Disclaimer: I do not own anything from Gintama.
Shinpachi: Tadaima.
Otae: Ah, Shin-chan. The dinner will be ready soon.
Shinpachi: Dinner?! Ane-ue! I am supposed to be the one cooking today!
Otae: I asked Manju about recipes recently. Let me try cooking them.
Shinpachi: Manju's recipes?
Otae: Yes. Apparently eggs have lots of uses besides egg rolls and omelets.
Shinpachi looked into the sizzling pan, a little hopeful at the end product since those a Manju's recipes, but he only saw the usual dark matter.
Shinpachi: Why?! Manju never cook like this!
Otae: Ahh... I tweaked to recipes a little to make sure the food are thoroughly cooked.
Shinpachi: That is beyond cooked. That is annihilation.
Otae: Just try it!
Shinpachi passed out after he was force fed, white foam forming at his mouth.
"Just why the hell are you two coming along?" Gintoki frowned at the two kids sitting opposite him as he ate a sandwich.
"Why not? Let us crash your date once in a while." Shinpachi grinned and said.
"This is not a date anymore." Gintoki complained. "Why are you people here anyway?" He then turned to those uniformed men next to his group.
"Instead of just normal sakura view, having the company of such big beautiful moon is a nice change," Kondo said with his arms cross. Hijikata, Sogo and Yamazaki sat with him as they helped themselves to food and drinks. They usually watch sakura in the morning, but because they were rather busy these few days, the three of them decided to view it at night. Just as they are going to their usual site, they saw the Yorozuya taking picnic basket and mat with them.
"Manju! This is all your fault. This place is suppose to be our secret spot and you bought them here." Gintoki pointed his strawberry poky at her.
"They followed us. This is a public area. I can't stop them from coming." Manju said in amusement. "It is not that bad. We can have mass picnic for a change."
"Why do we have to picnic with those tax thieves?" Gintoki chewed on his pokey and sighed.
"If you continue to complain like that, you are not going to enjoy it." Manju turned back to her drawing. "If you really hate them so much, you just have to ignore them."
A month passed since their wanko mimi and tail disappeared. Days were peaceful again. The Yorozuya had one or two jobs coming, enough to feed the four of them. The rent was no longer a problem since they had signed a contract with Otose Snacks to sell steak manjus after Manju tweaked the recipe.
"Manju..." Kagura pulled her arm to get her attention.
"Hmmm?" She turned to looked at the girl and asked.
"This..." Kagura showed her something on her palm, to which Manju's face darkened. "It was an accident! It got stuck in between the rocks and when I pulled it out and the leg got torn off!" Kagura explained immediately. On her palm was a torn kapibarasan toy, one of the limited editions toy Manju got from eating in a fast food restaurant.
"Kagura! I only have one of that." Manju cried and shook her in anguish. It was a kapibarasan keychain in a yellow bee costume. There is even a tiny switch to let the toy fly.
"Sorry!" Kagura apologised.
"My kapibarasan..." Manju took the corpse back and sobbed.
"Man-ju... Don't cry already. Maybe we can sew it back?" Shinpachi tried to comfort the girl with awkward smile. That girl's biggest weak point is probably Kapibarasan.
"Can you?!" Manju asked hopefully. There is one thing Manju suck at and that is sewing craft works. She tried it many times and failed miserably. She got tangle in the threads like cats playing with yarn balls.
"I can try." Shinpachi take a look at the condition. The kapibarasan limbs is so thin and small. "Gin-san, can you do something. I am still waiting for my new glasses." He rubbed his eyes and said.
"You kids are so lousy. Give me." He took the toy from Shinpachi and looked at it. "Just add a little super glue." Gintoki took a tub out of his pocket. Manju quickly snatched her toy.
"Don't touch my kapibarasan with that poisonous thing," Manju warned protectively and dug her bag for a small bag of sew kit. "Use this."
"You are definitely prepared for this," Shinpachi said. "Manju, you know Kagura will break it, you should not have lent it to her."
"She and Sadaharu look really happy when they are playing with it," Manju smiled
"Troublesome." Gintoki fished thread and needle out of the pouch and started mending the toy.
Kagura reached for the last piece of honey steak manju, but a blade landed on it before she did, almost cutting her hand. "Get lost mice. Steak manjus are ours." Kagura narrowed her eyes at Sogo.
"Kagura-chan, Okita-san. There is still more." Shinpachi bought out another box. Manju had made extras since everyone likes steak manju. The steak was socked in a mixture of honey, malt and water overnight, chopped finely but not minced, then stuffed into salt manju skin. The balance of sweet and saltiness goes well with the chewy texture of the skin and the juice beef inside.
"That is the last one with chocolate sauce!" The two of them said at the same time.
Chocolate Steak Manju. It was a variety Manju made specially for Gintoki. She had wanted to use red beans at first, but found that chocolate tasted better.
"Oi! What are you to trying to do by eating my food?!" Gintoki yelled at them and reached for the last chocolate manju.
"Gintoki! Fix my toy first!" Manju pulled his hand that was holding the needle back. "I will make you as many as you want. Fix my toy!"
"But I want to eat it now!" Gintoki lurched for the manju when he saw the two of them trying to snatch it.
Puffing her cheeks, Manju took the needle and toy from him and went to a quiet corner, ignoring their food fight. She tentatively poke through the tiny feet of the toy and got poked in the finger tip. Trying to pull the thread out, she occidentally tearing the feet farther. Desperate to fix it, she cut the thread off and tried to sew the cut back before attaching the whole leg back to the body.
"You are totally hopeless in that." Hijikata sat down opposite her, eyeing her toy. "Give me." He held out his hand for it.
Manju gave the toy to him and watched him sew the thing up. "Hijikata-san, you are so good at sewing." She said in envy.
"Our HQ has no girls. We can't just toss every single uniform away when it suffers little cuts." Hijikata stitched the leg and body together. He even add more stitches to where the head and the keyring connects. "Here."
"Ooo! Thank you so much!" Manju said and beamed happily.
"Go and learn sewing brat. You are a God. How can you not know something so simple?" Hijikata scoffed.
"Don't call me that Hijikata-san. I am far from that level." Manju smiled. "I have been practising, but I just can't do it." She dug her sewing kit's pouch and took out a piece of cloth that was decorate with blood drops and stray threads.
"I can only see this as fooling around." Hijikata took the cloth and said with dead fish eyes. "Just how are you practising?" The cloth is crumpled and messy. Stitches of different sizes all over the place with long loose threads tangling.
"I read them on books and tried to follow but... It just messed up." Manju scratched her head and smiled awkwardly.
"Just what kind of book are your reading?" Hijikata sighed. He took some fresh piece of cloth and started teaching her.
The food fight was still going on with Shinpachi fussing around them, trying to get them to stop destroying food. Yamazaki had bought his badminton racket, and Kondo actually joined him in a few matches.
"Dana, Hijikata-san is flirting with your girlfriend." Sogo pointed at Manju and Hijikata and said.
"Huh?" Gintoki frowned and turned to look, but turned back immediately when he saw Sogo reaching for a stick of dango. "Trying to distract me? Impossible!"
Shinpachi gave up on them, salvaging leftover tea and went to sit at another quiet spot. Relaxing as he stretched his back, he enjoyed the view of sakura under the moonlight but... He is hungry!
"Shinpachi-kun, if you want, you can have this." Yamazaki passed him a plate of egg sushi. "It is not as delicious as Manju's cooking but it is not as bad as your sister's."
"Yamazaki! Don't speak bad of Otae-chan!" Kondo scolded as he crewed on a tuna sushi.
"Thank you, Yamazaki-san. Have some tea." Shinpachi served them the tea they bought. It was given as a gift from a client who hired them to help out at a tea exhibition. If it was not for Manju back then, they will be arrested for breaking all the expensive tea-wares.
"Gin-san is right. Things are so much easier with Manju around." Shinpachi commented.
"Isn't it because Manju is God?" Yamazaki asked. "To God, everything is a piece of cake."
"For what I know, her powers are sealed until recently. Then again, maybe Gods are fast-learner, that is why she pick up things quick." Shinpachi said thoughtfully.
"If anything, I would say her cheerfulness makes things easy. Unlike us, she don't really gets angry easily. In fact anything offensive to us seems to be amusing to her." Kondo sipped the tea.
"You talk like you know her well." Shinpachi looked at the Shinsengumi Leader and said.
"That is just observation. Her interaction with Sogo and Toshi tells a lot about her attitude and personality."
"Based on my observation, you are not that bad when ane-ue is not around." Shinpachi saw the gorilla in a new light.
"That is mean Shinpachi-kun! I am a good man, the best of Otae-chan." Kondo protested.
"Ahh...Gin-chan, Mayora is flirting with Manju." Kagura pointed at Manju and Hijikata and said.
"That same trick is not going to work!" Gintoki snatched a sandwich and ate it.
"It is real Dana. Look. Hijikata-san is touching Manju's hair." Sogo too is looking at the two of them.
Gintoki turned to look at them, then turned back and grabbed a cup of yogurt.
"Gin-chan, you are not stopping them?" Kagura asked.
"If Manju gets affected by Mayora's flirting, she will have already broken up with me idiots." Gintoki looked at the Moon and said. There is no full moon today but this crescent one is bright and sharp. A gust of wind blew past them, scooping sakura petals with it and scattering them. For once, all of them stopped what they are doing and watch as the petals flew towards the Moon. The scene was breath-taking.
As the wind died down, Shinpachi shivered and rubbed his arms. The temperature drops further into the night. Manju stood up and thanked Hijikata for teaching her. "Since all the food are used in food fight, let us head back to Otose Snacks for supper." Manju started cleaning up. Shinpachi and Yamazaki went to help too.
"Manju, tomorrow's training is cancelled." Sogo went to her and said. "I have things to attend to."
"Then do you want to do it later? I will go over after I am done." Manju paused and looked at him.
"It is already this late. We can do it next time." Sogo said.
"It is either tonight or tomorrow morning. It will be our last training." Manju resumed picking rubbish.
"Last? Why?" Sogo folded his arms and asked.
"Well..." Manju was finding a good way to convey her thoughts. When she noticed that everyone is waiting for her answer, she straighten up and said, "I am leaving Gintama."