Kyo's First win
Book two in
Tales of Furuba
A/N: this comes from another day at the beach. We were hungry. And hot. And thirsty. And sandy. So what is the best thing to do when you are all of the above? Talk about food!!!
A/N #2: The first one in Tales of Furuba is "Kyo's new obsession." There really isn't any order. Well there is but I'm not writing them in order.
A/N #3: I know. I should be writing a new chapter for Kyo's new obsession but I wanted to write this really fast. Then I will.
Kyo was mad. At Shigure. And everyone else too. But mostly Shigure. The dumb dog had left his shirt at the top of the stairs. Then, along came ditzy Tohru with her arms full of clothes.
It was ironic really. Tohru had just spent fifteen minutes gathering up Shigure's laundry and one of his shirts was Tohru's downfall. Literally.
If you knew Tohru well enough, you could guess what happened. Slippery shirt at the top of the stairs, plus Tohru, her arms full of clothes, not able to see where she stepped. Not a good combination.
Sufficed to say… Tohru broke her leg.
For a while she had stayed in the hospital, feeling bad that she was leaving everyone else to do all of the house work. Later, when she came home, she tried doing all of the housework but she was unable due to her crutches. So the housework was divvied out to the other members of the Sohma household.
Kyo wasn't mad at Shigure because he was the inadvertent reason that he had to do so much housework, plus homework and the Dojo. He didn't really mind. It was the fact that the dog had wormed his way out of doing any housework. Then, since he didn't do any housework, he had time to make fun of Yuki and Kyo while they did the housework.
While Kyo was dusting, Shigure would come in and make a make a snide remark about how Kyo was going to grow up to be such a good housewife.
While Yuki was cleaning the bathroom, Shigure would slide into the bathroom and sing a bunch of nonsense words until it annoyed Yuki. Then when Yuki yelled at him he would shrink back to the door and say he just wanted to make sure that Yuki hadn't either drowned in the toilet or flooded the bathroom. Two things, according to Shigure, Yuki was sure to do.
When either Yuki or Kyo were doing homework, Shigure would prance into their rooms singing a song he had made up.
"Our dear little Tohru,
Has broken her leg.
For us to do housework,
She won't have to beg.
Yuki will tidy,
And Kyo with cook,
While Shigure slaves away,
Writing his book.
Oh yes, we'll work hard,
To make things easy for Tohru,
So easy in fact she,
Won't lift a finger for you"
Then Shigure looks around, mock surprise on his face.
"But hey! Wait!
What's this that I see?
Yuki and Kyo?
Are being lazy.
While the laundry piles,
And the windows yearn for dusting,
Tohru totters around,
Thinking 'This house is disgusting.'
But she can do naught,
But just look away,
For her leg in it's cast,
Won't come off 'til May.
Of course Yuki and Kyo,
Can't wait for that day,
Their belief in women and housework,
Is awfully cliché."
So Kyo and Yuki had rallied together, unofficially to create a partnership. Its goal: Torture Shigure.
Yuki, who was in charge of bathrooms and tidying, among other things, didn't clean Shigure's bathroom or pick up his stuff.
Kyo was in charge of cooking, along with many other things, put Tabasco sauce in all of Shigure's food. Shigure would hop around holding his tongue out of his mouth as if to air it out, then he would step on a piece of his junk that he had left out.
It didn't work. He stilled teased them. Yuki and Kyo had silently come to the assumption that Shigure didn't even realize that they were torturing him on purpose. The still continued with steadfast determination that wouldn't be swayed.
……
One of the good things about cooking was sometimes Tohru would come in and help him. Kyo was secretly glad he had been given a task that Tohru could help him with and not be in considerable pain. She could sit and peel potatoes for curry at the table while he stirred and added all of the ingredients. Tohru always told Kyo that she was thankful that he let her help. She told him that she didn't feel like she was earning her keep in the house if she didn't work. Kyo suspected that Shigure would allow her to stay even if she didn't work.
Tonight for dinner Kyo was making curry. Curry was also the first meal that he had made as the substitute chef in place of Tohru.
Kyo remembered the first time that he had made it. Actually he mostly remembered everyone's reactions to his cooking. Tohru's eyebrows had shot up and she smiled at him after she swallowed.
"This is delicious Kyo-kun!" she quickly ate it all and asked for seconds, something she never did.
Yuki looked surprised at Tohru's reaction and carefully took a bite. His eyes widened and he put his bowl down. Then he said something Kyo would never forget.
"It looks like the cat is actually good at something." Then he went on to eat his food.
The whole time Shigure had been eating and eating. Seeing as how Shigure hadn't made up the song yet, and he hadn't started continually torturing them yet, his food was the same as everyone else's.
Tonight however, Tohru was feeling a little worse for the wear and had decided to go to sleep early so she could get up in the morning. Kisa was living with them now so she could help Tohru, who was having a hard time with crutches.
So Kyo was stuck cooking alone. And as afore mentioned, it gave him time to think. And he wasn't in a good mood. Shigure had been teasing him all day while he was dusting and vacuuming. And that rat had put in his fair share of "the cat is worthless remarks." And Kyo had thought they might actually be able to get along after the whole Tohru breaking her leg thing and their unofficial/unspoken revolt against Shigure.
Kyo remembered the morning that Tohru had fallen down the stairs. Kyo was playing the Sims trying to carefully fix what Yuki had messed up. (A/N: for all of those Kyo's New Obsession readers!! This will happen… op ) He was swearing under his breath at the rat. The easiest way to summarize what Kyo was saying instead of using all 19 words of Kyo's choice we will just say: "Oh dear. My Sims aren't talking to each other anymore."
In the middle of a particularly bad word, Kyo was stopped by a loud thunk, followed by a scream, then a crash coupled by a sickening snap. Kyo leaped out of his chair and was the first one to Tohru. Sufficed to say what he saw wasn't pretty.
Looking back, it was good that she had all of that laundry in her hands. She would have tripped on the shirt anyway. The laundry had somehow padded Tohru's head and had managed to save her from further brain damage.
The ambulance came and somehow Yuki managed to ride in the ambulance with Tohru instead of him.
Kyo hurriedly put the thoughts of Tohru at the hospital to the back of his mind. Which put his mind on other things. Like Yuki.
Kyo peeled a potato angrily. That rat was always picking on him. And he didn't like it. Yuki always got everything. He was talented, smart, handsome, Student body president, Akito's favorite, had friends, good at sports and way better at Martial Arts than Kyo and he always got what he wanted. Heck, he was probably gonna get Tohru to.
Kyo reasoned that the only thing he was better at than that rat was cooking. Kyo laughed when he thought about the rat trying to cook. He couldn't. all he could see was a big black cloud of smoke. If there was one thing Kyo would ever beat Yuki at, it would be cooking.
Suddenly Kyo had a brilliant Idea. Brilliant. Now all he needed to do was put it into action.
…………
Kyo tried all week to get Yuki mad, but to no avail. That rat was in to good of a mood. It was at school the following week it finally happened.
Yuki was coming back from a particularly bad student council meeting. Manabe had insisted on assigning everyone colors, again, although he had graciously offered Yuki red instead of his normal pink. Then Kimi stated that Kimi was always pink and Yun-yun was never pink. They had gotten into an argument over that and chaos soon insured. Nothing got finished, Machi had turned over all of the desks, Nao was complaining loudly to Yuki, Yuki had a bunch of homework plus a load of house work and the garden (that wasn't up to it's usual standard of growing things) needed weeding. Then there was that cat. It seemed as if that cat was getting on his nerves more than usual. He would randomly come up and say snide remarks then skip off to his friends in the corner, where he would laugh and tease.
So Yuki was in a foul mood when he walked into the classroom. He walked in on Tohru and Kyo talking quietly talking. Tohru was smiling at Kyo from her wheelchair, (she only used it at school…) giving him a smile that she only gave to him. That cat didn't know how lucky he was. Another thing that bothered him.
Kyo looking up saw Yuki. His smile faded and he glared at him.
"Have a nice meeting?" Kyo asked, smirking. It was clear from the expression on Yuki's face that he had not had a good meeting and the cat was making fun of him. He glared at Kyo. But the glare was missed due to Kyo waving at someone out in the hallway.
Yuki silently fumed. Lately that cat had been getting on his nerves more than usual.
Kyo pushed Tohru out of the classroom without a second glance in Yuki's direction. As he went out the door the front wheel of Tohru's wheelchair was caught by the frame. Due to the sudden jolt Tohru almost fell out of the chair.
"I'm so sorry Tohru!!" Kyo rushed around to see if there was any damage. Aside from her wide eyes, she was fine.
Yuki laughed. He was mad and this was the perfect time to let out all of his anger. On the one person he hated most.
"Stupid cat. It seems like you are so inadequate that you can't even push a wheelchair properly. It's a wonder you can even brush your teeth without assistance."
Kyo glared at him. "For your information, it was the door's fault. And I can push wheelchair fine, thanks."
Yuki smirked. "Dumb cat. I could beat you in anything."
Kyo smirked. This was the moment he had been going for all week.
"Oh yeah." He challenged. "You wanna make a bet on that? You wanna challenge me or are you to much of a sissy?"
At the moment Yuki would have agreed to anything.
"Bring it on cat. Your choice."
What ever Yuki expected, it wasn't what came out of Kyo's mouth.
"Cooking. I challenge you to a cooking contest."
Yuki agreed.
It was only later on that Yuki finally realized what he was agreeing to.
………….
The competition was to be held that Sunday. The judges were the following: Hatori and Hiro. Hatori because he would be fair and Hiro because he wasn't biased (aka he didn't like either of them…) and wasn't afraid to speak his mind.
The school had graciously allowed them to use one of the Home-ec rooms to stage the competition. There was enough room for a crowd to gather and watch. The whole Zodiac group was coming to watch.
The competition was about to begin. Each challenger had a bunch of different ingredients ready and by their side. They had to make something out of the ingredients they had. Yuki was on the left and Kyo was on the right. Hiro put his head down on the table and instantly fell asleep. He wasn't interested.
Hatori started the timer and blew a whistle. It had begun.
Kyo looked around at his supplies: chicken, assorted veggies, rice, soy sauce, ginger, sugar, garlic, tomatoes and random sauces that they had gathered together. Kyo smiled. Just what he needed to make a stir fry. Kyo measured the appropriate amount of rice and water and placed them in the rice cooker. He pulled out a wok and began heating sesame oil. For flavor he added in some garlic. This was going better than he could have thought.
Yuki glanced at his pile in confusion. Sauces? Veggies? Chicken? What could he do with that? He glanced over at Kyo, who was furiously chopping chicken and peppers. Yuki could already smell the delicious fumes of something drifting over to him.
To Yuki, it looked like Kyo had no idea what he was doing. So he randomly threw some chopped vegetables into the wok and looked at the stove. "Now how to turn it on". Yuki thought. Suddenly Yuki spotted rice. That was something he could cook.
Kyo looked over at Yuki. He was standing with a bag of rice in his hand, a look of extreme confusion apparent on his face. Kyo laughed. His stir fry was going very well. He had just added in the shoyu, vinegar, mirin, sugar, and ginger. Now he needed to add the chicken and cook it until it was well done. Meanwhile his rice cooked at a steady pace.
BOOM!!
Hiro's head jerked up from the table when he heard the sound. He looked around, still sleepy eyed. On the contestants stand there was a big black cloud of smoke. Hiro vaguely wondered if someone had transformed, when he suddenly realized what it was.
Kyo had to stop stirring his chicken so he could bend over and laugh. It was just as he had thought. Yuki had done what only Yuki could do. Turn food into a nuclear bomb. He had somehow combined two innocent ingredients to somehow form a bomb of deadly proportions. All Kyo could see were Yuki's pale hands waving away the smoke
Hiro sighed; he wasn't looking forward to eating what Yuki cooked.
Yuki was frustrated. He had done exactly what the cat had done but somehow it had turned out immensely wrong. At least his rice was cooking. He pulled out a clean wok and began.
Kyo knew that Hatori and Hiro did not like crunchy veggies so he had been steaming his vegetables in a separate pan while he was cooking the chicken. When it was finally done he added the vegetables into the wok. After stirring it around for a while, he tasted it. He smiled. It was done. Now all he had to do was sit back and let the rice cook.
Yuki, across the room, wasn't feeling so confident. He had added in vegetables and sauce, managed to turn on the stove and it had produced… charcoal. Hum. How did that happen we all wonder?
Yuki thought he would do better if he had a recipe. He held up his hand.
The timer was stopped and Yuki asked his question.
"Are we allowed to use a recipe?"
Hatori looked at Hiro. Hiro shrugged. Anything to make the food taste better.
Hatori nodded at Yuki and reset the timer.
It was then that Kyo started to panic. He had just made it up as he went. And if he knew one thing, it was that rat was good at following instructions. But as Kyo looked at the timer, his worries started to fade; that rat had fifteen minutes to make something that didn't resemble charcoal.
Yuki was thinking along the same lines. He decided to wing the whole recipe idea and just sauté some vegetables to go with his rice.
Kyo turned off his stove. He loaded plates of food for the crowd and the judges. The crowd could taste the samples but the judges (Hatori and Hiro) would make the final decision.
Kyo scrapped the last of the Stir Fry from the bottom of the wok and began washing his dishes. As a twist, they were required to wash their dishes also before the timer beeped.
Kyo finished a few seconds before the timer, as did Yuki. After they had handed out their food to the crowd they approached the judges and placed their masterpieces in front to await the final judgment.
In front of Hiro was Yuki's sad excuse for sautéed vegetables and a mound of what looked like rice. Hiro sighed. He might as well get it over with. Surprisingly, the rice was good, if a little crunchy from not enough water and the lid put on the rice cooker wrong. Other than that, it was fine. The vegetables however, where a different story. Mixed in with the limp once vegetables where what looked like remains of Yuki's failed earlier attempt. Chopsticks to bowl, then chopsticks to mouth, Hiro took a first bite. At first you couldn't taste it. But as you chewed and got over the shock of overly squishy vegetables and a ton of oil you could defiantly taste it. The charred remains of Yuki's poor, poor first try where defiantly still there. And you could taste them. Hiro choked down as much as he could. He had to look strong in front of Kisa.
Hatori looked down at the stir fry that Kyo had created. Hatori wasn't a big fan of stir fry. So he tried the rice first. Not the best but it was still pretty good. Next Hatori turned to the stir fry. He picked up a piece of chicken. He chewed thoughtfully. He had noticed that Kyo hadn't used a cook book, which earned him brownie points. But there was a weird flavor. Kyo had probably used too much of some sauce. But Hatori cleaned his plate still the same.
While Hatori and Hiro took a glass of water to clear the taste of what ever food they had just eaten, Kyo and Yuki looked around the crowd. Most of the plates were cleared of all the food but on some plates, people where pushing around a few limp vegetables that where the remains of Yuki's cooking.
Hatori and Hiro switched food. Hatori had the same reaction to Yuki's food as Hiro. Only he actually held a strait face the whole time. He had a slightly green ting to his cheeks when he was finished.
Hiro, on the other hand, had no regrets as he quickly shoveled down as much of Kyo's stir fry as he could. He looked around moodily as his bowl reached critically low.
As soon as they were done Hatori and Hiro started the analysis.
Hiro began. "Kyo first. I loved your Stir Fry. It was the best. I didn't expect talent out of the cat. I guess I can be wrong about some things. But not very often. Yuki, First, what kind of lame excuse for sautéed vegetables was that? Secondly, are you trying to kill me with overly cooked vegetables? How can Vegetables get so squishy while being sautéed? I mean I could believe it if you were steaming them…" Hiro shook his head to say that he was done.
Hatori thought a moment. "Yuki, I have to agree with Hiro. Your vegetables weren't exactly the crunchiest things. But I do give you extra points for creating the meal in fifteen minutes. The rice was a little crunchy though… Kyo, your rice was very good, but your stir fry had a strange taste. I think that you added too much of a sauce but it was still good."
The crowd waited for their final judgment.
"I say that Kyo won. Yuki's was gross." Hiro cut to the chase.
Kyo sighed. One point.
Hatori sighed. "I would have to say… that Hiro is right. Squishy vegetables are good, but extremely squishy vegetables…" Hatori shuddered.
It didn't sink in until that night. Kyo had actually beat Yuki. He had actually beat Yuki. He thought about what that meant. He was now a member of the Zodiac.
The more Kyo thought about it, the more it made him frown. He didn't want to be a member of that family. The one that had shunned him forever. He didn't think it mattered. Akito wouldn't keep his end of the deal anyway.
The next day Kyo sent a message with Shigure to Akito. It simply stated that Kyo would not become a member of the zodiac. He had beaten the rat fair and square as the Cat NOT of the zodiac. And he was happy enough with that.
It was Kyo's first win.
And he won in a way he never thought he would.
It was Kyo's first win…
I guess the title kinda gave it away. cringe this had kinda bothered me the whole time I was reading the books. If Kyo wanted to win so badly he shoulda just challenged him to a cooking contest. But I guess he didn't want to take down his manly image and challenge Yuki to a cooking contest. laughs
Sorry for being so mean to Yuki. I just had to make him like that so that the victory would seem more sweet to Kyo and the audience. Heh heh. Sorry to all of those Yuki fans out there