A stroll on a frozen islet.

[Shadow_void]

"IT'S SPR-" announced a Lily, blissfully unaware of the impending pichuu~ that was about to befall it.
"It's February" Anon said to himself, cringing a bit at how much of a one-liner it was. Taking the chance to fix it he added "now fall", this just made it worse.

A student sitting in a park shooting yukkuri for fun wasn't exactly an unusual occurrence, but when the distance between the two was that great and the notoriously bad accuracy of pellet-guns were taken into consideration it would be natural to suspect him of being an abyuser, something that he was. This notion was consolidated by the huge backpack that clashed with the rest of his exterior since he looked nothing like a hiker, let alone a person who ever leaved his house.

Deciding that he had waited long enough he muttered as he began to rise up from the bench, his legs already stiff from the cold.

"Come on, let's just go without him" he said despite him not seemingly having any company.

A large pile of snow started to shake and eventually erupted, and forth sprang a lavender-haired yukkuri wearing a white cap, that appeared to struggle to keep up with Anon due to its excessive weight.

Anon's bag rustled as he walked out of the park, snow squeaking under his boots.


This time of year was always strange, with temperatures and weather going all over the place, this proved taxing for the normal types as they would often eat up all the food in their nest and break down the seal only to find snow covering everything and that the heat wasn't that of spring, but rather that of February. These families all died.

"Remember, keep your distance, I don't want you to break the ice" Anon coldly ordered the Letty, receiving a "Yum~!" in response, as he began crossing the river that separated the two parts of town.

He didn't just want to walk to the other side, if that were the case he would have used one of the bridges. But the thought of having to walk so far to reach a place that was within a stone's throw wasn't appealing in the slightest.

For there was a small islet in the middle of the river, only connected to one side, that Anon was attempting to reach. This islet wasn't that large, but it was big enough for there to be a playground, a campsite and two patches with trees, one bigger and more dense than the other.

During the sunny days of summer people would often come here to swim, children would play in the playground, and preschools would often have afternoons where children would come and experience the outdoors instead of having standard P.E.

When people weren't around however, this islet became a haven for yukkuri. The abundance of mushrooms in fall coupled with the attempts by people to preserve the nature on the islet meant that food was plenty all year round. Fortunately the islet was too small to support clans, which meant that there were no dosus, otherwise it would have been declared a safety hazard.

Pangs of panic shot up through Anon's spine every time Letty landed, producing the sound of crackling ice, but he knew that if he stopped then Letty would just catch up to him, endangering them both, and that if he walked faster that Letty would do it as well, endangering her.

As his foot finally found firm ground he let out a sigh of relief, and decided to take a bit of a breather while waiting for Letty to come over and his nerves to cool down.

Eventually the yukkuri reached the islet, not seeming any worse for wear, and the two set off into the tree line, in hunt of yukkuris.

Any nest Anon didn't find was a good one that didn't need any help, since only ones where the snow had melted were in danger of being destroyed by the yukkuri being tricked by the season. After all, the ones that were sealed up too well or didn't hoard enough food wasn't his responsibility or concern, they would have died anyway.

As he crept between the trees, being careful not to step anywhere near any of the large piles for fear that they might contain a nest, he heard a noise somewhere far off.
"Atai!"
And another.
"Atai~!"
Upon hearing this Letty raced off with uncharacteristic speed in the direction of the playground, where the noise originated, somehow not crushing a single nest. Anon gave chase, shouting "Wait, Letty!"

When he approached the playground he noticed a Cirno hovering above it, and considering how relaxed it was it was safe to say there was no danger here. He walked down from the tree line and into the playground proper and saw Letty playing with a few Cirnos.

"Hey, Letty!" he yelled, trying to get the yukkuri's attention which he succeeded in as it turned around to face him, silver badge glistening in the sun.
"We have a job to do, come on, let's go" showing some guilt at having to stop Letty from having fun.
"But Letty wants to play with Cirno!"
"I'll give you some hot chocolate if you come now", bargaining, with a yukkuri, this was going to hurt his pride somewhat.
"Hot chocolate! Lunch! Yum~" she said as she jumped back to Anon. As the words lingered in his ears his stomach started growling, making him realize that he was hungry.
"But let's go to a campsite first."
"Taste it easy!" Letty said, saying farewell to the Cirnos, who responded with "Atai~!", Anon could never understand how anyone understood what they were saying, waving them off as he and Letty made their way to the closest campsite.

Once there he produced from his backpack something that could constitute as lunch: a thermos with hot chocolate, a sandwich, and bowl into which he poured a small bag of yukkuri feed that was labeled as 'Strongest!' and having a blue and white pattern. He had long since given up on trying to find the difference between yukkuri feed meant for winter types and those meant for normal types.

Anon proceeded to pour some of the hot chocolate into the bowl. "Yum!~" Letty said; "Tasting it easy!" as she started eating it.

After their meals were finishing he decided to check the other side of the islet, to see if there were any nests there instead.

After trekking for a while he wasn't disappointed, as he saw a number of sticks and twigs stick out of the snow next to a tree. This part of the islet was the one less commonly visited, so there were fallen branches and trees about, perfect for building nests.

Deciding that this would be the first nest he would visit he began his preparations, starting with the blanket he was going to sit on.

After a short while the area in front of the nest looked like some sort of picnic for bug lovers, consisting of a large blanket with a number of devices, boxes, jars, and bags, the most notable of which being a periscope.

Water had been poured on the snow, causing the seal to be frozen solid, if they were alive he wouldn't want to make things worse, and once spring came and it became hot enough for them to survive the ice would melt automatically without problem.

He inched closer to the nest, trying to determine exactly where the seal started, finding it to be fairly close to the tree, which meant that the yukkuri were either in the tree or under it. He then put small red stakes around the perimeter of the seal to know exactly where it was, creating cracks between them.

The biggest bonus with having the yukkuri live inside or under the tree was that he could far more easily lean close without having to support himself against the tree.

As he brought the periscope closer to the top of the seal he started prodding it, looking for gaps, and knowing that the builders were yukkuris meant that there had to be some. "Bingo," he was right.

On the green display screen he could see a family of sleeping yukkuri, and it seemed to be a fairly normal one. A Marisa turned away from the entrance, a Reimu, two komarisa and three koreimu. The Marisa seemed a little bit thin compared to the Reimu.

"Well, it's the Marisa's choice, can't fault her" Anon said under his breath, prompting a "Yum?" from Letty.

"Ah, umm, nothing, just talking to myself" he responded, waving his hand dismissively.

Try as he might he couldn't get a clear view of the food hoard. However, he saw Marisa's hair rustle a bit, betraying both it's location and the fact that something wasn't sleeping. He turned on the microphone to get a better understanding of what was going on and heard a quiet "...inesh!" from his earbuds followed by a more audible "munch munch".

An uncomfortable silence settled in the nest, broken by a "Weimu's poo poo ish coming out! Wefweshed!".

"Yu?" A sound of surprise was heard; "Where did mishter munch-munch go?"

Unfortunately lack of sight didn't mean lack of smell.

"Yugyaa! Why ish shmelly mishter poo poo here! Go away!" accompanied by the ever so aggravating sound, "puff, puff."

This seemed to have awoken Reimu who said "Why is little one waking up Reimu? Reimu needs her beauty sleep to be the most beautiful yukkuri in the universe!"

This in turn served to awake Marisa. "Yu? YU?! Where is mister munch munch?! And why is mister poo poo here?!" She turned to the opening showing her face to the camera, revealing she was far skinnier than he thought, and directed a question at the koreimu that had bits of food around her mouth; "Why did you eat mister munch munch?! It was supposed to last un-"

Reimu slammed into Marisa, sending her careening into the wall, "Don't scream at my perfect little ones that are more beautiful than even the stars, shitty husband!"

Trying to get up, something that proved difficult given how malnourished she was, Marisa responded with "But how are we supposed to get more munch munch? It's s-"

"I'm hungry, get me more munch munch shitty husband, right now is fine!" Reimu cut Marisa off, ignoring her plight.

Marisa, lacking better judgment, even for a yukkuri, proceeded to go the seal and try to remove it.

"Yu?" Anon couldn't see what was going on due to the awkward angle, but he could still hear.

"Why won't mister seal go away?" Marisa said, increasingly panicked; "Mister seal go away! Why are you so hard?!"

The Reimu at this point looked at her husband with a face of contempt only a yukkuri could make, but it was soon replaced with a face of pure malice.

"If shitty husband won't get munch munch for beautiful Reimu and her perfect little ones then the genius Reimu will just have to make some on her own!"

The Reimu turned towards the komarisas that were just now waking up.

"Drop dead easy shitty little one!" Reimu reached for one of the komarisas and took a bite out of it.

"Yu-?" was the only thing the komarisa had time to say before its life was snuffed out by its own mother, who then proceeded to devour the rest of it, spraying bits of paste and drool everywhere while saying "Nffhh! This shit's sho good!"

Anon couldn't hear what the Marisa was doing anymore. She wasn't moving or saying anything.

One of the koreimus went up the Reimu and said "Mwomie! Weimu's also hungwy!" Reimu realized that her children also needed to eat some if they were to grow up and become beautiful and strong like their mother.

Reimu bore a wicked smile.

"Shitty little ones are better at being munch munch for perfect little ones than taking it easy!" Reimu jumped at the only komarisa left, pinning it under her, somehow not killing it in the process.

"Big Shister! Why Mwommie? Mawisha just wants to chake it eajy!"

"Oh? Shitty little one talks back? Take this!" Reimu proceeded to squeeze the komarisa.

"Shtoppit! Shtoppit!"

"Mwommiee!"

"Mawisha geddin' cwushed-!"

"YUBUEGH-!?"

Paste started being regurgitated out of the mouth of the komarisa, and her eyes were popping out.

With a wet noise, that komarisa's live was ended as well, shooting paste towards the entrance, drawing Reimu's attention to it.

"Yu? Is shitty husband still here?"

The koreimus, looking more like elongated, fat, oversized worms than actual yukkuris started eating the corpse of their dead sister, licking the paste off the frozen ground, smearing it all over their hog-like faces.

A grating sound was heard, like someone scraping something, back-and-forth, back-and-forth.

"Drop..." The voice must have come from Marisa, she sounded like she had completely lost it.

"Is shitty husband also talking back? The powerful Reimu will crush you like she crushes a mister insect!"

"Drop dead..." The voice became clearer, and out of overpowering curiosity, despite risking to destroy the seal, Anon turned the periscope to see the entrance, where Marisa was busy trying to dislodge a stick from the seal.

With a snap it came loose.

"DROP DEAD EASY!" Anon had to turn the periscope back quickly to see the events unfold.

"Shitty husband you were sup-" the stick sank into the left eye of Reimu, causing it to start spraying paste.

Marisa had underestimated the distance between them, causing only a shallow wound, but lethal nonetheless.

"YUNYAAA!" The Reimu recoiled, landing in the pile of shit where their food had used to be.

"Shitty little ones can't take it easy if they eat their beautiful sister!" Marisa had gone berserk, she started by skewering the koreimu that had eaten the food, flinging it across the nest, hitting the Reimu. She then jumped with surprising vigor on top of another koreimu, killing it instantly.

The koreimu that had landed on the Reimu tried to reach its legs and said "Mwommie, hejp, give weibu her..." it's last words trailing off.

Marisa stood triumphant on the body of the koreimu, still holding her stick.

Reimu mustered all her strength and charged at Marisa, shouting "LEAVE MY PERFECT LITTLE ONES ALONE SHITTY HUSBAND!"

She jumped straight into the stick with her whole mass, causing it to sink deep into her. Marisa could do little more than clench as hard as she could not to get impaled by it herself.

"YUBII!! ID HURTZ! DAGE IT OUT!" Reimu was delirious from the pain and pulled back from Marisa, taking the stick with her, she jumped around for a short while, screaming "DAGE IT OUD!" progressively weaker and weaker every time, until she fell down on the stick, driving it deeper into her body causing a slight protrusion in her back as the stick didn't go all the way through.

Realizing that Marisa had gone berserk, and that any surviving koreimu would grow up to become Deibus Anon decided that the nest was beyond redemption. He removed the periscope, grabbed a hold of the seal and pulled, ice cracking between the markers he had placed earlier. Finally the ice gave way and the entirety of the seal which was little more than twigs and ice was pulled off, letting light and cold air into the nest, this seemed to bring Marisa back to reality.

"YU? WHERE DID MISTER SEAL GO!? IT WAS BUILT BY MARISA THE MASTER ARC-" she stopped mid-sentence as she looked at Anon.

"MISTER HUMAN CAN GO DRO-"

"Go ahead Letty, they're all yours"

"Taste it easy!" Letty proclaimed as she jumped at the entrance of the nest, squeezing inside.

"LETTY? WHAT IS A L-"

Anon couldn't hear what was going on inside due to Letty plugging the hole, so he decided to pack up, starting with the boxes and jars.

After a few moments he heard a plea for help from a familiar voice.

"Master, Letty is stuck!"

It took a whole minute to get her out, since he had to be careful not to cut her on the frozen remains of the nest.

After packing up Anon continued his search for nests, and eventually he found another one in a similarly bad shape to the first one, and after ensuring that everyone was asleep inside he poured some water on the seal to keep it from melting.

"Master, is it time to visit the woods now?" Letty asked, to which Anon responded "Nope, we're going home first, we'll visit the woods after dinner."

While the prospect of dinner enticed Letty going out to the woods after dark did not, it was four o'clock and it was already getting dark.

"But Momijis will be out then, and all manner of bad things!"

"That's the point."

[Baron Mind]

That was a surprisingly interesting story. It even has a Letty in it! Will there be more?

[Shadow_void]

I was planning on it, yes.
I can't give an exact ETA, but some time before next week.

[Shadow_void]

"Yum~? What is it master?" Letty said, ever the expert at interrupting thoughts.

"N- Nothing." Blurted Anon out, he was still deep in thought when he started talking, making him stutter.

"Yum?" She prompted, her head tilting.

Not one to give in to the prying of a yukkuri and already having cleaned up his plate Anon simply got up and put away the dishes, he had waited long enough for night to fall.

Letty jumped down from the table, causing a muffled thud as she hit the slightly padded floor.

Anon went over to the dresser in the living room and opened it, revealing tools that would instil a sense of apprehension in most people.

He took great care to ensure he had everything he needed; considering what he was going to do, there was almost no need not to go overkill.

"Yu? Is Mister Owner leaving?" chirped a mystia standing a bit behind him on the shaggy carpet.

"Yes, I am." He said, giving a nod.

"A-" Knowing full well what she was about to say Anon interjected: "At night, yes"

"Yu!" Mystia objected, hopping towards him; "But it's dangerous! Mister Owner should stay in mister house!"

"Don't you worry," Anon reassured her, picking her up and softly stroking the bumps where her wings had used to be; "I'm bringing Letty"

The mention of Letty seemed to cause the bumps to wiggle back and forth as she jumped up and down, had she had wings, they would be clear signs of happiness.

"Chin-chin! Maybe she'll g-" she stopped and froze, looking to the side of Anon, her face turning pale.

"Huh?" Anon said, turning his head to see Letty's face peeking out from the door to the kitchen.

From the corner of his eye she had seemed sinister, but when he looked straight at her she appeared harmless as ever.

"Now Mystia, you know you shouldn't say things like that, Letty is your big sister!" He said, rubbing her head trying to get her to calm down.

"Come Letty, say hello to your little sister again, make her feel welcome" Anon gestured for Letty to come over.

Anon placed Mystia on the ground, turned towards Letty. For some reason she still hadn't started seeing Letty as family.

Letty started bouncing towards the comparatively tiny yukkuri, each stomp so heavy it could crush her effortlessly, greeting her with a warm "Tast- Take it easy!"

Mystia panicked.

She turned around and burrowed her face into Anon's hands, it seemed like she thought that Letty couldn't see her as long as she couldn't see Letty.

With a final thud Letty landed right next to Mystia, had she landed any closer she should have hit her.

It was now clear just how big the size difference was, Letty's frame towered over Mystia, being at least eight times taller.

"Come on, just do a rub rub!" Anon proposed, rubbing both Letty and Mystia, who both rubbed back in kind, although Mystia only seemed to do so half-heartedly.

After a while Anon ended the what was supposed to be a family hug and picked up Mystia, scolding her for not being nicer to Letty: "Mystia, Letty is your sister, she isn't going to eat you, not letting family take it easy is what uneasy yukkuri do!"

Mystia avoided his gaze, feeling ashamed.

Having decided she had suffered enough Anon lifted Mystia up and put her back in her house. It seemed losing her wings didn't mean that she lost her love for high places.

"Now be good, we'll be back before you know it, besides, if you need someone to talk to you can always talk to Meil-"

"Jaoo~!" Meiling announced, proud of herself.

Anon turned to see Meiling standing there, looking straight forward with a slightly vacant stare and just beaming with some sort of pride.

"Well, we'll come back later, take it easy!" Anon said, waving at the yukkuri.

"Jao~!" Meiling responded, followed by a "Take it easy!" from Mystia.

Shutting the door behind him Anon realized just how cold it was, his only consolation was that it wasn't going to take the entire night.

"Yum~ Is Master cold?" asked Letty coyly.

"Nah, it isn't that cold," Anon responded, then he muttered under his breath: "you seem fine for being made of ice cream."

"Yum!? What was that?"

"I said I'd sure be fine with eating some ice cream."

"Yum! Well, there might be some cirno in the forest." Hook, line and sinker.

How she ever managed to beat a patchouli at riddles Anon had no idea, he simply chalked it up to being because food was on the line.

Walking at night was never a pleasant experience, the only light being that of lampposts. Were it not for them mystias wouldn't even need to sing for Anon to be blind.

The snow, as always, squeaked under his boots, only being stopped by the occasional spot of ice that produced a crackling noise instead, neither of them were especially pleasing for the ears.

The only saving grace was how short the distance to the forest was, had that not been the case Anon would have let someone else do it, but he was the closest one that had a permit.

Unfortunately, darkness and cold could make even the shortest of distances seem to stretch on forever, and carrying a heavy bag didn't help.

"Hey Letty, could you carry this bag for a while?" Requested Anon, mostly interested in seeing her reaction, he then added as an excuse: "My arm's getting tired and neither of us wants that."

"Yum~? Is Master feeling tired? Why not go to sleep?"

Clever, but not smart.

"Yum~! Letty can carry mister bag, no problem!" Letty boasted.

Anon stopped and removed the strap from his shoulder, his arm and his back immediately thanked him for it.

After rolling the shoulder a few times to loosen up he picked up the bag and lowered it onto Letty, slowly, making sure he didn't just drop it on her.

"Yum! Mister bag is hea- no, this is nothing for Letty! Mister bag is as light as a mister feather! This is easy!" She said, despite clearly having some difficulty carrying it.

After making sure the strap had been looped around her and was firmly attached they kept walking.

"Yum~!"

"Yum~!"

Her grunts of exertion were surprisingly soothing and refreshing.

"Yum~!" Letty was started to sound ragged, so much so that she had to catch her breath; "What is Master carrying in mister bag?"

"You'll see once we get there." He said, suddenly reminded of the contents and that this might not have been the best idea, but knowing Letty she would never give back the bag now that she's said she'll take it.

After turning the corner of an apartment complex he reached his destination: the forest.

Once Letty saw the forest she gave a big "Yum~!"

"Letty will finally be able to take off mi- Letty means Letty will finally get to see what's inside mister bag!" At least it had been a good workout for her.

Anon removed the straps and took the bag from Letty, who seemed a bit disappointed once he started walking away.

"I'll open it at the camp site, come on." At this Letty got exited and started bouncing after him.

The camp site was covered in snow. The bench, the fireplace even the billboard had a thick layer of powdery snow on them, good thing only one of them would be needed thought Anon.

"But first, could you clear that bench?" Anon asked Letty, confident that such a low amount of powdery snow would be no problem for a big letty like her.

"Yum~!" She nodded, and jumped up on the bench.

"Cirno can make cold, but Letty can play with it!" She said as she began puffing at the snow. Every time she did it she looked just as dumb as a newborn koyukkuri doing 'puff puff' at it's own shit.

After a short while the snow around her started to fly up into the air, swirling around her, and once she had gathered enough snow she pushed it towards the opposite end of the bench. The resulting gust of wind and snow cleared the bench save for the spot she was standing on.

"Yum~! Isn't Letty just the easiest and strongest yukkuri Master has ever seen? Ohoho! Master does well not to get on my bad side!" Despite it being little more than a parlour trick she was acting like she could crash planes without leaving survivors.

Knowing that the best way to deal with this attitude was distraction Anon threw the bag down on the bench, giving Letty quite a shock as she had up until that point been completely absorbed by her own greatness.

"Yum~! What's in mister bag?" Letty said as she inched closer so she could see as the bag opened.

"Well, considering what we're here to do, this" Anon opened the bag.

"Yuum~ Was that it? It's not even munch munch!" he couldn't help but chuckle at her gluttonous personality.

"No, but we can get food using it." he said as he took out what to a yukkuri just looked like a long mister pipe.

"Yum~? How?"

Pushing the butt up to his shoulder Anon trained his sights on the billboard to get a feel for the shotgun and responded with one word; "Hunting!"

[Hitosura]

I like it so far.  Realistic-feeling anon, and yukkuri that aren't completely stupid.  I like how he's well aware of Letty's ego, but still likes her, and simply spins her thoughts away from the ego.  Smart way to keep their narcissism in check.