That afternoon on a sunny day in Shibuya, two teens burst into their dorm, dejected and embarrassed. “Cheer up Ichijou, at least people liked our cake.” Mahiro, a short Japanese teen with red hair and dark purple glasses to match, nudged his friend from against the couch where he slumped over.

Ichijou slung himself around, his blue hair matted to his face. “Yeah, they liked it in the same way they liked our bread pudding dish a few months back,” He leaped up and spun into a mimicking stance of his classmates. “Oh thanks, Kitchen Fist. This food is just delightful! I’m gonna save it, waaaay in the bottom of my backpack.”

“Three months later and I bet it’s still there,” He pouted and snatched a soda from a kitchen to help drown out his sorrows. “Mahiro, think we just suck at cooking?”

Mahiro yanked off his fluffy chuff hat and swaddled his cooking partner in a hug. “Don’t be silly, if we really did then do you think Yuzuka would be as supportive as she is?”

The storm clouds continued to swirl over Ichijou’s head and were undeterred when his phone started ringing. “Oh speaking off…” He read the caller ID that bounced Yuzuka in big bouncing colorful letters before tossing it to Mahiro who just barely caught it on his tippy toes.

“Hello?” He answered.

The girl on the other end already knew the story. “Hey there. Let me guess, he’s still bummed about the cake shriveling in front of everyone today?”

“Can’t imagine anything else that would have him down.”

Yuzuka thought for a moment. “Hey, don’t forget about the big party we’re all having in downtown to celebrate exam week being over. You guys are getting ready right? A night of partying will for sure snap him out of the funk.”

Mahiro got stars in his eyes as he thought about the raves and parties certain Shibuya spots were known for. “Wait, is that tonight? So soon after the final exam?”

“First of many baby! It starts at 7 so we have five hours to get ready. I’ll swing by your dorm to pick you guys up around then and then we’ll head down. Gotta be fashionably late after all.” She clicked the line off and Mahiro turned to face a still sulking Ichijou.

Quickly, a lightbulb popped over his head. “Yuzuka reminded me of the party last night. That’ll get your mind off things.”

Instead, the storm clouds just rained harder over Ichijo. “Didn’t we say we’d sign up to bring the food? How can we possibly do so after today!”

“Exactly,” He yanked Icjijou back up and threw his arm around his shoulder. “Well then we’ll just have to show them we still got it,” He threw his arm around the student and hoisted him up. “Tonight, we’ll show everyone from class and beyond the true might of Kitchen Fist!”

The depressed student felt the rain over him starting to clear a bit as he looked at the untouched kitchen of theirs. Ripe for opportunity for the day. “Fine, let’s give it a shot.”

***

After returning from the market across the street, the boys set out all the ingredients for their dishes one by one. “First up, let’s get these rice balls.” Mahiro threw on his pink chef apron that said Kiss the Cook in kanji, playfully teasing Ichijou who got to cooking the rice.

It was a quick and easy dish with not much opportunity to experiment, unlike what would happen next.

“Not bad.” Ichijou followed the delectable scent of the rice balls with his nose as it wafted through the air. Mahiro practically pulled him down from following it and handed him a slab of dough.

The rambunctious student caught onto his request and spun the material on his finger. “Next up, my special firework cookies.”

Mahiro’s eyes warped into cookies as he licked his lips. His mind was dead set on the finished product. “Mmm, I can feel the flavors popping in my mouth already.” After some hasty mixing, pouring and a touch of a secret ingredient that Mahiro had to cover his eyes for, the tray of treats were sitting in the oven waiting for their time to shine.

“I sure hope everyone will forget what happened when they get their hands on these.” Ichijou said with a sigh. He turned to Mahiro who just gave him a thumbs up.”

“Don’t worry, your firework cookies really taste like- f-fire?!”

Ichijou shrugged with a blush. “Well not literally but-”

Mahiro shouted, whipping him around to see a sudden fire starting to erupt out the oven. “No, fire!”

“Oh shoot, maybe I put too much of the secret ingredient in!” One by one, colorful pops started flashing within the oven. “Yep, definitely too much of the secret ingredient.” Ichijou gulped before hastily grabbing a can of whip cream.

Mahiro’s eyes bulged as he guessed what he was about to do and snatched his arm. “Ichi no! You can’t put that can into a freaking fire!”
“Yeah, I’m no dummy. Watch this.” Carefully, he sprayed the can of whipped cream, subduing the flames along the cookies into a soft popping concoction.

Mahiro just stared in awe at the dish. “I really feel like that shouldn’t have worked… but I wonder how those masterpiece cookies taste with whip cream,” Ichijou sighed at yet another disaster, signaling some needed comfort. “Hey, at least we’d be fan favorites on that show overseas, Heck’s Kitchen was it?”

***

Next up were the ribs. Mahiro finished adding his tangy barbecue sauce before spotting his partner eyeing them with laser vision. “Ichijou… don’t do it.”

The student swayed his blue hair and beamed with a fake innocent smile. “Don’t do what?”

“I know you’re eyeing my rib dish. That’s also for the party, you want some? Wait till it’s on the platter with everything else tonight.

Ichijou backed up, raising his hands in defense. “Right right…” He pouted as Mahrio’s bottle suddenly ran empty. Needing to get more sauce, the chef with the even saucier apron dove into their walk-in storage. Leaving the dish at Ichijou’s mercy.

About 5 minutes later, Mahiro finally returned. “Okay, I got the rest of the sau-” The treasure he sought for dropped onto the ground as he looked at a plate of ribs licked clean and Ichijou at the side of it, whistling while looking away. His forehead was a waterfall of sweat.

“ICHIJOU DID YOU LICK THE WHOLE THING BARE?!” Mahiro snatched him by the collar with fire in his eyes.

The meat thief’s eyes looked left, then right before just uttering out a single word. “Maybe.”

***

“Are you sure this isn’t too much salt for the ramen?” Ichijou later asked. Still tired from having to remake the ribs by himself from scratch.

“Nah, you need to trust my skills and NOT eat it. Now, help me find the onions.” As he grabbed Ichijou by the arm and spun him towards the fridge, determined to keep an eye on him. Unknowingly knocking over two important ingredients in the process into the pot.

After cutting up the onions and using the prepared tissues, Ichijou’s head spun on a swivel as he tried to clean up a bit. “Hey where’d you put the salt and sugar?”

“Pretty sure I put them back in the cabinet. But don’t worry about that. Just help me taste this out.” Ichijou shrugged and grabbed a spoon before his arm was snatched. “Just a couple sips, got it?”

After a couple sips exactly as promised, the boys would find concerned neighbors barging into their dorm to find the two laughing like maniacs while jumping on the couch. “W-Why can’t we stop moving?” Mahiro asked with a laugh, his eyes were swirling with the mad trip of a sugar and salt rush.

Mahiro shuddered in raw energy. “I don’t know, b-but I don’t wanna stop either!”

***

After many trials and errors, the boys settled on one last dish to whip up. “Okay my dude, we can do this,” Mahiro whipped out a booklet for a deluxe cake. “All we have to do is bake this. It can’t be that hard.” He looked at the various past deciduous. None of which turned out as planned but were still edible.

“Another cake huh? I’ve never tried one this big before.” He sighed, gulping at what happened earlier.

But then also looked back at the past culinary experiments and realized things couldn’t get any worse.

“You know, even though crazy stuff keeps happening each time, the dishes are getting done.”

“Yeah and they are edible I guess…”

“Think about it, what other chefs cook like this. If we can get the hang of this process of ours, who knows how high we can go with the crazy dishes we can make!”

That finally got a smile onto Icjijou’s face. “Okay fine, let’s do it!”

***

“And… into the oven we go,” Ichijou slapped the tray of batter in for cooking, sighing in relief. “We… we finally got one dish in tonight with no issues.”

Mahiro stretched satisfied. He was about to crack open a soda and drink to success when he noticed the numbers of the oven still climbing, far past 400 degrees. “Hey, what temperature did you set the oven to?”

“Oh, well we’re low on time, so I set the oven to 600 degrees for a speedy cooking.” His partner gave him a high-five with fiery eyes of determination.

“Oh heck yeah, now that’s the kind of genius thinking that runs Kitchen Fis-“

Down the hall from their dorm, Yuzuka jumped at the sound of an explosion and zipped down. “Guys? Hang on, I'm coming!” She banged down the door with her mighty athletic kicks worthy of the black belt she was. Once the door snapped open, she busted in, covering her nose as the smoke consumed her.

On the other side, the smoke cleared and she could see two outlines before her. Once her vision was near one hundred percent, she was speechless. “What… the…”

She watched as Mahiro chomped down on a sample slice of cake. “Wow you were right, this thing is a work of art.”

Ichijou’s lips quivered in delight. “Each bite from the bread alone is like a parade on my tongue! Let’s slap on that icing!”

As they got to work finishing their culinary art, Yuzuka’s eyes caught fire at the sight of them. It took all the willpower in her body not to pluck her eyes out and wash them in the sink.

“Guys…” She stomped forward, covering her eyes. “Would you care to explain to me why… you two are-” She choked up as the smoke fully vanished, revealing the two students in their birthday suits. Clothes burned away from the explosion. “Naked?!”

Ichijou chomped away at the rest of the cake sample while snuffing out the flames on his hair. “What? We’re boyfriends you know? We gotta be open to each other.”

“Not the point…” she grimaced while looking back at the messy kitchen. Sauce, spices and other ingredients were flung along the walls with every known utensil strewn about. Along the counter were several dishes, though something about each of them looked different. As if it were telling something went terribly wrong with each one song the way. “What happened here anyway?”

“We tried to whip up some dishes for the party to redeem the honor of Kitchen Fist, but it seems all we can do is cause destruction.” Ichijou sighed with a smile but Mahiro had an idea.

“Although, that might not be the worst thing.”

“Think about it, despite the chaos, our dishes are still a smash hit. It may have cost our clothes and half the kitchen, but don’t you feel free?”

“Wait yeah…” Ichijou thought about it for a moment. The entire time they worked on their project for class, the teacher forced them to cook in a clear and orderly fashion. From the calm watching of the bread bake to the carefully plucked sugar one by one. And they hated every moment of it.

Steam rose from the junior chef’s head as he recalled the memories. “That lazy whiner did nothing but complain about our methods until we were as stale as he was. At the rate we were going, our skills would’ve been as dry as the meatloaf he cooks.”

“Destructive or not, this is how we cook. Let’s not let anyone silence our techniques and culinary process again!”

“These rice balls do taste good… I’m not gonna pretend like you guys don’t often get ‘creative’ when working on Kitchen Fist but do me a favor. No matter what techniques you do, the clothes stay ON!” She rubbed her eyes again and walked back out the door. “The only buns I want to see are on a plate. Now hurry up and bag this food so we can go.”

The students shared a smirk before doing just that. Quickly, Ichijou threw all their masterpieces in a plastic bag before Mahiro dropped them into an insulated carrier. With newfound resolve for their team, they quickly meet up with Yuzuka in the hall. Radiating energy brighter than a stoves’ fire.

Perhaps a bit too quick.

“Put on some new clothes first, idiots!”

END