~~~~Soma~~~~
After the whole competition was over for the day, I carried my sister back to the Kyokusei dorm and basically locked her in her room for decompression. She told me that she was fine, but I didn't believe her, since her eyes were wide and her breathing was off, not to mention that her hands were almost always over her ears. She needed at least half a day.
So, I laid her in bed, helped her take her medicine, left her plenty of food to get her through the night and turned up the power on her hearing aids so she could sit in perfect silence. I told her to text me if she needed anything and went to go celebrate with the others in Zenji's room.
"Gather around folks!" Yuki said lifting her cup, "To the Fall Selection's theatrics. To its crazy conclusion, we celebrate the results and all our hard work. Let's par-tay!"
We all shouted in cheers and ate and drank our fill, laughing and celebrating. Although, Isami and Takumi got a little distracted with Isshiki's form of dress. But they'd get used to it sooner or later, once they start hanging out with us more often.
"Say, where're Shun and Hikari hiding out tonight?" Ryoko asked.
"I'd bet Shun's holed up in his room feeling sorry for himself." Yuki answered, "He may not let it show, but I think he was pretty upset. And with Hikari, you have no idea what's going on through that girl's head. Maybe I should go over and drag them both out here."
I laughed and set down my cup of juice, "You can do that with Shun, but not with my sister right now. She's going through decompression."
Everyone's eyes were now on me, confused by what I said about my sis.
"What do you mean by that, Soma?" Takumi asked.
I faced him, "Well, you see..." I trailed off trying to find a way to explain the whole situation with Hikari, "You all know how my sister has that crazy ability with her enhanced senses, right?" They nodded, "Well, it's actually a double edged sword."
"A double edged sword?" Megumi repeated.
"Yeah. My sister can hear even the smallest sounds, pick up the faintest scents, and her sense of touch can help her differentiate all sorts of things just by feeling it." I frowned as I thought back to the times when my sister would go completely silent. She wouldn't even get under the blankets sometimes because her senses were too whacked up to handle the feeling of her cotton sheets and blankets.
"However, sometimes those enhanced senses get a little too strong and her body and mind try to reject the overstimulation. So, when that happens, Hikari has to go through a kind of 'sensory detox'. And depending on how strong the backlash is, she spends anywhere from a couple hours to even a full day in her room trying to decompress herself from it all. That's why we call it a Decompression period."
"That sounds tough." Takumi said, "Did she have to do that a lot when she was younger?"
"Yeah, but that's because her senses weren't completely developed. It's gotten better over the years." I said with a smile, but I could never forget that one period of our lives when she really got bad. I never wanted that to happen again, which would explain why I was so protective of my sister and insisted that she take half a day.
I continued having fun at the party with the others until it was time to get to bed. As I walked to my room, I paused for a moment to listen in on my sister. I knocked three times as soft as I could. It was a system that we made when we were kids in case she was in a decompression period. When I knock three times, I'm asking her if she's okay. And when I heard three knocks in reply, she was telling me that she was all right.
She never steered me wrong when it comes to her decompression periods, so I didn't try to go into her room and returned to mine to get some sleep.
~~~~~Hikari~~~~~
It was dark... and it was so cold. I pulled the blanket around my body to try and warm myself up, but all of a sudden I felt someone rip it from my freezing form.
"What do you think you're doing?!" A harsh and cold voice shouted at me, freezing me even more as the blanket was completely torn from my shivering body.
"You are not allowed to take a break until you finally finish perfecting the dish!" I looked up with tears in my eyes, my blurred vision not allowing the owner of the shouting voice to come clear. But I knew it was a man and he was covered in black clothing.
He grabbed me by the arm and threw me to the ground again, pouring a bowl of boiling soup on my head, making the pain from the cold become even more painful with the scalding temperatures of the boiled soup.
"You will continue to cook until I deem this soup as perfection!" He said and threw the bowl at me, the porcelain material shattering as soon as it hit the red carpeted floor.
I looked down at my shaking hands and my body felt numb. I was broken....
I woke up gasping for breath, the soft glow of the sunrise bringing me back to reality. After calming myself down with a few deep breaths, I walked out of my room and stood on the balcony to catch my breath and enjoy the peace before the crazy storm to come.
It had been two weeks since the preliminary finals and I've been working on new cooking styles and experimenting with new flavors. I wanted to be prepared for anything that the real competition would bring to the table.
But that dream.... for the past two weeks I had been having that same nightmare, and it terrified me every time that it came to mind. I don't even know who was shouting at me, but I knew that he was terrifying.
"Hey sis." Soma's voice brought me out of my thoughts. I turned and saw him still in his pajamas with a warm smile on his face.
"Whatcha doing out here on your own? Still decompressing?"
I scoffed, "Of course not. I'm just thinking about the competition. It's gonna be crazy for the next little while."
"Yeah, but that's what's gonna make it so much fun. But remember, just because you're my sister doesn't mean I'll go easy on you."
"I could say the same thing about you, big brother."
We looked at each other with determination in our eyes, silently telling each other that we weren't gonna back down from taking the top spot. Even if that means we have to battle each other for it.
After waiting for the car to come and pick us up, we grabbed Megumi, who was a sputtering mess, and headed off the the main campus. We made it to one of the offices where Isshiki, Erina, and Eizan were already waiting for us with our assigned dishes in hand.
"Hey Soma, Hikari. The results of the draw are in." Isshiki said, "Soma, you'll be competing in the first round of the upcoming competition and your theme will be the bento box. And Hikari, you'll be competing in the fourth round with your theme being chocolate dessert."
"Bento box?" Soma repeated, "Like normal bento box?"
"That is up to you. Be sure to have all your prep work done early. Both of you will be in the finals tomorrow."
"Well, that's a bit of a twist." I laughed, "Guess the school decided to give a chance with a down-to-earth kind of dish, huh Soma? I mean, seriously, a bento box?"
Erina quickly huffed in annoyance, "Do you two even know what you're saying? You just don't get it, do you? The bento box was developed in Japan and has its own unique culture. By using only the right seasonal ingredients, the bento has remained beloved in many different cultures. the word bento is now even in the French dictionary. It is appropriate for a celebration of Haute cuisine, that is if you even know what that means. A sharp line divides it from second-rate drab cooking, which happens to be both of your specialties."
Without letting her say another word, my brother and burst out laughing.
"Sure enough, that's one thing I don't like about you." Soma said.
"And I can think of a few more if you want." I said, "Make no mistake Food Princess, my brother and I are pretty good at getting people to talk more openly. But coming from you, it's just too much to handle."
"Coming back from the training camp was pretty uncomfortable, huh?"
"What do you mean? What does that have to do with anything? I swear to God you ratty Yukihiras!"
Just then, Eizan walked towards the door and passed us, only stopping for a minute to give us a word of encouragement.
"Soma and Hikari Yukihira, promise me that both of you will give it your all tomorrow. You don't wanna lose your first battle. That would be a disgrace."
When Eizan left, Soma and I turned back to Isshiki.
"So, who are we going up against tomorrow?" Soma asked, and the names of our opponents were announce. Gotta say, I was a little surprised with mine and Soma's opponents, but I knew that we had this competition in the bag.
~~~~~
The next day came so fast and I was ready to cheer on my brother during his competition. His opponent, the queen of molecular Gastronomy, and not to mention the granddaughter of the head director of the school.
I bid my brother goodbye and wished him luck in his battle, hugging him tight while being mindful of his knife case held tightly in his hand.
"Good luck, big brother. I wanna go against you in the final rounds." I smiled.
"You can count on me, sis." He said and went on his way to the stage as Kawashima announced my brother and Alice Nakiri.
I was about to walk up the stands to join the others from the Kyokusei dorms, but before I could get to the first step I felt someone tap my shoulder. I turned around and saw Gin Dojima standing behind me with a kind smile.
"Mr. Dojima." I greeted, "Nice to see you so early in the competition. I would have thought that you'd be in the stands watching all the contestants."
"I had heard that you were fighting in the fourth round today, so I'd thought that it would nice to see you before. And I was a little worried since you nearly collapsed on-stage during the finals of the preliminaries." He said.
"Thanks for your concern, Mr. Dojima, but I'm all right. It was just my senses acting up. Guess I overstimulated myself just a bit too much. After half a day of decompressing, I was back to normal."
"Wonderful. But say, before you go join your friends to watch your brother, I wanted to ask you something."
I looked at him curiously, "Sure, what's up?"
"I wanted to ask you about Natsume Sendawara. I was wondering if you had ever met her as a child."
I shook my head, "Nope. I've never met her until that first competition. Maybe she mistook me for someone else."
"Yes, but here's the thing." He looked at me without a smile, but with a more serious expression, "She spoke to me about you and wanted to know more about your background. I told her the truth, but withheld information that pried too much into your privacy. What got me was that the girl she was describing had your facial features that matched your description, but had black hair. Perhaps you dyed your hair at one point in time?"
Once again, I shook my head, "Never. I love my bright red hair and I would never dye it."
He hummed in thought and shook his head, "Sorry for all the questions, I just had to confirm so that Natsume would stop bugging me about it. Thank you for your time, and enjoy the match."
Mr. Dojima walked away leaving me with curiosity and confusion. I shrugged my shoulders and went to join the others for Soma's match against Alice. I took a seat between Yuki and Ikumi and waited for the announcements to end.
"Sitting up here in the stands has my sensitive skin tingling with anxiety." Zenji said, "To think that he has to take on the Nakiri family here."
"Yeah, the pressure is on. He definitely has his work cut out for him." Shun added.
"Don't be so sure that my brother's pushed into a corner." I said smiling, "Soma is pretty good with simple things like a bento box. And in this situation, he won't disappoint anyone. After all, he still has to face me. He's not gonna give that opportunity up."
Finally, the time to cook started and I was nothing short of amazed after seeing Alice's cooking equipment. I looked like she was going to do her specialty: Molecular Gastronomy. As she started cooking, I couldn't keep my eyes off her constantly moving hands.
"I looks like some kind of science experiment." Ryoko said.
"Zenji, explain all this." Yuki demanded.
"I can't. This type of cooking is far out of my frame of reference." He replied.
"What are those nerd glasses even for?"
"Calm your little pigtails down, Yuki, I gotcha." I said while pulling her back to her seat, "Alice Nakiri is a master of molecular gastronomy, and from the looks of her equipment, she's gonna break down her ingredients to their base base. She even brought equipment to cool down her ingredients. She's already at a disadvantage."
"So what about Soma? He's got a plan, right?" Ikumi asked.
"Of course he does. Like I said, my brother's specialty are meals like this. Alice has her wits and skills, but Soma uses his skills along with his past failures and experiences. We both do this and make dishes that really hit home."
Everyone continued to watch silently as two hours passed and the two continued to cook. I marveled at the skills that Alice had, but loved the way that my brother was putting his heart and soul into his bento. Finally, the end of the round was announced and Alice came up first with her dish.
"Well, who's ready for lunch?" She asked, setting down five glass domes in front of the judges. Underneath each dome was a layer of smoke inside, keeping the dish inside completely hidden from the eyes of the judges and the audience.
"What is that contraption?" Yuki asked.
"Inside that dome, it looks like... smoke?" Ryoko said confused.
"That's something I could have never imagined." Ikumi commented.
I looked down sharply at the dish Alice presented, noticing the more white color of the smoke rather than it being grey. It wasn't smoke at all... It was something completely different.
"It's liquid Nitrogen." I muttered, but everyone heard.
"Liquid Nitrogen?" Ryoko asked.
I nodded, "Yeah, it's so that the bento box would keep cold. It produces cold air."
The domes were lifted and revealed a large bento filled to the brim with beautiful pieces of temari sushi all lined up in their own separate rows. Alice instructed them to start with the sushi starting from the top left: The Bounty of the Sea. The pieces of sushi in the top row are better seen as a seafood course of abalone, sea urchin roe, salmon roe, then slices of cured bonito. And with every bite of the different sushi, it became even more delicious as the umami became stronger and stronger.
The next row of sushi were better know as cake sushi, or a salad for a middle course of the meal. Each sushi was wrapped with paper thin cut vegetables. One had vegetable sprouts wrapped in pumpkin, the next had edamame wrapped in beets, another was wrapped in mustard leaves, and the last was corn wrapped in zucchini. She had even topped all of the sushi with legumes and infused the rice with tomato jus she had extracted with a centrifuge.
And finally with the third row, came the main dish. The first three being cured beef fillet topped with wasabi and for the final piece, it was a sea bream chazuke with an orb of solidified dashi that just covered the sushi with an extra hit of deliciousness.
It was so delicious that the headmaster tore his shirt off and showed his chest, confirming that the dish was incredible.
The others and I were shocked, but then again, they had only seen one of the competitors. Then, my brother presented something completely out of the ordinary. It was a seaweed bento, but with a twist.
"What is he doing?" Ikumi asked.
"He's made his own version of a traditional seaweed bento box." I explained grabbing everyone's attention, "See those containers he has?"
I gestured at the stainless steel boxes Soma placed in front of the judges.
"Those are food jars, made out of complete stainless steel. It's meant to keep food hot for almost up to half a day or sometimes even longer."
"Wow, that's pretty smart." Ryoko said.
"He doesn't even look nervous at all."
"Even though he's in the middle of the match." Yuki added.
"Is she talking down to Soma? That pasty little tramp." Ikumi growled, "Look at that smirk, the slug meat already thinks she's won this."
"Calm down, Nikumi." I said, "My brother's got this all handled. Just take a look."
I pointed to the judges opening the first of the three sides Soma prepared and took a bite. Immediately, the judges' mouths were filled to the brim with delicious, perfectly fried isobeage.
"What the? How did he make such a crispy fishcake?" Ryoko asked.
"Soma used beer in the fry batter to help volatize the batter a lot faster and give it a texture that isn't too gummy." I explained, "A perfect starting side dish for what's to come next."
When the judges tasted the Gobo, or burdock root, they were impressed with the mellow yet surprised by the depth in its flavor. I wanted to help Soma in a way, so I decided to help him with tasting. He wanted some kind of different depth of flavor for the side dish, so gave him some advice to increase the depth of flavor. He ended up using a hint of mayonnaise, balsamic vinegar, carrots and white sesame seeds added in.
They went on to the next side, a bit of fried cod seasoned dashi stock and simmered before frying. Soma had even used maguro flakes when he was simmering the cod to give it even more flavor.
It was then time for the miso soup filled with onions, bacons and dashi stock with maguro and Rishiri kombu. The sweetness of the onion mixed with the maguro stock fragrance, it made the dish even more savourable.
"This is incredible, the judges are just eating up every single bite." Yuki exclaimed.
"Hikari, your brother is incredible." Zenji commented.
I nodded, proud of my brother's skills in this round, "Yep, and with this bento box challenge, it hits a special place for us Yukihiras."
"What are you talking about?" Ikumi asked.
"You see, back home we used to have a customer named Mrs. Kiyo. She was one of our regulars and was a very sweet lady who used to come by everyday. But when she hurt her back, she couldn't come by as often. So, my brother and I made bento boxes for her so she wouldn't go hungry during dinner. One time, we even made a little picture of all three of us with maguro flakes in the rice. It showed feelings beyond taste. And that's exactly what my brother's gonna prove to Alice. Just take a look."
The others looked down at the screens at the final dish. A tray of rice covered in some kind of dark green orbs. And only Soma and I knew the secrets. When the judges took a bite of the rice and their mouths were filled to the brim with the salty taste of seaweed spreading over the sweet delicate rice.
"Didn't I tell you that my brother had everything under control?" I chuckled, "He extracted the the umami of the seaweed and used sodium alginate and calcium chloride to make little bombs of seaweed umami."
"Molecular Gastronomy?" Ryoko said shocked.
"But that's-"
"Alice's area of specialty!"
"How the heck did he learn that?" Zenji asked.
"Soma went to help a kid's cooking class the other day, and came back with traditional sweets. He used that to make the granules of seaweed." I explained.
But just as the judges were finishing up their rice, Soma quickly told them to stop and save a third of it. He told them to take the last container and pour a specially made Kudzu sauce all over the rice. The result was a whole new flavor and a brand new world of deliciousness. It even made the headmaster show his chest without anyone noticing.
"All the judges are wiggin' out, bro."
"Yeah, they're totally different from when it was Alice's turn. It actually looks like they're all best buds now."
From the stands, everyone watched as Alice was talking to her now half naked grandfather, and she was too shocked for words. Soma even gave her a portion of the rice covered in the kudzu sauce, and she too gave in to its deliciousness.
"HAND ME MY BRUSH!!" The headmaster said, grabbing a very large brush and dipping it in the large container of ink. He wrote with a shout a name on the paper and revealed it to the public.
"In the first battle of the first round, the winner is.... Soma Yukihira!" The headmaster announced, causing a loud cry of cheers to run throughout the entire arena.
"Way to go, big brother!" I cheered with the others. I ran down the stairs to go and congratulate my brother after he was released from the arena, since there was going to be a small intermission for the other competitors. But as I was about to leave the stands and head to the competitors' rooms, I was confronted by the Headmaster himself, who still didn't have a shirt on.
He looked down at me with a stern look in his eye.
"Headmaster Nakiri." I said respectively, "Can I help you with something?"
"Actually, yes you can." He said, "I would like to know about Ms. Sendawara and your relationship with her. She's been bugging me for days about it."
I sighed, "Mr. Dojima already asked me about that topic. I have no idea where she got the idea that I knew her."
The headmaster hummed and then smiled at me, "Well then, I do look forward to your challenge coming soon. I'm excited to see what kind of desert you'll be making, hopefully something that will rattle the senses."
As he walked away, I could swear that I had seen that smile somewhere before. It made me feel confident and safe. There a small flash in my mind and a voice shouting at me.
"I'll find you again one day, Hikari!" It shouted, but it wasn't the same voice from my nightmares. No, it was calmer, much more gentle. I shook it off and went to congratulate my brother, nearly forgetting about the flashed voice through my head.