Valerie Wheelwright

## General Information

### ☯**Personality**

Valerie is all business, all the time. If she's around, things WILL happen in a timely manner, or else she will make them. Because of this, she is not all that well-liked, but as long as you don't throw off her plans, she can be very cordial and respectful, if still a bit stiff. Unlike most tsukumogami, she bears no grudge against humans, and in fact actually has something of a soft spot for them, which has led her to make protecting them her life's purpose. Naturally, this does her no favors with her fellow youkai, but, ironically, she isn't all that popular among humans, either, mainly because of her constant attempts to impose things like curfews and schedules on them. Valerie, of course, pretends it doesn't bother her to have no friends, but the truth is she is desperately lonely - she just doesn't know how to express her feelings except by nagging and scolding. In truth, the more she scolds someone, chances are the more she likes them.

### ☯**Appearance**

She is the spirit of an old wall-mounted pendulum clock, one with an elaborately carved wooden casing, a gold-plated pendulum and clock face, and brass inner workings. Her humanoid body looks like a girl in her late teens who has golden eyes and short brown hair, the latter of which is usually kept in a pair of unbraided side pigtails held in place by gold hair bands. Being originally from Victorian-era England, she wears clothing reminiscent of that era, though she borrows more from the men's clothing of the time than the women's; her outfit consists mainly of a black waistcoat, a brown tailcoat on top of that with gold trim and long coattails, a brown miniskirt, and black stockings. She typically also wears a pair of black gloves, brown boots, a golden necktie shaped like the pendulum of her clock, and a black top hat with a gold hat band. Her clock is almost always seen floating close by her.

### ☯**Theme Songs**

* Mario & Luigi Dream Team - The Final Antasma Battle (Battle)

## Backstory

She was originally an ordinary clock made in 18th-century England, which after a long life in some lord's mansion, found its way into the care of an antique dealer named Alfred Wheelwright. Mr. Wheelwright, then a young man, took a liking to this clock and, instead of selling it, kept it for himself and hung it on the wall of his shop. He took good care of it, which is why it lasted until the 100th anniversary of its creation, when it awakened into the tsukumogami now known as Valerie. From her vantage point in his shop, Valerie watched Mr. Wheelwright, and as she did so, something strange happened: she fell in love. As the years passed and she fell more and more in love, she felt a growing urge to speak to him, but she didn't know what to say, and, besides, she was afraid, so she stayed quiet.

And then he died.

Without any heir to take over the shop, most of the items were pawned off, including Valerie, who was sold to a Japanese businessman who was in England on business. He took her back with him to Japan, where he displayed her in his home alongside all the other souvenirs he'd acquired. But without the care of Mr. Wheelwright, and because her grief left her with little incentive to keep ticking, Valerie soon began to malfunction and was thrown away. Shortly afterward she turned up in Gensokyo, where she matured into her full power and gradually managed to recover from her broken heart. Still, she hasn't forgotten Mr. Wheelwright, as demonstrated by her taking his name for her own. Currently she lives in a small, formerly abandoned house just outside the Human Village, where she is tolerated because she helps drive other youkai away.

## Relationships

### ☯**Kameko Kakamura**

Valerie is not fond of Kameko's easygoing nature, but because they both are sympathetic to humans, they have managed to become friends. They often work together to protect humans as they come and go from the Human Village.

### ☯**Keine Kamishirasawa**

Keine is the closest thing Valerie has to a friend. While Keine does find Valerie's perfectionist tendencies annoying, she recognizes the good intentions underneath them, so she is willing to tolerate them. She is one of the few who know about Valerie's past. Because Valerie is sympathetic toward humans and often helps drive away other youkai, Keine allows Valerie to live near the Human Village.

### ☯**Reimu Hakurei**

She likes the shrine maiden and often worries about her carefree lifestyle, but because of how powerful and no-nonsense Reimu is Valerie usually refrains from nagging her. Still, she does often drop by the shrine to check up on her.

### ☯**Rinnosuke Morichika**

She often goes to visit him at Kourindou, mainly to lecture him about his lifestyle, but also sometimes to look at what he has in stock. She never buys anything, though. For these reasons, he generally considers her annoying, but he does have a small soft spot for her and is usually the one to perform maintenance on her clock when needed. Secretly Valerie harbors a massive crush on him because of how similar he is to her old owner, but she won't allow herself to act on it because of what happened to her owner. The best she can do is nag.

## Abilities

### **☯Ability to Stop Time**

Valerie has the ability to stop time at will. This freezes the world around her in place, but freezes her as well, though she can still see and think while time is stopped. Others besides her are completely unaware that she has stopped time, however, unless they also possess time-related abilities. While the fact that she can't move in this time-stopped state limits its usefulness, it still allows her to think and strategize during situations that might otherwise leave her little time to react, such as combat. She can keep time frozen for as long as she wants, meaning she can essentially spend an unlimited amount of time figuring out her next move.

### ☯**Perfect Sense of Timing**

In addition to this, Valerie also has an impeccable sense of timing, which lets her know at any given moment what time it is, as well as to judge with perfect accuracy the length of any elapsed time. Combined with her time-stopping ability, this allows her to construct complicated, multi-part plans on the fly, ironically making her a very good team player.

## Danmaku

Her normal danmaku resemble brass gears. In keeping with her clock theme, she tends to use lots of spiral patterns in her danmaku, mimicking the way a clock's hands spin around its face.

## Trivia

* The hands on her clock usually show the actual time, but when she uses a spell card, they move to the position corresponding to the name of the card.
* Her clock needs to be wound up roughly once a day in order to continue running. If it stops, she loses both her perfect sense of timing and her ability to stop time. However, if started again, she regains both abilities, and there are no other adverse effects. She usually winds it herself but may let others do so if she becomes sufficiently close to them.