"That's a jet, you rube. An airplane."

"Oh. I thought those were smaller."

"They come in a lot of sizes. That looks like a passenger jet. I guess it could be a cargo jet, I've never seen one of those."

"That's trouble, you layabouts."

"Whoa, that thing's losing to the ambient fairies."

She points. The jet doesn't look damaged or anything, but it does seem to be failing to dodge the haphazard magic attacks of the atmospheric fairies flying around it.

"Oh, huh. I guess that's a problem."

"Don't they use those things in wars?"

"Not that kind, there's smaller planes with weapons. That kind's just for flying passengers around."

"Huh, okay."

She stands up, which doesn't get her particularly further off the ground than she was while lying down. She hops on her broomstick and hovers, which is significantly more effective.

"I'll go say hi, I guess. Do you think there's a lot of passengers?" Isn't it irresponsible to let a vehicle full of passengers in here? is the subtext.

"This is my jurisdiction, you know."

"Don't see you flying up there."

Marisa smiles and zooms off.

"Yeah, yeah," says Reimu, mostly to herself. "I'm going."

"I'm not."

Yes, you are, says one of her bosses into her mind. Buy that jet. Consider your budget to be unlimited.

"Then again, sitting here by myself would be pretty boring."

The atmospheric fairies swoop around chaotically, firing attacks in all directions, as they do. It doesn't take much for Marisa to scatter them.

This "jet" is pretty weird, actually. It does have windows, though!

And it does look like it has a lot of passengers inside. What the hell was that stupid hag thinking, anyway.

She waves cheerfully, which doesn't seem to raise the passengers' spirits. Not that she can really see inside that well.

Huh, this thing has "Southwest Airlines" painted on it. They seem pretty lost! This is definitely the East, even if it's not really east of anything!

Then again, it's probably just the airplane's name. Maybe it was built southwest of something.

It's probably piloted from the front, so the pilots can see where they're going. Marisa flies around to the front and waves into that window. (She's considerate, and doesn't go right in the center. Not much up here, and they demonstrably can't even shoot down atmospheric fairies, but blocking someone's view isn't friendly.)

"I'm going to want some more of that oxygen, actually," says one of the pilots.

"No, I think I see it too," says the other.

"You say it first."

The captain sighs. "There's a witch on a broom waving at us."

"Well, now I'm mentally primed to see that, since you mentioned it. But yeah, witch on a broom."

"HELLO!" shouts Marisa. (In English, because the writing on the plane was in English.)

Then she does some complicated magical manipulations, with a bit of a minor light show, and says it again.

(This is a considered strategy; it makes it obvious to the occupants, who are looking at her, that she's throwing her voice with magic. It's a nice flourish that it doesn't look all that considered.)

"Hello," says the captain, waving back, professionalism switched back on, but still at a bit of a loss.

"It looks like you're lost and could use some help," says Marisa, her voice present at a normal volume in the cockpit. "I don't actually know much about airplanes, sorry! What's the most urgent thing I can do for you right now?"

"We need a safe air corridor." He isn't sure how to describe the fairy attack. "A large area of sky we can move through, without any obstructions or other aircraft."

"Not as urgently, but urgently, we need a safe place to land this aircraft. Do you know where the nearest airport is?"

"There's no such area of sky, but I'll keep escorting you for as long as you need. Some friends of mine should be up here shortly, too."

Marisa hasn't really picked up the word "airport" from reading, but she gets the idea from context clues. "There's no airports nearby. You won't be able to reach one from here, either."

This is a worrying response.

"Do you mean there's no area of sky without, uh." Uh.

"Yes, that's what I mean, more or less. Don't worry, you're being escorted by the finest, and I can recommend a flight path to you, too."

Visibility is good, fortunately, so this is fairly simple. She'd cast some visual aids, but that's actually tough through glass; fixing that problem might be worth some research later.

"That mountain to your right is a dangerous area, but let me use it as a point of reference. We're south-southeast of it. If you look to its south, about three compass points clockwise from your current heading, there's a town; the gondola between the town and the mountain might be hard to see but it's almost perfectly north-south. If you're not going to fall out of the sky and crash anytime soon, I recommend circling over the town as tightly as you can; my friends and I will vastly outmatch anything hostile in the sky. If you are going to fall out of the sky soon, let me know."

"Is there no way to reach an airport without... hostilities?"

"There isn't. It's unclear how you got here," this is not quite a lie but she has a fairly good guess about how, "but unless you can hover indefinitely—I really don't know anything about airplanes, but I don't think you can—the best we can do is land you here."

He didn't realize it was that sort of not knowing anything about airplanes!

"We have a minimum speed beyond which we can't slow down, yes."

"Are the negative consequences of slowing down beyond that speed simply that you'll fall out of the sky, or are there other considerations?"

"We'd fall out of the sky, yeah. Not straight down like a stone, but below a certain speed we can only descend, not stay level or ascend. We're at around the slowest speed we can handle already."

"Definitely fly in a circle, then. This place isn't really that large, and you don't want to go too far. And you're going really fast, my friends are actually having to work at catching up."

"Already working on it. Does it need to be a literal circle? Our ordinary procedure is a rectangular path."

Being directed by a witch outside your cockpit window is actually very reassuring compared to the alternative on offer.

"That's fine too."

Sanae drifts into Marisa's general vicinity. This plane is going really fast, which is normal, she supposes, but it's hard to keep up with. Mortifyingly, she's performing a minor miracle right now, though no one must ever know.

"The Mountain's airspace is at the disposal of our guests," she says.

Sanae isn't conferenced in, but the pilots of this airplane also likely don't speak Japanese. Marisa casts the extra spell anyway.

"My green friend here says the mountain's cleared you to fly over. Don't change your flight path about it, but it's less danger for you, so it's good!"

It's not good; the subtext is that the Mountain is interested. But that's a problem for future Marisa when she's getting drunk with these pilots, not present Marisa.

"I hope that's taken care of. What do you need to land? If you could just set down in a field you probably would have, right?"

"This aircraft is very heavy, and landing is still at a fairly high speed. Barring a real runway, we need a large flat area without obstructions. Landing on a large body of water is also possible as a last resort."

There aren't really any suitable large, flat fields, this area is all more or less mountainland and doesn't seem to have large farm fields anywhere. (Not a single sign of paved roads, of course.) If they really have to stay around here or get shot at, that lake isn't huge but might be the best option.

Sanae can barely follow this conversation at all, which is mortifying. But if she uses a miracle for translation, Marisa will know.

She can't even pretend to be distracted by sweeping the flight path for fairies, because Reimu is just doing that without any apparent effort. Or actual effort.

Curiosity tips the balance, and helps her enter the right mindset. After all, for a god, there are no "foreign languages".

"I can see why you'd have trouble! Don't worry, we can help."

Any one of the three of them are in principle capable of gently setting this airplane down in a field. That doesn't make it a good idea to rely on one of them to do it.

Marisa knows how to move objects around with magic. It's not really one of her specialties, though, and she isn't well practiced. And the known tolerances on her developed spells in that area definitely don't include something this heavy or moving this fast. She's reluctant to use something untested if she can instead find a more reliable way.

Sanae could probably perform a miracle, but similar considerations apply; she doesn't actually perform major miracles often, and they don't necessarily go quite how they're expected to.

Reimu, of course, doesn't actually inhabit the logical universe. If Reimu happens to drift over and nonchalantly say "okay, let's lead it to the ground now," Marisa will go along with this; it'll work. But you can't make plans involving Reimu.

After a bit of thought, she has a few ideas.

"Can you describe a runway to me?"

"We'd need a flat paved path, wide enough for us, at least six thousand feet long, clear of any obstructions. I don't see anything around here that would fit the bill."

"English feet? And a flat, empty field is second best?"

"I think so? American feet. English imperial. We can work with an empty field, but we're in the mountains here. I've been thinking that lake is our best bet, though it's smaller than I'd like."

"I'm going to ask some acquaintances for help. If they come through, we can enlarge a field for you. I think we can give you more than enough room. I'm not sure we can get you a paved road, I've never seen one but I know what they are. I'm going to make a call about that, though."

"How long does it take to... enlarge a field?"

"Most of the time will be assembling the right people to try it, we'll just do it right away once they're on board. Can you hold on for an hour? If it doesn't work out, we can review our options then, if that isn't cutting it too close."

"We can spare an hour."

He's worried about this plan! However, he isn't being asked to commit to anything dubious beyond spending an hour of fuel, which he'd want to do anyway before attempting his current best option, the dangerous water landing.

"I'll work as fast as I can. Sanae, can you go to the Mountain and ask about paving?"

If anyone in Gensokyo can pave them a strip to be enlarged, they're in the Mountain. Sanae's already as much as said she's representing the Mountain here, and she might as well make herself useful because of it. If someone thinks they're owed a favor, Marisa can deal with it later; more likely, the Mountain will be spending more than Marisa will.

Not as important, but still relevant, is that she's seen paved roads before and Marisa has not.

Oh no, she said that in English, she knows. Sanae really wants to go bury her head under a pillow. Too bad she's on the clock.

"I can. We're leaving Reimu to escort?"

"Yeah. I know it's overkill."

She addresses the plane. "Your escort's pretty distinctive, she's in red and white. Can't mistake her. I'd introduce you but I want to take care of this fast."

"Understood. Do you have... radio, or something?"

"You know, I really should, but I don't. I have some junk on me that might work, but I don't think it's worth you opening a door. Unless you do that all the time."

Marisa can actually call people, but not humans (they mostly aren't magic enough), and it's a really rough work in progress. She usually just drops in on people.

"See you soon!" And she flies north.

They'll likely have their hands full figuring out what to tell the passengers, who are probably pretty upset.

Sanae doesn't keep abreast of the local technology level, that's not her job. It's not that implausible that they can pave a (miniature) airfield. And if Marisa thinks she can get a miniature airfield enlarged, she's right.

The problem is, it's not that implausible. This is all above her pay grade, but she thinks the idea is that fake pseudoscience technology is a lot easier to research and develop here than boring real technology.

Which is why they have a fusion reactor, but she can't charge her phone.

I'm setting it up for you.

Kanako has formed a body to negotiate in person; tall, wide, and mountainous. She's not particularly lowballing the kappa engineers. This whole situation counts as a capital expenditure, and she's not a quarterly-report-chasing sort of god.

Reimu has engaged an inexplicably present Cirno in battle, for some reason. The plane is safe from crossfire, though. The people inside have a decent view.

"I've got this sinking feeling."

"Please don't have one, we're pilots. Our sinking feelings should be purely physical."

Besides herself, Marisa can think of two good space-expanders off the top of her head, though she's sure she could scrounge up more if she has to.

Sakuya is a hobbyist, but Marisa knows she's good at it. They've got a longstanding relationship, but she'll want to be paid.

Komachi is a professional, but she's a slacker. That's fine; Marisa can finesse her.

It's unclear how compatible what they each do would be together, but Marisa thinks she can stabilize whatever mess results. She couldn't do it at all on her own, it's not an active research area for her, but she has a rough intuition built for it.

She flies to the Sanzu-no-kawa, the river separating life and death, which is north of the mountain, because she has to get Komachi physically but can send a message to Sakuya (a target she's practiced her rough message spell on already). As she flies, she composes that message.

Got an emergency! ☆⌒(> _ <)
Help out???

Stop sending emoticons directly into my mind.

My bid's two hours.

Two of Marisa's consulting hours, that is.

Six.

Wow. Marisa's idea of a fair price was eight.

Feeling generous?

Something like that. I can guess what you want, I'll meet you there.