thenearshore | [closed] it's not a nutritional dinner

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[closed] it's not a nutritional dinner

Who: Chikusa, Ken, and all the people invited to Hakkai's temple
When: October 12
Where: Li Tieugai's temple in the Central District
What: Having recently lost their other god, Ken is sad by yet another loss.... so Chikusa is fixing this with his dog's favorite things: people he likes and copious amounts of meat.

Unless people actually ask, Chikusa.... doesn't exactly tell what time the dinner is actually going to be at. At least he'll probably tell them that Hakkai's temple moved? One would hope.

The temple of Iron Crutch Li doesn't really seem all that impressive upon approaching it, despite being in the Central District. The walled gardens are certainly large and lovely enough, if a little wild, but the building itself is rather plain at its two stories. There's a small sign attached to the front door that simply says 'come in'. Chikusa isn't going to bother answering the door for visitors. It's not like Hakkai locks that thing anyway.

The inside of the temple is about as sparsely decorated as its outside, but, today, the overwhelming smell wafting from the kitchen has overtaken any medicinal smells that might normally be about. It adds a certain warmth to the room.

Until dinner will be served a little later into the night, people are free to do whatever- hang about the gardens, go bother Chikusa in the kitchen, or otherwise find the other residents of the temple. Chikusa won't care to stop anyone, although Hakkai might.

As for dinner? Chikusa is serving so much meat: rabbit stew with olives and rosemary, swordfish, curried chicken, veal marsala, and a more traditional spaghetti served with meatballs. Fortunately, at least there's garlic bread and stuffed mushrooms, so there's something that isn't meat.... And for dessert? Zeppole, cannoli, and an apple ciambella with almond cream.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Would you like to take a closer look? It sounds like you're much better with electronics than I am.

[He's never been too handy. Cooking and cleaning, yes. Some minor household necessities... major ones, though, like replacing doors, are beyond his expertise. So is fixing an old cathode-ray TV.

He steps back, gesturing Adrien towards the television.]

I don't know about being better but I could take a look.

[Adrien moves at that gesture ducking behind the TV. He's crouching down and furrowing his brows as he tests the cables - making sure all the connections are tight and that they're in the right spot. A couple of them are a touch loose so he'll fix that and while he's back there he's going to check and see if any of them are worn or bent at such extremes that the wiring inside might be broken down.]

[Hakkai leans over, watching with interest as Adrien goes through the connections and checks the wires. He should probably be watching the screen to see if the static is clearing, but this way, he supposes, he can learn what it is that the young man is actually doing....]

[Adrien's brows are drawn together and his tongue is peeking out of his mouth as he tightens one last cable. The wires don't seem too bad - well all things considered. They should hold out just fine for now.]

You may want to get someone a bit more tech savvy to make sure this bad boy is is good order and will last but I think I've got all the cords tight and set up right.

[He's glancing up at Hakkai tilting his head as he brushes his hands off on his jeans.]

How's it looking out there?

Ah... let me check.

[He steps back to squint at the screen. There's still a bit of fuzziness around the edges -- he notes, to himself, that he'll have to find a repair manual and check all its innards, but not tonight -- but overall....]

Much better!

[Adrien smiles brightly moving to come from behind it.]

It's an old set so you may have to look inside at some of the wiring and stuff like that. Fuses tubes and whatnot. might have to replace a few things just to keep it in working order.

[Coming to his feet he's circling around to peer at the screen himself. It's an improvement to be sure but yeah there's definitely something internal.]

That's as good as it's going to get before you can get in with a schematic and new parts. Little late for that tonight though. But if you need an extra pair of hands let me know.

That's better than I'd managed. I'll have to see if I can find a repair manual and check the wiring later, but for tonight, I think we may as well skip to the movie.

[He chuckles, pulling an equally old copy of a kung-fu classic off the shelf below the VCR, and holds it up.]

I hope you like martial arts movies?

Sounds good. It'd be kind of hard to find one at this hour anyway. And we don't want to keep everyone waiting.

[Adrien blinks then he's reaching to look over the box before handing it back.]

I think I would. I like action shows. Marinette and I watched a few movies. This would be an actiony fighting show, right?

Ahaha, more or less! There's quite a bit of comedy, too.

[It's an old Jackie Chan movie, Drunken Master, dubbed in Japanese; he tucks the box neatly back onto the shelf, and fast-forwards to the title sequence.]

Or so it seems. I haven't watched this one yet.

Oh! That sounds even better.

[This is great! happily Adrien is going to settle himself down.]

Really? That's neat. We get to watch it for the first time together - that's always fun. When Mari and I watched movies I knew she'd already seen them before so I felt kind of bad because she had to re-watch them because of me.

I don't mind rewatching movies myself, but it's always more interesting to watch one for the first time, isn't it?

So I bought a few down on the Near Shore for the party.

[In the certain knowledge that Chikusa was going to collapse after a day of cooking and be immovable from the couch for hours.]

I guess? I've never re-watched a movie. For me every time is the first time. She didn't seem very put out about it though. But I did catch her humming some of the songs.

[He laughed softly and smiled.]

Sounds like a good idea really. It'll help keep everyone entertained since I'm sure Chikusa will be tired after all that hardwork cooking for everyone.

You haven't been here very long yet, have you?

[Meaning: not nearly enough time to watch movies more than once. He smiles, briefly, and starts this one up before returning to settle on his end of the couch.]

I'm sure, if she knew the songs, she did enjoy the movie -- so you shouldn't feel bad about it.

Not really? I've been trying to learn things here and there so I haven't really just sat down and watched things.

[He's settling, drawing a throw pillow into his lap hugging it against himself. A smile tugged at his lips.]

I really hope so.

No, I remember what it was like first arriving here. There's not much time to sit around and watch movies.

It takes a while to get your bearings!

[He smiles a little, settling back more deeply into his spot with legs crossed.]

Exactly. I'm trying to learn the spells and how to use various weapons so I can protect Marinette with whatever might be available to me.

Right I've been here since the 25th of last month. So that's almost two weeks? Somewhere around there. I'm finding my feet.

[Adrien is making himself comfy and at home, settling to lay on his stomach on the floor his arms on that throw pillow and his chin rest on them.]

Oh, how are your borderlines coming along? If you need extra practice, there's a shinki spell club that meets at the school on weekday mornings.

I'm getting better but I'm not satisfied. I did talk to Kairi about the classes on the first day though. There's so much I need to learn. I don't think I've ever used this kind of - [He pauses trying to pick the right word, brows furrowed slightly.] Magic? Power? - Whatever you'd like to call it before. I was thinking of attending the classes.

[He won't be satisfied even if he's doing his best a little voice in the back of his mind whispers that there's always room for improvement - that he can do better be better. He doesn't know where it comes from or why it's there - Marinette had never said any such thing to him.]

You'd be welcome to come. We don't have a set curriculum -- it's just shinki helping each other with spells. I try to attend when I can, although I can't demonstrate any more, of course.

[There's a faint glint of amusement in his eyes as he looks over at Adrien.]

I was a shinki once, though.

I'll definitely do that then. I'm at the point that learning anything would help really. That's very nice of you to be there to help. I'm certain that everyone appreciates it.

[His head tilts though at that mention of being unable to demonstrate anymore. He'd thought only Shinki had to learn stuff like that.]

You were? [He's surprised by this new knowledge.] Wow, That's really neat. How'd that happen?

I'm afraid I can't explain how. Sometimes, gods become shinki, or shinki gods; we generally disappear for a period of time first.

[He spreads his hands in a little shrug.]

Most of us don't remember, but I seem to be in the minority there.

Fair enough! Seems like a lot of stuff here is kind of just - 'This is a thing that happened. There you go.' but I guess that's true of anywhere? Only here it's a bit different - more extreme.

[He shrugs his shoulders a bit.]

Nice to know I'm not the only one just going, 'I don't know what's going on here but I'm going to make the best of it'. It's kind of comforting really? We're all kind of in this together.

No matter where you are, I suppose, you have to deal with what happens to you.

-- I could wish there were a few more explanations forthcoming about why these things happen to us, but apparently no one knows. Exciting, isn't it?

[His tone is too pleasant by half: exciting is not the word he'd prefer, if he had to pick one. But this is Ken's party and he's not going to ruin the mood by snarling about things that none of them can help.]

Pretty much, yep. It's lots of random sometimes unexplained things, too. So you just have to go with the flow.

-- Honestly? I'm pretty sure they're as clueless as the rest of us are. They might know a bit more but during that party thing they seemed just as lost as me.

[Adrien laughs softly only it's not an amused laugh not even by half.] Yeah it's a really thrill a minute. [But he's glancing around the room.] There are worse ways to face uncertainty though.

They have been telling us they don't know anything. For now, I suppose, it doesn't seem they know much.

[He shakes his head, and adds:] I suspect someone has more information, but I couldn't say who.

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