Skipping Stones Rippling The Reflection in The Lake

It's strange, the effects water can have on a person. Great bodies of water in particular have an ability to instill in us peace of mind in some aspects and nervous fits of terror in others; often related to our distance from the safety of solid ground. Thankfully, the shoreline is perfectly suited for the calming of nerves via the lapping of waves or the simple enjoyment of a placid, mirror-like surface. You came to the Misty Lake for the latter, enjoying a small walk along its outer edge in the autumn fog and gazing over what water was visible, its surface calm, murky and gray like quicksilver. You stopped along the marshy shore to take a breather.

The water was reflective despite its mercurial qualities and idly teased the surface with a reed as you sat at its edge. A certain seasonal depression had set in, brought on by the colder weather worming its way in. Gensokyo hadn't been the fantasy you had thought and around you hung a melancholy that tended only to worsen than to alleviate. A good deal of it was due to the loneliness, or more accurately, the otherness you felt in this place. Indeed, you'd always be an "outsider" from the "outside" and never would you be on the "inside". You tried many times, in the darkness of the shack you managed to pay for with labor, to convince yourself that a loner's life suited you as fine here as it had out there. However, each time your presence was acknowledged by the locals when you went out, you were reminded of the facts as they were.

A hand couldn't help curl its fingers around a smooth stone found beside your sitting place. It wasn't very large at all and you weren't even cognizant of it until you had raised it to your eye. A jolt shot through you, taking you out of brooding and back into a normal level of conscious. How bizarre, you thought, that you had even managed to find it, absentminded or no, among the thick grass on the shore. You rolled it in your palm, marveling at the preternatural smoothness of the stone. It domed at the top and rounded out to a superbly flat bottom in a manner more reminiscent of a piece of glass than any sort of natural pebble. It was indeed perfectly formed for a particular task; skipping.

You looked out over the water and into the fog once more, its surface once more flat. You gave a few testing flicks of your wrist as you stood once more, giving a silent wish though you doubted the efficacy of it even in this world of unreality. Oh, to be somebody who belonged here, or at the very least, somebody who didn't get so many looks from the locals. The stone flew from your hand and skipped lightly across the lake and into the fog with very little sound. You had to strain to try to hear its drop into the depths, but nothing was heard. It had simply disappeared from sight, and all the evidence that it had been was quickly rippling away and settling down. You watched your warped visage in the water, finding interest in the discoloration that must've been caused by silt near the shore being kicked up by the pebble's wake. The gazing was broken by a sound coming out of the fog.

Outside world rationality wouldn't permit it to be true, yet you heard the light skipping of a stone heading to you. From the fog darted a small, silver thing that bounced merrily and you subconsciously raised a hand to protect yourself from the impact and found that your instincts were at least enough to catch the thing. It was perfectly smooth and shaped and... it was the exact same stone. You stared, dumfounded at the little rock that had left your hand and sunk into the lake just moments before, or so you had thought. Giggles from the fog, that of a young girl, broke you from yet another moment of sinking into your thoughts. Fear crept into you as you remembered what fantasies and phantasms really populated Gensokyo. A yokai was here, and had decided you were its entertainment.

You didn't think as you chucked the stone back to the noise, a side arm throw sending it careening across the water in a blur. A moment later, it came back with equal fury and your hand reacted and caught it before your mind had the chance to keep up. The monster didn't show itself from the mist, the only other image of any living thing being the ever more wavering and distorted reflection of you in the water. You readied another throw before forcible stopping your movements. Why were you doing this? The thought rooted you back into the conscious world. Hesitation gave way to reasoning as you surmised that perhaps you could get out of this predicament by getting along.

Your body continued the skipping before the thought completed, and once more caught the stone with little effort. Indeed, the motions felt mechanical the more it repeated and dulled the senses with its monotony. Your reflection had become unrecognizable in the continuous ripples, yellows and greens kicked up from the bottom blotting its color. A part of you wanted to stop this endless cycle, but another understood instinctually that it should continue for his own good. Air flowed easier through your sleeves, and in a half-awake stupor you thought it must've been a ripped sleeve. Thoughts in general were becoming harder as you tired and you lost count of the number of passes. Did the number really matter? No, you'd do it as many times as you needed until it was done, though what "it" was didn't readily come to any of your flickering ideations.

Pectoral muscles worked more and more against an increasing weight, though soon you found that a bit of momentum was helping the follow through of your throws. The reeds around you seemed taller and a few of their strange, brightly green, drooping tips entered your vision, though they were quickly wiped away without so much as a thought. The end, you felt, was drawing closer and closer, and you were glad, excited even, for it. A small giggle escaped your mouth in a much higher pitch than usual, not that you paid it any mind. You just continued skipping the stone with the unknown and unseen playmate. It wasn't until the stone unexpectedly dipped below the surface that the games stopped and you plunged after it.

However, it was gone. Looking down, you could find nothing, not even the water. Just paleness fringed by ruffles of black and yellow. What...? Oh, right! These were your tits! How could you have been so forgetful about yourself? Another giggle as you embraced your chest with your arms robed in loose chartreuse cloth. You played with them for a while with zero concern of any watching, admiring your reflection as it settled into your new form. There was another, opposite of you and curiously approaching. Looking up from the surface, another double, though imperfect, floated forward.

Right, the water had soaked your boots now, and you slowly floated above it and tried shaking your legs dry. The other you continued her approach and stopped before you before pinching your cheek. Oh, right! You had been looking for something when you came to the Misty Lake. The less endowed you smiled as instinctual understanding set in. She had found a friend, even if it was just herself. A hug, though difficult due to the wall of breast between you and yourself, was shared. You could now go back to where you belonged. Back home with your other you. She placed her hat atop your head in a display of self-love as you both floated silently away back to the Palace of the Earth Spirits.