Letter deliveries! (part 1 of valentines event!)

Duskie was currently in his house, making Valentines cards to celebrate, when-

CRASH!

"I don't think we're in Kansas anymore, Mashiro!"

What was that?! Was that... was that a...

That was a human. She had light brown skin, bright red hair, a frilly poncho draped across her shoulders, frills on her pants, a brightly colored mailbag with a heart on it... and she had just crashed into his window!

"Are you ok?!" Duskie asked, running out to help the mysterious girl.

"I'm alright!" She adjusted her bag, then offered up her hand. "Name's Mousey! And you are...?"

"Did you just give him your real name?!" A white cat popped his head out of Mousey's mailbag.

"This... this is still the Dreamlands, right?" Mousey's yellow eyes showed clear confusion. "Mashiro, what's going on?"

"...I don't know... I lost the plot the moment you found a Nightscape while out in the Dreamlands..." Mashiro sighed.

"Dreamlands? Nightscape?" Duskie... had no idea what was going on.

"I ended up here from a Nightscape filled with a thousand letters!" Mousey said. "There was a goat with wings who was made partly out of jelly, and he ended up stuck there from the stress of delivering letters to thousands of people in this cold freezing weather, so..." She patted her bag. "As a fellow mailperson, I decided to help him out!"

"Can I come with you?" Duskie asked.

"...Wait, why?"

I wanna see what she does! She's a human just showing up here and saying all sorts of weird things- I need to see what's up with her!

"Sure!"

Mousey had just dropped off another letter when Duskie spotted Straybow sitting nearby on a bench, writing down something.

"Hibby!" Duskie yelled, running off towards him at once. He reached in his pockets for the card he wrote specifically for Hibby, and presented it to her at once. "I love you!" He smiled. "I love you very, very much!"

Hibby smiled back, then passed him a card of her own making- one that had a heart and the words 'To my dear- I cannot have enough of your heart."

Duskie squealed. Mousey, watching from behind, squeaked. "It's true love!" She exclaimed, tears in her eyes.

"...It's a Valentine's card." Mashiro said, looking at them from Mousey's mailbag.

"It's true love!" Duskie yelled.

"...I see." Mashiro said. "Very well, then. True love it is."

"Yeah!" Duskie nodded.

Hibby took a few seconds to look at the card that Duskie had written for her, before nodding at him.

"Thank you..." Duskie smiled, tears in his eyes, before turning to look at Mousey and Mashiro. "Alright, now what?"

"Well..." Mousey said. "You mentioned a 'Barkley', didn't you? One of these letters is addressed to him!"

Duskie gasped. "WHAT!?"

"A letter for you!" Mousey said, handing Barkley a letter. "Signed 'Vivi'!"

Barkley's tail wagged. "A letter from her..." He took it.

"A letter from- WAIT, WHAT?!" Duskie turned to look at Mousey. "Vivi is dead! How'd- How'd she send Barkley a letter!?"

"Maybe she turned into a dog or something and sent this across multiversal lines?"

"The afterlife works in mysterious ways." Mashiro popped his head out again. "... Actually, is reincarnation a thing in this world? I know back in the Fearless Kingdoms, some reincarnations wrote letters to people from their previous lives under their old names... but..." He sweatdropped. "I don't think we're where we should be, anymore..."

"Mashiro!" Mousey yelled, pumping her fists. "Where we should be is where people need our help! And right now, this place needs a postwoman to deliver the mail! If anything, I'm exactly where I should be!" She patted her mailbag! "And... well... it's like this problem was calling my name! I mean... it's mail!"

Barkley looked up at Mousey, smiling with tears in his eyes. "Thank you!" He said, jumping up to tackle her. "Thank you, thank you, thank you!"

"Vivi was important to you, wasn't she?" Mousey asked.

"Yes, yes!" Barkley nodded. "She was my owner- I was her familiar- just like you and Mashiro over there!" He kept wagging his tail as Mousey wrapped an arm around him.

"That is true." Mashiro said. "I may be a different kind of familiar to her than you were to Vivi, but..." He shook. "Seeing the human you're meant to help and assist, the human that you've bonded with... die so suddenly, is... A sight that too many Shikigami have to deal with in my world!" His yellow eyes were wide with fear as he shuddered. "I... I always tell my Princesses to think things through, to not make foolish decisions... sometimes they do, anyways, and sometimes those decisions..." Mashiro exhaled. "How does the Court of Swords carry on, I wonder..."

Mousey gave Mashiro an affectionate headpat. "It's nice that Vivi set you a card beyond the grave- even if I'm not sure how she did so..." She let out a laugh. "That just means that the postal service is more important than people think, if it can deliver messages from beyond death!"

Barkley nodded, then slid out from under Mousey's embrace.

 "So... where to, now?" Duskie asked.

"... For me?" Sprinkles asked, shaking. She... was clearly not used to social interaction, half-frozen as she looked over Mousey and Duskie.

"Of course!" Mousey said. "Unless it was written wrong, but I doubt it- it'd have to be like this whole... coincidence where there's another Sprinkles with an address so close to your place that a typo could get the two all mixed up!" She laughed. "That happened to me once! It was bizarre and I didn't even know what to do at the time!"

Mashiro popped out of Mousey's bag. "What she's saying is that unless things got really, really mixed up for some reason, it's for you, so don't worry about it..."

"...Thank you..." Sprinkles looked down bashfully, her blue eyes showing confusion and fear. He took the mail from Mousey's hand and opened it with his paws. "...It's a Valentine's from the old owner of this place."

"It is?" Mousey asked.

He nodded. "It's thanking me for living here..." Sprinkles smiled. "What an odd thing to thank someone for."

"Well, there's a lot of things normal to us that are odd to others." Mashiro said.

"By the way..." Sprinkles asked. "What's a... human doing here?"

"What do you mean?" Duskie sweatdropped. "Humans aren't rare or anything, are they? I see a human every week so that Odio can talk about his problems!"

"Yeah but... you go somewhere for that, don't you?" Sprinkles asked. "Humans don't usually come into here... And where's Milo? Isn't delivering the mail his duty?"

"Milo's actually the one who led to me ending up here!" Mousey said, smiling. "It was his Nightscape that I found in the Dreamlands that led to me ending up here."

"... Dreamlands?" Sprinkles asked.

"It's basically where people go whenever they fall asleep!" Mousey said. "It's this land of humanity's collective dreams or something..." She rubbed the back of her head sheepishly and sighed. "I don't really know, myself... Mashiro, are we even in the Dreamlands anymore?"

"I don't know." Mashiro said. "Have you noticed how bizarre this entire thing has been?"

"Considering my first reaction to seeing Milo was 'animals can have Nightscapes!?'... Probably?" Mousey cocked her head. "But also... magical talking animals that aren't Shikigami or not, this is a problem that was made for me, wasn't it? I mean..." She gestured to her mailbag. "I've still got letters and packages to deliver to Sudsy!"

"S- Sudsy?" Sprinkles gasped. "The... Sudsy?"

"Sudsy from the shop?" Duskie asked.

"Yeah, that Sudsy!" Mousey struck a pose. 

"That is... unless there's another Sudsy we don't know of... So..." Mashiro added. "...Probably that Sudsy. We're not native to this universe or this part of the Dreamlands or... wherever we are..."

Sprinkles shook as she spoke. "...Sudsy..." She walked towards them with shaking paws. "Please, let me go with you... let me see Sudsy..."

"Sure!" Mousey nodded. "Do you wanna join Mashiro in my bag?" She asked, already opening her mailbag up.

Sprinkles jumped in among the packages, curled up next to Mashiro, and popped her head out. Mousey moved to reclose the mailbag with a click!

"To Sudsy's!" Mousey yelled, before running off, only to pause. "...Where's Sudsy's?"

Duskie pointed, and off Mousey went to visit her, Duskie following close behind!

(Well, visit her and drop off the sheer impressive quantity in that mailbag- Seriously, that thing could carry more than it looks!)