Very uneasy 3-pup post -- Sunday morning

[undead_radish_seller]

So here is what happened:

Wen Ning had been in the kitchen making noodles (as you do) on that cool machine they have here where you feed it the noodle dough, crank a handle, and it flattens and cuts the dough so nice mie strings come out, all ready to be dumped into the boiling water, or dried to use later. And while he had been turning the handle, happily thinking of all the nice dishes he'd make for his little village of twenty people all told,

in waltzed Jin Guangyao, took off his silly black hat, his gold-embroidered silk outer robe with the huge tacky peony emblem, tied back his sleeves, put on an apron that had a pattern of tiny peonies, clouds and bulls (really? really???) printed all over, and went about mixing some sauces. Only when he went to look for fresh ginger did he notice Wen Ning, who had kept absolutely still, not even having any breath to hold. The Jin bastard, however, just sighed, shook his head, and said, "Look, you can make your noodles over there, I can mix my sauces here, and we can ignore each other perfectly fine, as this is Milliways anyway, and a huge kitchen at that. Please, unfreeze."

This would have worked, except that about fifteen minutes later, Dr. Hannibal Lecter came in, and of course he knew both of them! He casually complemented Wen Ning on how good he looked in those new black robes, offered him an apron because you can never rely on your neatness to keep you clean while cooking, as that consideration seriously cramps your style, and then he turned right to bloody Lianfang-zun and told him that, honestly, he looked so much better without the hat, if he'd excuse such a rude remark, and that those sauces would actually go very well with the noodles, even though he personally would try soba with them, and then he had to explain to both of them what soba were,

and, in the end, that led to Dr. Lecter cooking dishes from the land of Wa (which, apparently, his paternal uncle's cultivation partner (or something??) had been from, so he knew all about it) with an uneasy young cultivator and a severely spooked fierce corpse assisting him and listening to him ramble on while he cooked and ordered them around ("In a historical Chinese setting, you can of course replace them with -- what, you have potatoes? Okay then? Just peel them, there's a good little zombie!"), all oblivious about the undercurrent of deep wariness between his two young helpers.

And this is what you are going to walk in on when you want something in the kitchen.


tinytag: jin guangyao
tinytag: wen ning

[[OOC: Say in your tag which of the three you want, or you might get all three...]]

Comments

[mogget_cat]

Yrael has never been one to avoid deliciousness going on, so at some point, the outside door to the kitchen opens (don't ask how) and allows a small white cat to pad into the room. Or what looks like a small white cat, anyway.

[cook_the_rude]

"Good morning, my friend!" Hannibal greets the not!cat.

He waves his spatula and grins brightly.

Jin Guangyao turns his head and looks at the cat; Wen Ning, still peeling potatoes, smiles at the cat with something approaching relief. There had been excruciating awkwardness in the last hour or so.

[mogget_cat]

"Good morning, Dr. Lecter," replies the cat, coming over to rub against the doctor's ankles briefly in fond greeting. "You and your friends are concocting something delicious, today. Good morning, Wen Ning."

Wen Ning's ankles also get rubbed against by a purring not'cat, before he steps in Jin Guangyao's direction with an equable wish for a "Good morning."

[hat_and_dimples]

"Good morning," Jin Guangyao says, sounding completely unfazed because in Golden Koi Tower, you can't afford to be astonished before reacting.

He bends down to stroke the cat's ears, and that is when he gets really astonished.

His cultivation isn't up to much, but even he can feel that this creature's spiritual energy is huge, reaching far beyond the small cat shape, and strange beyond comparison to anything he knows from his own world (as if resentful energy was bright as lightning?), and also strangely enticing.

It results in him standing straight, putting his hands together, and bowing to the cat.

Wen Ning doesn't snigger, no really not. He is just over there, smiling preciously, like the lovely cinnamon roll he is.

[mogget_cat]

The cat lowers its head briefly in return, though perhaps it is a bow, perhaps it is merely sniffing at the hem of Jin Guangyao's robe, wondering if there might still be ear scritches.

"I am Yrael," he introduced himself. "And you are?"

[hat_and_dimples]

Yes, there are more ear scritches. A mind like Jin Guangyao's can encompass the concepts of 'cat' and 'medium-sized deity' at the same time.

After all, a few years later, his mind can encompass the concepts of 'I love him' and 'I am going to murder him' about the same person just fine.

"I am Jin Guangyao, of the Lanling Jin sect," he introduces himself while giving said ear scritches.

No need to go into details.

[mogget_cat]

The creature certainly feels like a cat under one's hand, soft and warm with silky fur and pettable ears, and it certainly sounds like a cat when it purrs its appreciation and approval. It contains multitudes, and appreciates those who also contain complication and many facets.

"Good to make your acquaintance, Jin Guangyao," the not'cat replies, before ducking out of the ear scritches as any cat might when its attention is caught elsewhere. It rubs once more against Jin Guangyao's ankle, then pads over to wind once more around Wen Ning's feet, and then around Hannibal's once more, before it turns and leaps as lightly as you please up onto a clear spot on the kitchen table, where it might see the room from a more advantageous vantage point.

Also so those wishing to give it scritches would not have to lean down to do so.

"What is it that you are making that smells so delightful, this morning?"

[cook_the_rude]

"A selection of Japanese dishes based on noodles and soy-vinegar-sugar sauces," Hannibal answers him. "A-Yao here was experimenting with the sauce, and A-Ning there was making noodles but had never heard of soba, and then one thing led to another, and here we are."

There is still the bristling qi of resentment and distrust between 'A-Yao' and 'A-Ning', but Hannibal apparently doesn't let that stop him in the culinary pursuit of inter-sect understanding.

[mogget_cat]

"Food is always best when shared, and even in my limited experience that carries over into the making of it as well," mwrrs the not'cat, watching them with his head resting on a small bag of flour. "You will not mind if I stay and bask, I hope."

Anxiety and distrust add lovely sharp notes to the scents of the sauces.

[undead_radish_seller]

"Oh, you are very welcome," Wen Ning says, "but we haven't added any fish to the dishes yet. Lecter-qianbei, is there a way to cook that with fish?"

Of course there must be fish, for their not!cat friend.

"Of course," Dr. Lecter says, smiling sweetly. "Japanese cuisine is rather based on fish."

[mogget_cat]

There is a great chorus of purrs of approval from the not-cat at this notion.

"Mmm, what a lovely idea!" he purrs, flopping lightly into his side a streeeeetching, longcat-style, across that corner of the table.

"Wen Ning is possessed of a kind and generous spirit, I can tell."

[undead_radish_seller]

"Anything to please the resident cats and not!cats," Wen Ning says, giving a little bow. "They rule this place, while we merely pass through."

Jin Guangyao, not to be undone, fetches a slice of tuna from where he'd found the ginger, cuts it into a number of thin slivers, and then offers it to Yrael.

"My friend, it seems you have some new worshippers," Hannibal comments with a chuckle.

[mogget_cat]

"I will not pretend the attention isn't appreciated," mwrrs the not'cat, looking pleased and happy. The offer of tuna is received gladly with an enthusiastic purr and a word of thanks for Jin Guangyao. The promise of future fish is lovely, of course, but present-fish is an immediate joy.

"Jin Guangyao, you are of the same world as our Wen Ning, unless I miss my guess?"

[hat_and_dimples]

"Oh, we are," Jin Guangyao says, "it's just that our fortunes have placed us on different sides of a great divide, and have reversed recently, too."

Pause.

"But it doesn't have to stay that way."

[mogget_cat]

"I have never yet found a fortune that stood unchanging while the person yet walked in Life," mwrrs the very white cat, blinking its very green eyes at Jin Guangyao. "Milliways itself can and does exert strong influence upon the fortunes and futures of those who come here, skewing the trajectories of their lives in interesting and unforeseen ways."

[undead_radish_seller]

"It has already skewed ours much for the better," Wen Ning ventures. "I am truly grateful for this place, its bounty, it's patrons and its amazing kitchen!"

"The Lady Guanyin is smiling on you again at long last?" Jin Guangyao says, with a little smile. "Seems this place has a way."

"It certainly has," Dr. Lecter agrees, sliding a batch of noodles into the water he had been boiling.

[mogget_cat]

"It does, indeed," mwrrs the not'cat. "Truly I have not met anyone here who has not benefitted from this place one way or another, whether by gaining crucial knowledge or wisdom they otherwise would not have, being given the opportunity to rest or recuperate, or gaining friends and allies willing to help in times of struggle."

He include himself in that statement.

"There has long been much discussion, of course, about why only certain people find this place, and who determines when and where they find it."

[hat_and_dimples]

"It's a special privilege, then, and we are chosen," Jin Guangyao muses. "But why would all of us come at the same time? From my world, there are this fierce corpse here, his sister, me, my sworn brother's little brother, and the actual Yiling Laozu. Who even picks those people?"

[mogget_cat]

"That is the question," Yrael agrees, cleaning his whiskers fastidiously for any lingering traces of tuna. "Of all the many people in a world at any given time, one, maybe a few, a handful at most, find this place. Typically around the same time as time is reckoned in the bar, and from similar - if not exact - same points in time within their world. Despite the great number of people within a given world who could have been chosen, somehow those who find themselves here from the same world tend to already know each other."

"That would suggest some purpose behind who is allowed to find this place, and when. There is talk of some all-knowing-but-unknown Landlord for this place, who determines who comes and goes for their own purposes, but no one has ever met such a being or found proof of their existence."

[hat_and_dimples]

"It sounds quite worrisome," Jin Guangyao muses. "What do they want from us?"

He is cutting chili and very careful not to touch his face while thinking on that new danger.

"Entertainment," Dr. Lecter says. "People suffer very dramatically to great effect."

[mogget_cat]

"Food for their curiosity," Yrael says with just as much ease. "What would happen if people from opposite sides in a conflict were put in a kitchen together, or if people from worlds that are similar but different in poignant and thought-provoking ways were to interact beyond the bounds of their time and place? What new divergence would their paths take? How would it change the future of their world?"

There are reasons Yrael and Hannibal are friends.

[cook_the_rude]

"And so," Dr. Lecter says, "here we are, to the great entertainment of whoever is watching this. They might be hoping that the fierce corpse and the young cultivator would enact a dramatic xianxia scene, but instead I am here, and we are cooking."

Jin Guangyao does rub his nose at the unease the idea of somebody watching him for entertainment elicits in him; then he realises what he has done, and gives a yelp.

"At one time, everybody from my world who came here was from a slightly different version of our reality, as everybody had taken the opportunity to change something about it, based on what they had learned here. It was very good to see; my friends are really fiendishly clever," Dr. Lecter says, sounding proud of these people. "All those different antler-shaped plans all paid off beautifully, and separately. It was a kaleidoscope of possible stories, none of them quite mine."

[mogget_cat]

Yrael smiles, purring with his eyes mostly closed. "Your cooking can be delightfully dramatic in its own right, Dr. Lecter."

He doesn't know about the Landlord, or xianxia, but he always enjoys it. Cooking is not a skill Yrael shares.

"A scant handful of people from my world have come here in the past since I made my home here. The current Abhorsen and the Abhorsen-in-waiting, the burgeoning Wallmaker prince, his friend, my sister... Apart from the young Wallmaker princeling, none have stayed, or returned."

And not through any of Yrael's doing, either.

[hat_and_dimples]

"Why would a princeling make walls?" Jin Guangyao asks, loking for something, anything, that he can clean his face with before the capsaicin reaches a place that will really hurt.

"Magic," Dr. Lecter says, which is apparently the Milliways explanation for almost anything.

"Who is your sister?" Wen Ning asks. Sisters are important!

[mogget_cat]

"Wallmaker is his birthright, his title," murmurs the thing that isn't a cat, "he is the first in hundreds of years. A lifelong purpose to which to put his ingenuity and creativity for new, clever uses of Charter magic, a destiny that suits him much better than Abhorsen-in-Waiting. Or Prince, for that matter."

Yrael flicks an ear. "My sister who also found this place is Kibeth, the Walker, third of the Seven."