Nakahama

(expecting but public)

Hitomi, still in stylish hakama of a granite-marled gray, golden yellow faux-kimono blouse embroidered with swirling birds and stylized winds over the worn spots, and a long modern hapi coat of cobolt blue, strolls through the district, careful to stick to the raised walkways as some of the streets still had a bit of flooding to clear. Her destination is apparent through the cooling, but still sticky air, light and laughter (and a spot of drunken singing) drifting out with the smoke.

It'll be a few moments before she spots her quarry, a table outside that's about to be free. Stepping in behind a departing trio of dockworkers, she sets a small fukoshiki-wrapped bundle on one of the metal tables, even as one of the efficient staff swoops in to clear glasses and swipe the table with a mostly-clean rag. Hitomi settles into a folding chair, scooting to look out across the street at the darkening waves catching the nearly-gone sun. There'll be someone to take a drink order over in a few seconds, she can him scribbling on a holoslate two tables over now.

Well, while the Golden Shotengai Set had just been a little too ambitious for the talents of her cooks, overall it was a good day for Taraka. She had been a little bit surprised, but not unpleasantly so to be asked to meet with Suzume-san so soon again. At least she was meeting with Suzume-san this time, and not with the dreaded archivist.

She had chosen her outfit for the evening to look nice for the judges, but with the tropical weather in mind. A brick red boatneck dress with short sleeves for the weather, little embroidered Carp around the neckline in gold. Belted, with an A-line skirt attached with a thin, dark blue pinstripe pattern, with embroidered carp in the same blue at the hem. Her purse had been coordinated to match the ensemble, and her little temporator made the evening quite comfortable.

Spotting the Empire's most elegant Sparrow, she made her way over to the table. She offered a polite bow and a smile.

"Good evening, Suzume-san. I don't normally get to see quite so much of you in any given day, despite us both having shops on Golden Shotengai. The price of being two relatively successful businesswomen in completely unrelated businesses I suppose. How is the evening finding you?"

Hiromi stands to return the bow, then gestures to another folding chair. "A bit tired, and with a new appreciation for those running food shops of all sizes. I don't know that if the powers that be are actually making decisions based on all this, but I imagine the spectacle will some incidental interest in the region, so that's all to the good."

The waiter has arrived, holoslate held expectantly. "Something that goes well with sweet and starchy," she requests, trusting the bartender's knowledge. That might end up with a more expensive drink, but she was willing to indulge tonight."

After orders are taken, she'll unwrap the little bento box with some of the maple fragrance yams from the competition. The judges all took small bites, so she and her team split the rest. Pushing it toward the middle of the table, she adds, "and rather well-fed after all that. Behold! Leftovers!"

Taraka smiled at the offer.

"I agree it's never good to waste food, Suzume-san. We should make sure to be generous to the bartender with our drinks to stay their wrath." she said, reaching into her purse to fish out a box that had been sitting in a freezer along with two little spoons.

"I sent most of the food we prepared home with the cooks. I'm sure it will be a treat for their families to sample such fine ingredients."

Assuming they loved truffle oil blasted entrees.

"But this ice cream turned out really well. The flavor of boba tea comes through very well, and it's got the vibrant colors of Tian Tea. I would love to both sample your yams, and split this....and drink enough to keep the bar staff from chasing us out."

"Agreed on all counts, I already expect they'll be padding the tab with a higher end recommendation here. On the plus side, it will be better sake." She finds her chopsticks. No sense annoying the bar by asking for some for their 'imported' food.

But, even if the day is cooling, it's warm out, so she starts by sampling the ice cream. "hoh, that is good. You should see if Tian wants to diversify and buy your recipe."

"The maple yams are very very old school. They'd have been honey yams originally, then maple syrup got more popular in the expansionist ages."

"Yes, no sense wasting food. Even the...not so appealing dishes went home with some of the heimin." They might feed it to farmed fish for all she knew, but at least is wasn't going to waste. Where'd you figure out the technique for getting this flavor right?"

She too partook of the ice cream, melting and all, but the yams were a new one on her.

"Ah, my older sister is the master chef, not me. I had hoped she'd compete in the competition this year, but she couldn't find time away from her duties. So I asked her for some of her recipes. I couldn't lead the cooks to pulling off my vision of elevating the dishes, but this one definitely is a winner. " she offered.

"I do like how the maple and the yams offset one another. Old family recipe?" she guessed.

She nods, "Sweet and sweet but very different types, and a touch of smoked salt," she leans in with a grin "that's the family secret, honest." The drinks arrive. Full cups with the half full bottles beside them so one can be assured of the quality brand. _Secret Caldera Brewery_.

"Yams were one of the things that grew on the very poor lands the Sparrow tended in the Empire's early centuries. So they're a bit of a staple." She sips her sake with an appreciative lift of the eyebrows.

"Well, the show would be less fun with actual professional chefs running things. The audience couldn't laugh at about someone trying to make a Jimen Tori skin mimic a pheasant, for example. Should I worry that you didn't want to include Feather in your featured shops? Or be glad that it wasn't in the mix of dishes that didn't work as intended?"

Taraka wondered about the label on the bottle. A secret caldera seemed like a somewhat odd concept, but perhaps it was meant to put one in mind of an unreached summit that held a mighty secret.

She sipped her sake, the Sparrow certainly had a much more refined palette than many might have guessed.

"I like to think that if I were to have presented something in the name of your store and failed that you are a kind enough neighbor to forgive such a transgression just as I am hopeful that the omission did not cause offense." says says.


"Mostly I just got on a roll with seafood, with the oysters and the carp, and the goldfish onigiri, I didn't think to try and fit in a poultry dish." she admitted.

She took another sip.

"To atone for this, the next time my sister makes osechi ryori I'll ask for her to put poultry in the ozoni, and bring you some." she offers.

Hitomi laughs, reaching for another scoop. "Of course, of course. That wasn't the sort of court for slipping in symbolic insults."

At the offer of shared New Year's feasts, she pauses, sitting back with glass in hand again. "Really? I've missed getting to go home for New Year and sharing food. I make some for the staff as we clean everything beforehand, but that's not the same. That's atonement and then some, Yasuki-sama."

"Those onigiri were cute too, well the idea was. I need more time to cook, clearly. Oohh, maybe something for the next um..Nightshade meeting," she laughts. "Hard to do food themed around Essence though...it's not very solid."

Taraka considered that.

"Cute but that's the one I should have dropped to make room for a poultry dish, just got kind of fixated on seafood after the auction."

She sipped on her sake thinking about the problem of Essence food.

"Hm, well, forbidden rice makes thing a deep purple when you cook it." she suggested.

"Essence onigiri? I'll have to try that. And maybe some pomegranate ice. Such an odd thing to have been going on all this time hidden away." She politely leaves the last bit of ice cream for the one who brought it, and scoops a bit of yam with her chopsticks instead.

"Should it be a worry that the governor plays and seems to be in charge of the main faction there? I suppose it's not much different than a governor who like fishing...and people learn to fish to hang out and influence them. Somehow it seems different though."

Taraka isn't going to let the heat have the last bit, and finishes the ice cream.

"True, although it would certainly reflavor the inevitable rumors. 'Secret fishing trips actually to hidden love nest! Is governor's secret lover a Ningyo?" she sensationalizes.

She takes a sip of the sake.

"But so far, things seems to be going well with the governor's plans. The Shrimps may even stay in Nakahama" she says referring to the local baseball team. "If a little silliness after dark help keep them in shape to perform like that during the day, it can only be a good thing I think."

Hitomi laughs, "ah well if the Shrimps require Essence to do their best, I guess that's all to the good. How've they done this season? I can hear the cheering from the Izakaya sometimes, but I'm never sure how things are overall."

"I did hear from Haru* that there were some young folks looking to reform the old draw lot troupe that used to perform out near the harbor with their hat out. I think the old one sort of faded just as I was getting started...younger folks moving on to assignments elsewhere and such, I think." She sips, then pours most the rest of the bottle. "Did you ever see the older group?"

*Haru is one of the clerks at Feather

Taraka gave an iffy wave of the hand.

"I mean, they've got good raw talent" Taraka offered. "Hiruma Hu was named rookie of the year after all. But a lot of people seem to think that the owners, Yasuki Houshu and Yasuki Kosuteru don't even know how and where to apply all those talents. Maybe it's just hard to run a baseball team, or if you listen to the more cynically minded, they're deliberately mismanaging it to justify the sell out and move to Aoihama."

Taraka had always been more interested in the more commercial aspects of the game, rather than enjoying it for the pure love of the game.

She grabbed another yam with a deft motion of chopsticks.

"Oh I do remember them. I would often time wonder if the draws were rigged to ensure maximum comedy. There was this one time where it was Hida Daichi, who was this great hulk of a Hida, was cast as 'Lady Snake, the tragically blind and wispy heiress' and Yasuki Kobato, who was the runt of the troupe, was cast as "Lady Snakes's kemari playing pet grizzly bear.'" she recalled.

"With Daichi trying to project 'wispy' and Kobato trying to puff herself up to tower over him, they barely needed words."

Hitomi laughs just imagining the scene. "That sounds like a recommendation of the entertainment, at least. I'll have to try and catch them sometime. "I remember a old legend about a kemari-playing bear in some court or other, do you think they were drawing on that, or just making it up as something barely plausible and amusing?"

Now baseball, well, she was a lot more comfortable dissecting the commercial side of the sport. "Why do they want to move to Aoihama? That's a lot of merchandise to toss and rebrand, isn't it? And I'd think housing the players here would be a bit less expensive overall, though cost of living might rise if we get an influx of investment here."

Taraka shrugged a bit.

"Gate's been down. When people aren't doing so well, they tend not shell out for tickets and merch. Aoihama could afford to build them a new stadium, and the owners might enjoy that big city kind of life." she explained.

She nods, having felt some of that herself at the lower end of her wares. The high end items relied on people wealthy enough not to feel those smaller ebbs and flows. But if they weren't coming to enjoy the province, they'd never stop in. "They'd lose some fans that wouldn't travel over there just to see them, but hope to make it up over there, I guess. I'm not a sports fan to have a good idea what gets more people to show up. Hard to run a sale for that."

Thinking of a certain Miya's thoughts the other night, she asks, "so how did your family hit on the flying carp idea? Descended from a long line of kite-makers, or something relatively new?"

Taraka finished her cup.


"Ah, well it's true that our line can be traced back to the homeworld. Primarily merchants, scholars, and crafters, though some have felt the need to deal with the enemies of the Crab in a more direct and permanent fashion. It draw inspiration from battle kites, wandering duelists of old, and the samurai's back banner flying upon the battlefield.....but that's really just marketing." she admits.

She sets down the cup.

"Their creation is really the product of my father and mother. My father was a drone designer at Kaiu Heavy Industries, working on prototyping different materials for military production. Het met my mother at a miai. Her family actually bred fighting fish. So she managed to get the rights from KHI to make civilian versions of my father's work. And thus Flying Battle Carps was born." she explained.

She looked over to the Sparrow.

"So, what brings a Sparrow from the home world to sell antiques on Green Carp of all places?" she asked, curious how Hitomi got here.

"Marketing is just tapping on our collected memory of history, and thus keeps it tethered to the present at least a bit. It might not always be accurate, but it's hard to keep a collective memory 100% accurate. I think it's a better place to draw inspiration from than cheesy noir detectives from an era that never existed...to sell toothpaste." She references one of the cheesier current holovid ads in circulation.

At the question, she raises a hand for the server to bring more drinks over. Not because her past requires lubrications to get past her lips. But they *do* need to assuage the bar for their lack of food orders, and Sparrow storytelling is notoriously thirsty work, right? At least in that often inaccurate, shared memory of Sparrow stereotypes, it is.

"That's honestly two separate questions...sort of." Hitomi says, finishing her cup so she's not getting more while still nursing the first bottle. "I'm far enough down the list of kids that I'm not intended to take over a position from my parents. While my training with the Doji did produce expectations of creating a path that offered some return on investment, neh? So I got creative and pitched the idea of a shop to bring a bit of the Rokugan experience out to those who don't make a pilgrimage to the home world. It's modeled after elements of the museum and historical district gift shops." There's a certain amount of animated hand gestures along with the telling...one miming the familiar image of a hand flicking beads on an abacus to get that return on investment to calculate out.

"And then I needed a venue. Golden Mirror seems obvious at first, but getting established there is very expensive, and the competition from all their re-creation craft industries is substantial. Add in that they *really* don't want a Sparrow chirping about the greater authenticity of their wares as a marketing point, and..." She shakes her head. Golden Mirror had been a very strange place for one raised on Rokugan.

"After a few more options...Green Carp became an attractive balance between cost to run and appropriate clients drawn to the area. Also just generally really friendly compared to some spaces." She finishes with a small shrug, "and here I am!"

"Have you ever considered expanding beyond Green Carp?"

The drinks arrived, and Taraka took a moment to refill the Sparrows cup.

"Ah, I see. I'm not sure if this has come up in your conversations with her, but Kakita Haruhi is from Golden Mirror. If she is representative of what samurai are like on that world, I can envision the difficulties in setting up shop there."

She took a sip of her drink.

"Don't get me wrong, she's a lovely and talented samurai. It just seems like the pressures that their families put on them make them turn out....well a little different. Like it seems like she is utterly fascinated by birds. At first I thought she was just dangerously obsessed with conservation, but then she locked onto the Jimen Tori costume at Yoritomo-sans party and when you told her the name of your store, I saw that same intent focus come on. So...different." she summarized.

She nodded.

"That's the ultimate goal...well my ultimate goal at any rate. Father's not particularly passionate about the business side of the business. If he had a design lab with infinite funding for him to tinker with drones, he'd truly be content. But despite it being a prestigious line, it doesn't contain infinite wealth for passions like that." she admitted.

She looked over to the Sparrow.

"What about you, Suzume-san? Are you content with where you're at in life, or is there something you'd also like to achieve still?"