Description: Some of Pacific's more entitled members decide to harass a food cart. Tiffany Lords takes exception, and makes friends with, like, the coolest chef, like, you don't even know.
On the boardwalk near to the entrance of Pacific High rests a food truck that has seen its better days. Perhaps it had gotten swept up in a hurricane or maybe it was trampled upon by a herd of wild oxen. Whatever the case may be, the food truck features numerous dents, imperfections, and a general damaged look to it. And this does make the food truck look a tad out of place with it being located so near to such a fancy school. A large chalkboard (duct taped together across the middle) announces that 'Real Authentic Chinese Food' can be ordered here. And standing right next to this sign is a young Chinese woman in a totally real and authentic red cheongsam. The young woman is smiling pleasantly and seems to be holding a tray that features some sort of noodle based dish. Despite all of this prepatory work, the food truck seems to not be doing much business at the moment.
"The best Chinese food in all of Japan can be tasted right here! And my prices are even good!" calls out the young chef in the cheongsam. But of all the people that could come up to the stand next, it seems that Jam has attracted the attention of a group of ne'er'do-wells from Pacific High. They chuckle and laugh among themselves before the leader approaches the owner of the food truck. "Is this what passes for Chinese food around here? Where's the sweet and sour chicken?" In response, the cheongsam wearer looks a little aggravated. "I have -authentic- food for sale!" She reiterates. "And not westernized horse plop" adds the young woman under her breath. The young punks seemed to have overheard this and have taken offense. "So what does that mean? It's all dog and cat here?" They poke at Jam with. It seems like the young food truck owner is in a spot of trouble and she seems to be simmering with growing rage. For now, Jam merely holds her ground, but there is no telling when this situation will go into full roast.
There's a lot of Chinese food in Southtown, it turns out, and Tiffany Lords has every intention of trying all of it, in her steadfast effort to avoid eating a lot of Japanese food. She hasn't had good experiences so far, which /surely/ means -- and Roy backs her up on this -- that it's probably all crap.
Striding out to the cart, Tiffany gets in line; she listens to the punks with a small frown. /These/ were supposed to be future leaders, future politicians, future captains of industry? It looks like not everyone with rich parents or the brains to get a scholarship can avoid being a tool.
"Hey, back off," Tiffany says, in English, under her breath. "At least give it a try! Seriously, like -- what's the big deal?" She clenches her fist a little bit, shouldering past a couple of them. Taking a breath, she declares loudly, "I'll have the chef's special!" Hopefully, she can leverage her popularity to defuse this one -- the image of her school is at stake!
Jam has learned that lesson all too well. There -was- a lot of Chinese food places around. Competition has been killer and that's when her place doesn't get trashed by ninjas or thugs. Dealing with these punks would have been a refreshing change. Well, until they turned out to be Yakuza or all highly trained martial arts fighters that would proceed to trash her food stand once more. The young Chinese woman had placed one hand on the collar of her cheongsam in preparation of tossing it off, but unexpectedly someone else has arrived and to her rescue? Jam snaps her attention over towards the newcomer and tilts her head to the side slightly. She smiles from to ear to ear as she tosses the tray she had up into the air and turns to retrieve a different tray from the cart.
The airborne dish lopsided hops up into the air before Jam catches it at the last minute with her back leg. So far, so good! She then twirls and offers one chef's special in front of Tiffany, it's a bowl of noodles with some sort of squishy colorless meat inside it. "One chef's special, specially made!" She then kicks the sampler tray that was on her back foot back up into the air and hold her free hand out expectedly. Unfortunately, the second time this sampler tray goes airborne it goes off course and lands directly on the head of the leader of the punks. "What the hell?!" He barks in response as Jam looks a little mortified at her grevious juggling mishap. But the punk leader takes another look over at Tiffany before scoffing and leading his crew out of there. It seems that Tiffany does have plenty of leverage to use around here. "Hey! Are you going to pay for that?!" Jam futilely yells as the punks walk away wearing what was left of her sampler platter.
An defeated Jam turns back to Tiffany whom she smiles towards. "Thanks! It's been a tough crowd here." She states as she leans looks back at her beat up food truck. "It's like no one appreciates real Chinese food around here."
Tiffany tenses up her shoulders a little as the tray lands on the punks' leader; for a second, she, too, anticipates a fight. Fortunately, the lot of them back off without too much more fuss, giving Tiffany the opportunity to pull down her eyelid and stick out her tongue like a grade schooler as they leave. Good riddance, she thinks; maybe they'll appreciate their local food options a little better now that they're intimately acquainted!
Looking the cheongsam-clad restauranteur over once before returning her gaze to the bowl of noodles, she decides to make some light conversation. She shifts back to Japanese -- not awful, but evidently not her mother tongue, either. "You're welcome! Some of these guys can get a LITTLE rowdy," she notes, with a small shake of her head. "I don't know what the deal is! Maybe it's their first time OUT of the country, or something."
Glancing back at the building, Tiffany considers whether she wants to just go back in with her food; Jam seems nice enough, though, so she decides to take her meal al fresco. "I've had some REALLY GOOD Chinese food lately... one of the Chinese restaurants downtown will give you free food if you beat up one of their servers. Apparently he's a great FIGHTER?" Playing with her noodles, Tiffany notes, "I handled him, though," before finally taking a bite.
Japanese is not particularly Jam's forte either, but she does her best to both understand and keep up with Tiffany. Afterall, the language wasn't her mother tongue either. The dish in question was jellyfish, noodles, and vegetables. A Chinese delicacy, but it remains to be seen if Tiffany has the stomach for such a thing. The talk of the dumb punks causes Jam to nod her head in agreement. "Yeah, I seem to run into more -jerks- than anything else around here." A beat. "That and ninjas. I've run into a lot of ninjas lately." She admits with a scornful look back at her damaged food truck. If Tiffany looks close enough, there even seems to be a strange almost human like imprint in the side of the truck.
Jam focuses her brown eyes intently on Tiffany when she talks about this Chinese restaurant and their....awesome...promotion. "I wish I would have thought of that first!" Jam shakes a fist angrily into the air. "Maybe that's why I'm doing so bad, I need to have a cool promotion too. But you beat him? I should go down there and challenge him myself!" Jam says with a determined look on her face. After seeing that Tiffany finally took a bite, Jam has to ask. "How's the jellyfish?"
If the grin on her face is any indication, Tiffany seems to be enjoying the meal; it's not her /favourite/ thing, but she's not displeased, either. Though most of her experience with Chinese food has been 'some sort of meat inside some sort of grain,' the more authentic experience doesn't seem to have put her off of it any. "What's WITH all the ninjas, anyway?" Tiffany asks, a hair incredulous. "One of them broke into cheerleading practice to... watch?" She's still not really clear on that one. "I bet it has something to do with all the WEIRD STUFF going on at Taiyo."
Another long slurp of noodles into her mouth follows, as Jam inquires after the promotion. "Yeah! Ooooh... challenge him to the rights to the promotion! Then YOU could be the one everyone fights for free food." This all makes perfect sense in Tiffany's head -- that's how restaurants settle things with each other, right?
Then the question comes, and Tiffany's eyes widen a little. For a second, she's mortified; she's eating /jellyfish/? On the other hand... it does taste really good. "... Well, I wish I would have known it was jellyfish, but... it's still DELICIOUS," she answers. "How much is it?"
"Aiya! I know!" Jam says in agreement with the other girl. "They are tough fighters too." The young food truck owner says softly before a flash of fire enters her brown eyes. She then shakes a fist angrily into the air. "But I'll get her next time!" exclaims the martial artist is a fierce tone. She then looks over at Tiffany and grins, her anger slowly fading away. The young cook was pleased that her cooking was being enjoyed, some people have a real problem with the texture of jellyfish. It's not like there were any stingers left in the noodles. Jam actually was a pretty cook cook in the end.
Tiffany's suggestions causes Jam to punch her left hand into her right palm. "That's a great idea! Um...what restaurant was this?" Jam grins as she knows just what she was going to do. She was going to march down there, challenge him, and then beat him up just like that. It would be like something straight out of a martial arts movie. "You've never had jellyfish before?" Jam then twirls on a booted heel and outstretches a hand. "1000 yen!" [:Jam:]
Tiffany can definitely taste the love in Jam's cooking; even if it's a little -- unorthodox, at least to her palate, it's delicious. She shovels a little more into her mouth, her pink lips slurping up the noodles with a little bit of glee. There's something viscerally satisfying about trying a new food and /enjoying/ it; for a few moments, she's so content that she forgets to even consider answering Jam.
Fortunately, the reverie passes before /too/ long, and she brings her attention around to Jam's punching fist. "It's, uhhh... Genhanten, I think! If you want, I can tell you a bunch about how THE GUY fights, so you can go in all ready to, LIKE, ruin his day." Her smile turns into a conspiratorial grin as she fishes around in the pockets of her Pacific uniform.
Slapping a thousand-yen note down into Jam's outstretched hand, she says, "Tiffany Lords, BY THE WAY. I go here." Ther's a beat before she adds, "You... probably already guessed that, ha ha."
There are actually two things now that Jam is thankful for. An acutal paying customer and someone whom actually likes her cooking. Both of those things were something that was oddly rare these days. Jam would have to start looking into making money some other way if this kept up. But maybe after she challenges this other martial artist, Jam's money problem will go away.....atleast for a little while.
In the brief lull of conversation, Jam heads over to atleast retrieve the plate that she had accidentally dropped earlier. The food will be left for the birds, but Jam could illafford to let that tray go so easily. Her battered tray plate in hand, the dress wearing Jam heads back over to her sole customer. The restaurant name draws a quick nod from Jam. She now had a new goal. To head down to Genhanten and beat up this server!
"Is he cute?" Jam asks after a moment's consideration before shaking her head. "Ah, I mean. Yeah, tell me more about him!" She implores of Tiffany before graciously accepting the yen bill. "I'm Kuradoberi Jamu!" The way the other girl phrased her names causes Jam to pause for a minute. "Oh, are you famous around here or something?" It seems that Jam is quite the oblivious one when it comes to the who's who around there.
"He's okay. Maybe a year older than I am," Tiffany says -- the topic of 'cute boys' is one she's perfectly content to discuss, at least for a little while. "Nice legs. Works on his kicks a lot, probably." Tiffany doesn't actually know enough about fighting styles to /really/ unpack Yun for her, so she settles for a mumbled, "Watch your head -- he's /really/ fast when he starts jumping around," to close it off. Then again... that's probably still better than /no/ information!
Tiffany makes a note of the beaten-up tray before moving right along to her favourite topic: herself. "I wouldn't say FAMOUS... I'm the head of the Pacific cheer squad, though, so I guess I'm PRETTY well-known around here..." There's a beat, before she adds, "Oh, and I was part of a team that fought the Emperor of Muay Thai and won," offhandedly. She's not going to misrepresent it -- that /was/ a team effort -- but in a world where 100-man kumite aren't unheard of, any victory is a victory worth mentioning.
There's a beat, before something sticks in her head. "Wait a sec... you fight, too?" It seems like there's quite a few brawlers in Southtown! There's a beat, before she adds, "In that dress?" /That/ would be a martial feat.
Kuradoberi Jam is all ears when Tiffany elaborates on this mysterious server whom she seems destined to oneday fight for the right to own the best Chinese food promotion in Southtown. He's got nice legs, Jam's got nice legs. But could he really outkick her? Pfft, no one could! Well, maybe that one ninja could, but she also cheated and used unfair ninja techniques. "I'll have to go check him out and see for myself," decides Jam with a sly smile before displayed towards Tiffany.
The first part of Tiffany's spiel doesn't really do anything for Jam. It sort of goes right over her head since she doesn't attend school here or anywhere else for that matter. But that second part sounds respectably impressive. "You must be really strong. We should fight sometime!" Jam says a little too eagerly as she lightly tosses the bent serving tray back into the food truck.
That last little part causes Jam to flourish a great smile towards Tiffany. "Of course I fight! I'm a bounty hunter too!" The mention of the dress causes Jam to knowingly smile some more. She reaches back up to the collar of her dress in preparation. Jam then yanks her tradtional cheongsam off with one hand while twirling gracefully in her heeled boots. By the time her dress hits the ground, the chef/bounty hunter has already adopted a martial arts stance with her left leg being drawn upwards while keeeping her right leg down for balance. It seems that Jam was wearing a much shorter and a far easier to move in cheongsam underneath her long and conservative one.
The idea that Tiffany is really strong is a little weird to her; she's always thought of herself as just a regular girl, but... she has a lot of advantages most people don't, and she's starting to become acutely aware of that fact. "I'd love that!" she says, at the idea of fighting Jam; she doesn't want to do it right now -- she has dinner to eat -- but the idea sticks in her mind. "Should we trade PHONE numbers?" After all -- she can't count on this strange food cart to come around like clockwork when she wants a fight!
Taking a second to set her jellyfish down, Tiffany takes the opportunity to breathe and stretch; this gives her a prime, unobstructed view to Jam's quick-change. Her eyes widen a little, and after a second of thought, she applauds vigorously, saying, "Oh wow! This dress is even cuter than the other one!" Her stance is good too, Tiffany thinks -- all around incredible.
"Oh gosh -- you're so cool and talented!" When she's not /thinking/ about it, her Japanese manages to sound a little more natural -- and right now, what she's thinking about is how incredible this gorgeous chef/bounty hunter/martial artist is. It is totally unfair. "We /have/ to fight some time."
Jam may dress like she's from another age, but she does have access to certain creature comforts. And a cellphone is definitely one of those things that Jam cannot live without. She retrieves a menu from her food cart and writes her number down on it before handing it over to Tiffany. The Chinese martial artist seems to flourish and grow under Tiffany's compliments. "Thanks! Anytime you want to fight! Just let me know! I need to stay in shape if I want to fight off all the ninjas and beat that guy over at Genhanten!" Jam resumes the same stance form before, but this time shows off a little by bringing her left leg straight up to where her legs are now perpendicular to the ground. She holds this pose for a brief moment before letting her leg fall back down so that she was standing normally again.
The continued compliments has Jam going back to the food cart to retrieve something a little extra for Tiffany. It's one delicious dumpling and a fortune cookie. Maybe there was a touch of westernization to Jam's food cart afterall. "Don't hold back when we do fight! Because I don't plan to!" Despite these fearsome words, Jam delivers them, the dumpling, and the fortune cookie to Tiffany with a smile on her face. This Tiffany wasn't so bad. Maybe setting up shop here at Pacific High wasn't such a bad idea afterall.
Casually exchanging numbers with the restauranteur, the young Ms. Lords decides that she /has/ to look this girl up soon; if she's half as good a training partner as she is a chef, Tiffany might have a new number-one pick on her hands!
Tiffany, it seems, has her awe easily bought -- under the right circumstances. When she's in turn rewarded for this easygoing attention with a dumpling and a fortune cookie, she grins broadly, finishing up her bowl of noodles greedily before trading Jam the bowl for the new stuff. After all -- if she's chasing after dented serving trays, she /probably/ wants the bowl back.
"Well... I'm still kinda RECOVERING from my last one," Tiffany admits, with a small frown; she glances from side to side, saying, "I lost to some weirdo with a wolf on his head." Having admitted her defeat, she says, "Thanks for the food! I should prrrrobably get back inside -- they're doing dorm inspections today. Good luck with the food! Sorry about those jerks."
Practically skipping as she turns around and heads back toward the Pacific dorms, Tiffany decides to wait to open her cookie until she's back in her room. It'll be more delicious if she gives what she ate time to settle a little bit.
Jam graciously accepts the now empty bowl in return for the dumpling and fortune cookie. It was always nice to see another satisfied customer! And it was also nice to not have to go chasing down the bowl like she had to do with the serving tray. She does pause what she is doing when Tiffany talks about some guy with a wolf on his head. "A wolf on his head? I'm keep an eye out for him so I can beat him up when I find'em!" It wouldn't be the exactly the most legitimate bounty she would have chased, but she felt good about beating up the guy who defeated her potential new sparring partner.
And as Tiffany says goodbye, Jam offers a traditional bow before offering a much less tradtional wave to the departing student. The young martial artist now goes over to retrieve her tossed cheongsam before draping it over her arm. It's not too much longer after this that Jam goes back to shouting her wares. She's still going to need to make a lot more yen if she's going to ever repair her food truck, but Tiffany's 1000 yen note was atleast a step in the right direction!
Log created on 02:31:35 11/30/2014 by Tiffany, and last modified on 02:32:31 11/30/2014.