen. "I'll teach you how to make my famous mushroom soup!" 

"Heck yes! Best soup in the world!" Sayako grabbed the backpack, opening it up to peer inside. "Oh, and Tanaka-san had a few packages for you, I put them on the table." She said as her grandmother began rummaging through the cupboards to start making the soup. 

"Oh perfect, I've been waiting for a while for those to arrive." Kana clapped her hands together and turned on the stove. 

"Who are they from? If you don't mind me asking." Sayako wouldn't tell Tanaka or the rest of the villagers if it was someone her grandmother didn't want to talk about, but there was no harm in asking. 

"They're from an old pen-pal, we met in the city when I was very young, and we kept in touch. I haven't been able to visit her since she moved up to Aomori, but we send each other parcels as a sort of tradition that we started when we were little. It started with her gifting me a bracelet she made from flowers, and then I continued it by gifting her a pretty rock in return." Kana sighed with a fond smile at the memory. 

"Of course, we call as often as we want since technology has gotten better, but it's still so incredibly fun to see what new things we can send each other, we can open the parcels up after dinner if you'd like! I'm dying to see what Senna sent me this time."  

"I'd love to, and I'll keep it a secret from Tanaka-san, I think it's more entertaining if he thinks it's from your long-lost secret lover." Sayako said, emptying the contents of the backpack out onto the counter to sort them into their places. 

"Oh he's back to that theory now?" Kana clicked her tongue. "I told that man so many times they're not from a secret lover, but he just doesn't listen! And it's no help that the three gossipers from the shop keep fuelling his ideas." She shook her head in false disappointment. 

"Why not just tell them who it's from?" Sayako asked, placing the mushrooms onto a plate to be cleaned. 

"That would take all the fun out of hearing their absurd guesses." Kana replied with a wink and got to preparing the soup. 

The two fell into an easy rhythm around the kitchen after that, it was almost a wordless task for the two to move about the place putting ingredients into the pot and scouring the shelves for the correct herbs and spices for the simmering soup. Or at least it would have been wordless if Kana hadn't been talking through each of the ingredients and steps required in the soup, instructing Sayako carefully on each of the delicate parts. 

Not to mention the flood of questions about how life was going, how things were looking at university and everything and anything in between that Sayako answered as best as she could, until the dreaded question came up. 

"What are you planning to do once you graduate?" Kana asked as she turned the stove off while Sayako placed two bowls down onto the countertop to be filled. 

"I know this will sound a bit bad, but I'm not entirely sure." Her grandmother was the only person she was freely willing to admit this to. "I don't think I've found my calling yet, there are still so many things I want to do, so many things to create and to experience and so, so many different skills I want to learn I just don't know what to do. What to start with, what to follow down the path where I'll eventually make a career out of it, it's just so much... I don't know what I'm doing." 

"That's alright, I didn't realise what I wanted to do for a long time. Neither did your mother, so I suppose it runs in the family." Kana chuckled. "We can figure it out together, how does that sound?" She placed the ladle into the pot and poured enough soup into the two bowls to fill them to the brim.  

Sayako smiled at that, blinking away the wetness that started forming in her eyes and nodded. "That sounds good, I would really appreciate it." 

"Good, now, let's carry these into the living room and after dinner I can give you your old yukata, it should still fit." Kana replied, gesturing to the two bowls as she opened the fridge to find a cold drink to go with the soup. 

"I think it should, it was very big on me when I was younger. I remember the sleeves reached my elbow and the bottom of it was folded up so I wouldn't trip." Sayako snickered as she carefully placed the bowls and some utensils onto a wooden tray and headed into the living room. 

The soup was as good as she had remembered (maybe even better since she hadn't had it in so long), and the cold lemonade helped cool her down afterwards, keeping the warm air of the summer evening from overheating her. Her grandmother had opened the sliding doors to the living room so they could watch the sun setting while they ate, and Sayako couldn't help but wish she could stay there forever, in the mountains that felt like home no matter how long she was away for, and the house she would call home no matter how far she was. 

"Can I ask something?" 

The two of them were sitting facing the back of the garden, allowing them a full view of everything that was behind the house. The garden was filled with various vegetables and a handful of fruit trees at the back, and beyond the fenced off area lay the forest that held a little pathway up and over the mountains. 

Sayako knew the pathway well, she had spent so many days walking through the forests that it was practically ingrained into her muscle memory. She wondered if the roots that she would have to step over still stuck out of the ground, if the little stream grew in size and engulfed the stepping stones that acted as a makeshift bridge. 

Did the giant oak tree still house the owls inside its trunk, did the trees look the same? How much had the plants grown? How much had things changed? 

Would she still be able to recognise the paths, or would they refuse to show themselves to her? 

"Of course, go ahead." Kana smiled, the crow's feet around her eyes crinkling as she did. 

"How did you know what you wanted to do?" She asked. "For the future, how did you know?" 

"Well, that is a bit of a difficult one." Kana took a deep breath and turned back to the garden bathed in the colours of the setting sun. "There was one moment I think I realised what I wanted to do with my life, and that was when I found out I was pregnant with your mother." 

It was rare to hear anything about her grandmother's life before she had Sayako's mother, even rarer for her to mention the situation that landed her to be carrying a child without ever marrying. 

"Senna knew of course, we did everything together, she was with me when I found out, so I suppose in a way it's something we decided together."  

"Decided what together?" 

"That we would raise your mother on our own, and to keep how it happened a secret." Kana smiled, turning back to face Sayako. She had a strange expression that Sayako couldn't place, a look that meant she knew something nobody else did. 

"When I was just ten years old, Senna visited me here during the summer. We had been friends for years at this point and we begged our parents to let us visit each other over the summer, so a plan was made. Senna would visit at the start of the summer and stay for a few weeks before I would visit her for a few weeks...I think she lived in Tokyo at the time." 

Sayako turned to fully face her grandmother, shifting to sit in a more comfortable position as she settled down to listen. 

"We spent the whole time exploring the fields, building bridges in the river with rocks and camping over the other side of the mountains. It was magical and the clearest memory I have of my childhood. There was always something amazing about these mountains, and I got to share it with her." Kana's tone shifted towards the end, a tone Sayako couldn't put a name to. 

"While we were on the other side of the mountains, we discovered a place that wasn't like our world at all. It was a village full of strange people who could cast all sorts of amazing magic from the tips of their fingers. I think it must have been a dream because everything was so... it was so different to the world I know and live in now. We promised each other we'd never speak of this place ever again, and every chance we got the two of us would visit this place, it became our little secret." 

It was no secret among the village (and Sayako's family) that her grandmother was odd, she would disappear for hours or even days into the mountains and come back with a different air about her, like she had just been on the greatest adventure of her lifetime. 

"I was around your age when it happened, I fell in love with a man from the place over the mountains. One thing led to another and before I knew it, I was carrying a baby. It was a tad bit foolish on my part, since we weren't married and my family didn't know about his existence, and I was so terrified I couldn't return home for a while." She cleared her throat a little, taking in a deep breath. 

"Senna was the one who came looking for me when I didn't come back, I cried to her and told her what happened, and she told me that she would stick by my side no matter what happened because we were friends, and no matter what she would always have my back." 

"The man I fell in love with proposed to me shortly after, and even offered to marry me if that's what it took for us to be together... I think he would have moved mountains for me if I asked." She took a deep breath, a smile forming on her face as she did. "He wanted to abandon his village, he wanted to leave and live with me in a world where we could be together, Senna helped us plan everything out, she even made a marriage certificate for us, but unfortunately things didn't quite work out the way we wanted them to." 

Sayako wanted to move, she wanted to leap over to her grandmother and wrap her up in her arms, to tell her that it was alright even if her story didn't have the perfect happy ending. Yes, Sayako's mother was born, and Kana now had a family that loved her and even a grandchild who would do anything for her, but the path to get to this happiness was filled with a bittersweet taste that never quite left. 

"When his family found out about him wanting to run away, they were furious, not just with him but with me and the fact I was carrying his child. Since I was a stranger who held none of the magic they did, I was seen as lower than them. We couldn't return to the village, and that night was the last I ever saw him." Kana closed her eyes to take a deep breath. 

"I still regret it to this day, Senna says that things just weren't meant to be, but I still feel so much regret for not staying with him...I just...I..." 

"You just wish things had worked out different?" Sayako asked, hoping that her words would help her grandmother in some way, to let her know that Sayako understood what she was trying to say, that she didn't need to say the words out loud, she was understood regardless. 

"Yes, I do. I really do wish things had gone differently... but then I might not be here, your mother wouldn't have met your father, and I wouldn't have ever gotten to meet my amazing granddaughter." Kana smiled wide, and Sayako could practically feel the pride her grandmother had towards her. 

"There is no moral to this story, no big advice or secret. The thing I realised about my life was something I figured out when you were born. The path I took in life felt like it had been the wrong one to take, I abandoned the man I loved and raised a child with Senna without being married at a time when it was considered to be a horrendous disgrace to be unwed with a child, especially when the father wasn't even present." She said, shaking her head at the memory. 

"So, we lied, Senna once again saved my hide and I owe her my life for that. She came up with the story of how the man I was supposed to wed had been killed, which is the story we told my whole family and it's the one your mother knows too." She reached towards her neck and pulled a piece of string from under her clothes. 

It was a simple black string that held a metallic ring that let the light bounce off of it and it shimmered with a strange glow in the light of the setting sun. Kana was holding it up to eye level, showing it to Sayako with a fond look in her eyes. 

"I think the ring he proposed to me with helped sell the story, so the secret lover who I was going to introduce to my family died before we could be wed, and I was left with his child to raise on my own. It was a tragic story that lessened the blame on my shoulders when my parents found out about it, and Senna was there with me the whole way." 

Kana took a moment to admire the ring, taking the string from around her neck and extending it out to Sayako, who took it with all the care she had in her body. It was warm to the touch and beautiful, a handmade ring that had the strange shimmer to it between the flowers and birds welded onto it. 

"When you were born, I realised that despite the path I took in life, it was one I wouldn't regret. Yes, I do feel regret about not trying harder to bring him with me, but I know that I wouldn't change things for the world." She said, holding out her hand as Sayako gave the ring back to her. 

"No matter what path you take in life, it will have good things and bad things, but in the end it will be worth it. Learn from my mistakes, and if you really truly want something; then do not hesitate to grasp onto it and not let go. A river will change its flow if you shove a big enough rock in the middle, and over the years it might even change its shape. So, no matter what happens, if you find something you love, you do not let it go." 

Sayako couldn't say anything to that, so instead she smiled. While she still had no idea what she wanted to do in life, she was less apprehensive about what her future held in store. If things worked out for her grandmother, then it would surely work out for her too. 

The conversation ended there, Sayako didn't want to push for more details of the story since her grandmother had shared so much with her already, it wouldn't have been fair. The two washed away the dishes and left them to dry overnight on the side as the sun fully set, giving way for the moon and the stars to take over the sky. 

"I think your old yukata should be in here somewhere." Kana said as she rummaged through the cabinet in Sayako's room to find her old sleepwear while Sayako set up the futon in the middle of the room. "I really should look through these cabinets more often." She muttered to herself as she finally pulled the fabric from its place. 

"Here it is!" She waved the fabric towards Sayako. The yukata was made from an adult sized one for Sayako, but because the fabric was good quality, Kana ended up putting a string around the bottom of it and folded it up to the waist, so that when Sayako was older she could still use it by undoing the strings and having a full length yukata to wear. 

"Thank you!" Sayako grasped the fabric, holding it up and smiling at the garment. She loved it when she was younger, the fabric was soft and had a sturdy quality to it, not to mention the colours. The fabric was a lighter, muted green colour often seen in fresh ferns and had all sorts of leaves embroidered onto it. The embroidery was plain, mostly sticking to simple shapes and outlines with a darker thread to contrast the fabric. 

It was beautiful, and Sayako couldn't help but wonder if the garment had been made from an older yukata that was passed down and then re-purposed to suit a child. 

"I'll let you get some rest, we can take a walk through the mountains tomorrow, you're here to rest and figure things out. We'll worry about everything another day." Kana said, wrapping her arms around her granddaughter in a hug and pressing a kiss to her forehead. 

"Thank you, good night and sleep well." Sayako returned the hug, feeling her worries melt away at the contact and wished that she would never have to let go. She wanted to stay here forever without a single worry about the rest of the world. 

After her grandmother left the room, Sayako changed into her yukata that reached just above her knees before untying the strings and letting the fabric fall down to her ankles. The sleeves were rolled up to her elbows but that wasn't a problem with the summer heat. 

She wore a pair of sleep shorts beneath it out of habit, and once the lights were off, she climbed into her futon with a pleased sigh. She counted the stars on her ceiling the same way she did before she left, and despite knowing exactly how many stars were on the ceiling, she still began counting them. 

There wasn't a definitive moment where she realised her eyes had drooped down and sleep took over her body, but it was as if she had simply blinked and was awake again, well rested and feeling the sun on her face. It wasn't often she fell asleep like this, usually a strange dream followed and then she'd slowly find herself waking up. 

It must have been the exhaustion from the travel and hearing the story of her grandmother (which Sayako was only now realising how strange it was that her grandmother shared it with her so quickly, perhaps her mother had been told the same thing when she was seeking help in life). 

She could hear the leaves in the gentle wind, and as she took in a deep breath her lungs felt the fresh summer air filter through her body. It was good to be back home. 

However, this peace wouldn't last long as Sayako very quickly realised that she wasn't laying on her futon, instead she felt soft, lush grass beneath her body as it tickled her skin and the sun on her face wouldn't have been possible with how she set up her futon. 

As fast as she could, her eyes snapped open and she sat upright to see if she had wandered outside during the night and fell asleep in the garden, sleepwalking wasn't something she had issues with as an adult, so surely she hadn't wandered outside but as she looked around all she could see was the grass beneath her and the trees all around her. 

She was in a small clearing in the middle of a forest and that wasn't the end of the strangeness, there were a bunch of crows all around her, staring at her as if they were expecting her to know exactly why she was out there. 

"Morning?" She greeted the crows, holding up her hand to wave at them when she realised that the sleeve of her yukata reached down to her hand, and as she looked at the rest of her body, the bottom part of her yukata was now past her feet. 

Did she miss her home so much her dreams turned her into a child? 

"Morning!" A voice called back to her from the left and Sayako's neck cracked with the speed at which her head turned to the left. 

There wasn't a single soul to her left besides the crows, not a single human in sight, and even when she looked over to the right and then fully turned to look backwards, she couldn't see anyone. 

"Um, where are you?" Even her voice sounded squeakier, almost exactly the same way it did when she was younger. She went to stand up, carefully grabbing the string at the end of her yukata to draw it up and tie it around her waist so she could walk around without getting it dirty. It fit her exactly the same way it had when she was little. 

It would have been terrifying if it wasn't a dream. 

"Right here! In your pocket!" The voice replied as she finished tying the string securely, further proving that this was a dream and nothing else. Otherwise, a strange voice wouldn't be talking to her from her own pocket. 

"My pocket? What are you doing in there?" She reached inside, feeling around for anything that might resembled a mouse or maybe a tiny bird? Who knows, but whatever it was clearly hid in her pocket for a reason. 

"I'm hiding! The crows want to eat me!" The voice yelled as Sayako felt something...long? And quite thin by the feel of it, it felt similar to a snake. 

Oh. 

She fished the little reptile out of her pocket, it was pretty with a strange pattern that she hadn't seen before. It was a beautiful green colour with various shapes crossing and uncrossing over its back. There were some reoccurring shapes like diamonds and spots, but otherwise the pattern felt natural. 

"You're pretty." Sayako said, smiling down at the snake. It looked like a Baron's Racer snake, the colour was spot on, with a lighter underbelly, a green back and the thin darker line on its sides, although the shapes were certainly not normal for the snake. 

"Why thank you! I'm Moebi, so I suppose the name fits me perfectly then." The snake replied, waving its head around. 

"Why were the crows after you?" Sayako asked, committing the snakes name to memory as the crows slowly began to fly away, seeing as they wouldn't be able to eat the pretty snake after all. "Or were they jackdaws? They looked smaller than crows." 

"And a bit greyer, eurgh, they're clearly not good enough to be actual crows." Moebi stuck out her tongue at the retreating birds, only for the birds to turn around almost immediately upon hearing the disrespect the snake was spitting at them and Moebi practically shrieked as she slithered up Sayako's sleeve to hide once again. 

"You know, I think I know why they're after you now." Sayako muttered as some of the crows landed on her shoulders and head, the rest splaying out around her in the field. There must have been at least three dozen of the birds, and upon closer inspection they really did look like jackdaws rather than crows. 

She took in a deep breath, collecting herself as best as she could, this was a dream and the animals could clearly understand her (or at least acknowledge her to some extent, they seemed more pissed off at the little snake.) 

"Look, the snake..erm-Moebi, didn't mean to insult you guys, she's just a bit.... immature." Sayako had to mentally give herself an A+ for effort for calling a talking snake immature, on top of the fact she was talking to a bunch of jackdaws in her dream. "Please forgive her for her insults, she's clearly young and has no respect for others." Sayako had no idea if this was true or not, but it appeared to appease the birds as they all loudly cawed at her and began flying off once again. 

"Don't say another word until they leave or I'm tossing you up into the air to let them catch you." She whispered to the snake, waving goodbye to the jackdaws to make sure they were out of earshot before the snake decided to insult them again. "You really shouldn't insult others so freely."  

The snake grumbled something as it slithered up to her shoulders, loosely wrapping itself around her neck to hang from there and see the world from a higher point. 

"It's not my fault they were trying to eat me."  

"You insulted them." 

"That was after they started chasing me!" 

"Fine, but why did you choose me of all people to help you? Couldn't you have just slipped under a rock or something?" Sayako glanced down at the snake before looking around the clearing, it was a beautiful place no matter which way you looked at it. The flowers in full bloom, the trees a lush green and everything just looked so full of life. 

"Yeah, but they wouldn't have left me alone until I came back out. And I didn't think you would actually say good morning to me." Moebi yawned and got comfortable in her spot. 

"I was actually saying morning to the jackdaws, I had no idea you were in my pocket." 

"Oh, I don't know whether I should feel insulted or not about that." 

"Such a difficult dilemma." Sayako rolled her eyes and began to take in more of her surroundings. From what she could see, she had woken up on a mountainside meadow. The field was angled on a downward slope slightly that gave her the view of everything beneath the mountain, it was stunning, lush green forests, fields growing various.... wait was that wheat? 

Down in the valley bellow were large fields of wheat, rice, corn and a handful of other plants she couldn't quite see from the distance. Maybe potatoes? The fields stretched out for miles and miles on end with a large river flowing past them, down the valley towards the forest that lay on the opposite end of the fields and ran past the village that lay bellow the mountain. 

That wasn't her village, not by a longshot. Sayako could recognise her village from any distance, and this was not her village. But then again, this was a dream so it was more than likely that she was just imagining a random village instead of her own; still it felt off for some reason, like she shouldn't be here, shouldn't be witnessing this place. 

It was bigger too, much bigger than her own and the river ran alongside it, rather than through it. 

"Why were you up here?" Moebi stuck her tongue out at Sayako. 

"Hm? What do you mean?" 

"Most of the villagers don't come up this far, they're not fond of the spirits." Moebi looked back towards the village. "Or are you one of the rebellious ones?" Her tone (Sayako didn't even think a snake could be capable of such a tone in the first place) sounded mischievous. 

"That's not my village. And I'm not particularly rebellious, I'm not good with confrontation." Sayako shrugged, slowly beginning to walk towards said village. If this was a dream, everything made sense, sort of. Of course, the villagers wouldn't like the spirits residing in the mountains, it was like reading a fantasy book. Although the realism of everything made Sayako a little worried, maybe her grandmother put something into her tea to give her a weird dream. 

"You're not from the village? Then how'd you get up here? There isn't another settlement for hundreds of miles!" Moebi asked, frantically trying to make sense of everything. 

"This is a dream, so I suppose I come from wherever my dream self would come from, but I'm originally from a smaller village on a mountainside, this village is fully in the valley, or I guess.... you can't really call it a valley if there's only one mountain so..." Sayako shrugged. 

"What are you talking about? Did you hit your head? Is that why you were sleeping in the grass?" Moebi stared up at her incredulously with beady black eyes (a strangely human and slightly off-putting look on a snake but Sayako was going by dream rules, everything was fine when it happened in a dream.) 

"Actually no, that...that makes sense! You can understand me, and the crows listened to you! So, you can't be from the village! Most of the villagers can't understand spirits much less hold a conversation with them, and you even managed to reason with them! They're known for being stubborn pricks." From Moebi's tone, Sayako couldn't tell if she was calling the birds stubborn, or the people.

"Those birds were spirits?!" 

"Yeah, what about it?" 

"How did you manage to piss off a bunch of spirits? And more importantly, why did they listen to me?!" Sayako threw her hands into the air, wildly gesturing towards where the birds had just flown off to. "Also, they're jackdaws not crows, I think that's partially why they got offended with you." Sayako glared down at the little snake wrapped around her neck. 

"Well, I can't help it! I'm not a big spirit like them! I gotta do what I gotta do to survive!" Moebi argued back (with a rather weak argument at that). 

"You're a spirit too? Explains your appearance, and that you can speak, but in no way-shape-or-form does it explain why you had to anger a bunch of jackdaw spirits." Sayako sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose, just what had she gotten herself into? 

"Actually, most humans can't understand us spirits, so that makes you special." Moebi grinned, another impossible thing for a snake to accomplish in such a human fashion. 

"Oh no, no no no. No, I'm not special, nope, not a chance. I'm not dealing with any of this 'chosen one' bullshit that this dream is trying to conjure up, I'm not special, I'm just a very confused person with no special talents or abilities besides art who suddenly woke up in a strange place." Sayako flailed her arms around a bit longer before she crossed them over her chest, shaking her head at the ridiculousness of the whole situation. 

This felt right out of all of the fanfic's she had read (and written) where a person ends up in another dimension. It was weird, and with how realistic everything felt (and the lack of proof that her grandmother spiked her tea with something after telling her that weird story), but it wasn't real, because these things didn't happen in real life, not to people like her anyway. 

"This isn't a dream! For the love of...do you want me to bite you?! Would that prove it?" Moebi hissed at her, earning a sharp glare. 

"You bite me and I'm sending you back to the birds." 

"Never mind." The snake muttered. 

"Good, now I need to figure out if I did actually get myself involved in one of those 'falling into another world' stories, and if yes, what world and where, that or I just live my life out as a peaceful farmer and die of old age surrounded by loved ones before my soul returns home and I continue my life having learned a life-time's worth of knowledge." Sayako grumbled as she left the field of flowers behind. 

She entered the forest and was carefully stepping over dirt and roots and rocks on her way down. The mountain wasn't as steep as it looked from above, which Sayako would be eternally grateful for (lest she face-plants and breaks her nose before she could figure out what the heck, she'd gotten herself into.)

The forest around her consisted of a few evergreens with a large amount of gentle green-leaved trees, some oak and birch stood out to her. They looked larger than the ones back home, sturdier and older too. This mountain was as undisturbed as the ones from her home. The rocks and boulders were covered in moss, some even had small flowers growing atop them.

There wasn't a clear path, but the soft moss beneath her foot at least cushioned her steps as she navigated her way through the woods.

"You know, you're really bad mouthed for a child." Moebi suddenly spoke up as Sayako was carefully slipping past a rock, using tree roots to lower herself past the mossy stone. 

"That's because I'm not a child, where I'm from I am a fully grown adult. I don't know why this dre...this world has decided to put me into the body of my younger self other than to spite me, but I'm not gonna argue with the laws of the same universe that landed me in a fantasy world where spirits exist, and snakes can talk." Sayako grumbled out the latter half of the sentence as she continued her way through the woods. 

"Oh yeah, you do not sound like a child in the slightest." Moebi said, and there was not a hint of sarcasm in her voice. She seemed like she was fairly convinced of Sayako's story. 

"Thank you, I'll choose to take that as a compliment." She grinned back at the snake, looking around the soak in her environment and remember the path she took in case she needed to get back up the mountain. 

There was a small drinking pond beneath the roots of a tree, surrounded by a stone circle and various lush ferns while a family of mice (probably spirits from the way they were moving around) were having a small swim in the pond, while a large white and green toad sat under a fern, peacefully sleeping as the mice children ran around him. 

It was almost silly how these little animal spirits had their own story going on in their own world, completely happy to just get on with their day and exist away from anything and everything else going on in the wider world. 

As Sayako continued her way she encountered more spirits like that, one was a two headed pigeon that asked her to carry some of his nesting materials for him so he could impress another two headed pigeon spirit. There was the rock that came to life and began running around wildly when she stepped on it, and she profusely apologized to it before it bumped into her knee head-first to let her know it was all forgiven. 

There were so many spirits in the forest, it was almost surprising that the humans didn't get along with them (according to Moebi anyway), the spirits were simply existing. 

It was when the forest began to thin out and only a handful of trees were left that Sayako knew she'd reached the bottom of the mountain, it had been a fair way to walk and the sun had moved far across the sky, almost on the cusp of setting when she finally stumbled out of the woods. 

"Damn, that was so much more difficult than I thought it would be, downhill always seems so much easier" She huffed as she stopped to catch her breath. 

"Left!" Moebi suddenly yelled and Sayako turned to the left just as an arrow whizzed past her head, grazing her cheek and leaving a long, thin cut along her face. 

She stumbled backwards out of surprise, adrenaline kicking in as she scrambled away from whoever had shot her with an arrow (at least she could now start piecing her environment together, they used bows- not the best time for such observations though). 

"Don't shoot! Don't shoot! I mean you no harm!" She stumbled backwards as her foot hit a rock and she fell onto her back, one hand holding onto her cheek to stop the bleeding and the other out in front of her as a boy appeared in her vision, blocking most of the sky. 

He looked to be about fifteen with short, dark blue hair and matching blue eyes. His clothes looked almost historical (key word being almost , they looked to be leaning onto the fantasy side of things a bit too much to be historically accurate) and the bow was raised with an arrow pointed directly at Sayako. 

Or rather at her neck where Moebi had been sitting moments prior, now she was nowhere to be seen and Sayako would've thought she fell off in the scuffle if not for the fact she could feel the snake sliding down her arm to wrap itself around her bicep to stay hidden under her clothes. 

The boy clicked his tongue and lowered his bow, looking around frantically as if finding and shooting the snake was his life's mission. 

"Shit, where is it? Where is the spirit?!" He yelled in a panic, turning back to face Sayako and she could finally get a proper look at him. He was lanky with wide shoulders that helped in drawing back the bowstrings, he had a heavy number of freckles and moles around his face with a small scar on the left side of his temple. 

The boy paused in his frantic searching as Sayako simply stared up at him a little confused before deciding that maybe pretending that she didn't see Moebi in the first place could work. Or she could just act her way out of this situation, both could end disastrously.

"You shot me!" She yelled at him and scrunched her face up in pain as a bit of blood seeped through her fingers, dripping onto her shoulder and the grass bellow. The boy looked taken aback for a moment and took half a step back, clearly not expecting this weird (apparently now a child) person to yell at him about shooting an arrow at her. 

"I was aiming for the spirit!" The boy replied in an unsteady voice, like he knew he was in the wrong but didn't want to admit it out loud. 

"You thought the best way to hit it was to aim your bow at me ?!" Sayako felt a little guilty for yelling at a boy (even if she looked like she was ten, she could still make someone taller and older cower, a win in her books), but he did shoot at her and Moebi so she was a little justified. 

"Well, I mean, kinda!" The boy yelled before letting out a frustrated yell that resulted in a voice crack and he put his bow and arrow back into their casing that was slung over his back. "Here, I'll take you to the healers." He sighed and held a hand out. 

"Healers?" Those existed? Well, things just got a whole lot more complicated. 

Sayako took the boy's hand and was swiftly pulled to her feet as the boy began dragging her towards the village. It was a little way away from where she'd stumbled out of the forest, so at least they didn't need to walk long. 

"Yeah, the village healers. Everyone knows them!" The boy turned back to regard Sayako, as if he was telling off a younger sibling for not knowing something obvious. "They'll look at your cut and send...you.... home....." The boy's words trailed off as he looked at Sayako a little closer, almost stopping as he stared at her. 

"You're not from here." It wasn't a question, and Sayako shook her head in affirmation. 

"I'm lost; I woke up on the mountainside and I saw the village, I thought I could find someone to help me get home." It made sense (not), a lost child waking up in the woods and seeing a village would probably immediately head to it. As the two continued to make their way into the village, Sayako was starting to form a story in her head. 

She woke up on the mountains, saw the village and has no idea what spirits are or what is going on. She couldn't say too much because that could reveal that she knew more than she let on (that she wasn't a ten-year-old child and instead a fully grown adult shrunken down into her teeny tiny ten-year-old body). 

The boy seemed to believe her so far (even if it was a rather obvious lie.)

Now she just had to pray the adults would buy her story too. 

In the meantime, Moebi would hopefully stay hidden (and out of trouble), and Sayako could figure out exactly what kind of insanity she was dropped into.