THE RETURN; in the darkness you shine

[biddentodance]

Who: Minato!!! Guest starring Akira (boy version). Closed prompt for Shido (and close CR).
What: Minato returns from his canon update and now he’s sad. Also: stargazing, chocolate, and training with A Friend!
When: February! The like. Middle half. Ish.
Where: Around the station, also the beach
Warnings: Persona 3. Mind those subject lines? Canon update was not happy.

[Closed 2/7 very late evening; the night is so long]
[One week.

One week since Minato disappeared.

He’s back now, washed up onshore like driftwood and just as motionless. He’s not unconscious, but he’s also making no move to escape the tide. Just...waiting. Waiting for what? Maybe sleep, if his blue pajamas are any indication. But judging by the deep, dark shadows under his eyes, the way his face is drawn and pale...sleep is a rare thing for him now.

Once he’s been found, of course, those close to him will probably want to come be with him.]

[Open 2/8-2/10 nights; when everything’s wrong]
[Sleep doesn’t come easy, and isn’t welcome when it does. Minato isn’t up for a lot of alternatives, though - too little energy, for a guy who’s default state is ‘tired’. But there are always the stars.]

Never gets old…

[He can be found on the roof at night, wrapped in a blanket and holding a toy rocket, gazing up at the stars. Instead of sleeping. Because he and sleep aren’t great friends, these days.]

[Open 2/11-2/13; if you give me your hand]
[Oh, shit. It’s February. And he’s dating three people???

Minato will accept no less than ideal for his boyfriends, so he’s...making a lot of batches of chocolate. He’s dedicated. Not to fear, though, he’s perfectly willing to give away his good batches that aren’t perfect! And, in fact, he encourages people to enjoy them.

Though, uh, maybe someone should like. Stop him from eating the disaster batches himself? That can’t be healthy. One of those is even less chocolate than charcoalate at this point.]

[Open 2/15-dungeon days; i will help you hold on]
[There’s another mission coming up. Minato and his friends have gotten into more than enough trouble on these in the past, but he’s stronger now. He’ll do better. So he has to be ready.

He’s down on the beach, training away with a variety of weapons: axes, bows, spears, swords… Not to mention his upgraded set of Personas. He’s going all out - because while he’s better rested than he was, exhausting himself is a pretty solid way to get some rest.

Or, well, he’s going all out with training until a small black ragdoll kitten pounces and somehow knocks him face-first into the sand. Kitten has demands that must be met. Something to the effect of “stop training and play with meeeee!!!!” So, maybe you just find Minato fooling around on the beach with a kitten instead of training. Because, honestly, who here is going to deny a kitten?

((OOC: threads for this prompt may or may not get replies from beguiledcard!))]

Comments

[hairpincurves]

My point still stands! And I'm still not letting you eat it!

[biddentodance]

Wasting's bad... [It's a weak argument, more token effort than actually fighting her.] ....Do you know how to make chocolate?

[hairpincurves]

So is eating things that'll make you sick. Besides, how would your boyfriends feel if they found out you made yourself sick eating a bad batch of something you were trying to make for them? I'll figure out something else to do with them, but they're not fit for consumption.

[There's an unspoken "and that's final" at the end of it. Her expression softens at the question, though.]

Yeah. Want some pointers? [She'd offer help, but she figures that if it's for the boyfriends, Minato probably wants to do it entirely on his own...]

[biddentodance]

[He nods. He understands...] Don't have much experience with making candy. Did pretty bad at making caramels for Goro's birthday, too.

[And he nods again, more eagerly. Yes please pointers please.]

[hairpincurves]

Caramel can be pretty tricky to work with... Chocolate can be, too. What sort of problems have you been having with it?

[biddentodance]

Mostly....think I've been burning something. Not sure what but not something that should be burnt. [...] Think I got proportions wrong a few times, and.....

[He glances at the Disaster Tray again.]

Less said about that the better, probably.

[hairpincurves]

Burning... have you been using a double boiler?

[biddentodance]

A what? [He's trying??? To picture that?????]

[hairpincurves]

It's a way to do gentle heating--specifically, it provides heat through steam. It's good for delicate sauces, and, more relevantly here, chocolate.

[As she says this, she gets a saucepan from a cabinet, then a glass bowl. She puts the bowl on top of the pan, face lighting up a bit when she finds it fits snugly. The bowl gets set aside as she fills the saucepan with water.]

You want to start with a pan like this, with water in it.

[She puts it on the stove, then goes for the glass bowl again.]

And then you'll want a heat-proof bowl of some sort. I prefer heat-proof glass myself, but some people prefer metal or ceramic. The main things are you should have at least ten centimeters between the bases--preferably more, actually--and the bowl should fit snugly. The second one's really important because steam escaping means the chocolate can come in contact with that water, which can make chocolate seize up. Still with me?

[biddentodance]

...Think so? Direct heat bad. Steam good. Steam touching chocolate bad.

[He watches her put it together, paying rapt attention.]

What does it mean for it to seize up? Is that burning?

[hairpincurves]

Also a good idea to kill the heat and let residual heat take it from there when you're melting stuff. At least, that's what I've found. Gentle heat is best, don't let it get to boiling.

[She shakes her head.]

Seizing up means the chocolate's become grainy and clumpy and... kinda gross-looking? It's what happens when moisture's introduced to it. I can go into the science behind it if you want, but the big takeaway here is make sure your utensils you use are dry too, and don't use anything that can retain moisture, like wooden spoons. Seized chocolate can be salvaged... if maybe having to be used for other stuff, burnt chocolate can't.

[biddentodance]

Simmering, then... And metal tools. [Maybe he has heard of this technique? He's not sure.]

Know a lot about this, don't you?

[hairpincurves]

Yup, that's exactly right!

[She beams.]

Ahaha, well. I didn't really have a lot of friends when I was a kid... any, really, so when I started getting into cooking and making sweets... I really threw myself into it because it was something I was good at. So I did a lot of research and a lot of practicing... Candy-making is still fairly new territory for me, I've only been at it for... well, it was a year before coming here.

[biddentodance]

Cooking I can do. Baking's not too different, but candy... Wasn't something any of my relatives wanted me to learn.

Gonna be a chef, in the future, or do you plan to do something else?

[hairpincurves]

I... don't really know.

[She looks a bit sheepish admitting it.]

I've kind of avoided thinking too much about my future since I got put on probation... Big black mark on my record, you know? The most attractive idea right now is investigative journalism, because then I could still... kind of do what the Phantom Thieves do, you know? I'm content just doing stuff with food as a hobby.

[biddentodance]

...Makes two of us. [There's a little strain in his voice, something distinctly uncomfortable, but he holds it in fairly well. The future. Ha.]

Journalism would suit you, I think. Been told about Confidants, those would be useful, and you'd be kind of like a detective. Sort of?

[hairpincurves]

[... That strain gets a scrutinizing eye from Akira.]

Minato-kun...

[Ah, but--]

You think so? That'd be pretty funny, huh? From phantom thief to detective...

[biddentodance]

[He knows he's avoiding. He knows he should stop. He looks away.]

In the end, isn't the only difference between detective work and what you do now which side of the law you're on? ...and the supernatural aspect.

[hairpincurves]

[... Yeah, she'd answer the question but there's something more pressing here. She puts the bowl down to give Minato a stern look. Are you going to say anything of your own will or does she have to actually press, buddy?]

[biddentodance]

[Ah.] ...Guess you probably heard I was gone for a little while.

[hairpincurves]

[She scowls a bit and nods.]

[biddentodance]

Went back to Iwatodai. One week here, I think? Two and a half months, there.

[hairpincurves]

... So time really does freeze while we're here...

[It's quiet, but she's... relieved.]

I see... And... I take it bad things happened while you were there.

[biddentodance]

[He nods in response to the first part.] Didn't remember being here at all. Like I'd never left.

[As for the second part... Looking away is probably all the confirmation Akira will need. Some very, very bad things happened. As happy and full of life as he'd been before - he looks positively hopeless now.]