AAOOOSC! Junior Powers!

The day is beginning to pass. Five out of the six members are now sitting around the ice rink-themed table with plates in front of them, waiting for Kailer to bring dinner. They are still wearing their Suit-Motos, minus the helmet and gloves.

“I’m hungry,” Jeremy mumbles, tapping impatiently on the table’s white surface.

Matteo faces him with his arms folded on the table. “We all are. No worries, Kailer’s getting the food. Just a few more minutes.” He holds his wrist to his eye level, reading the blue-coloured map from his Wrist-Moto. “Yeah, he’s nearby.”

On the other side of the table, Jake is hunched over with the edge of the table in his mouth. “Mmm…”

Next to him, Brett flicks his eyes down from his handheld mirror while brushing his hair, spotting what his partner is doing. “Jake Dog!” He halts his movements. “Stop biting the table!”

Jake immediately shoots up, straightening his posture. Guilt is written all over his face. “I’m sorry, Brett.”

The forward peers at where the goalie had his mouth on; there are dents on the surface of the table. “You left bite marks behind…?!”

Jake dips his head with a sorrowful look. “I-I’m sorry…I’m so sorry… I don’t deserve to be here. I’ll fix it, I’ll buy a new table, then I’ll leave…” He begins rising to his feet.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa--” Brett holds his arm, halting him from moving any further. “--it’s okay, Jake Dog. This’ll just be your spot if you’re okay eating with that.”

Jake perks at him; his eyes immediately light up. “Oh, thank you so much!” He sweeps over and pulls him into a hug. “You’re my best bestie!” He rubs the side of his face on Brett’s fluffy hair.

Brett pats his head, signalling him to let go. “Ah-ha, okay, okay.” He pulls himself away from him. “You’re gonna ruin my hair.”

Jake frowns with slanted eyebrows and large eyes. “Sorry…” He takes his seat again.

Brett picks up his mirror and brush, combing its bristles through his hair to fix it. “No worries, it’s perfect.” He drops his utensils and peers at the other three. “See, my hair is perfect!”

Kale has a glower at the forward. He then turns to the others and says, “Brett says that his hair is perfect because he has to convince us that is it perfect.”

“Because you guys are too oblivious to see the perfection of my hair,” Brett adds in arrogantly.

Kale slides his sharp eyes at him. “No, we just don’t care.”

Brett sinks in his chair with a glare at him, shutting his mouth close.

Then Kailer prances into the room with two plastic bags in his hands. “I am here! My presence has come! I have in every sense of the word ‘arrived’!” He halts and raises the bags in the air with a flawless grin.

Jake peers behind his shoulder, spotting the bags of food. “FOOOD!!!” He launches from his seat and rushes up to the small teenager. “Ooo, ooo, what food did you get?” He begins zipping around him, figuring out the dinner. “What is it? It smells like the ocean. Did you buy fish? I bet you bought—”

Kailer places a bag in one hand and pushes the excited goalie away with his free hand, holding the bags away from him. “Now, hush, hush, Oettinger.” He rises on his tiptoes and pats his shoulder thrice. “I shall show everyone our dinner!”

Jake quickly bounds back to the table and sits in his seat, eager for dinner.

Kailer sashays to the table and places the bags on it. He then pulls the take-out containers from the plastic bags and opens up the lids, revealing the dinner:

In the boxes, a famous type of Japanese dish is displayed: sushi! A handful of boxes contains different sorts of sushi rolls. The rest of the boxes have nigiri and sashimi.

Everybody gawks at the dinner choice while Kailer is beaming proudly at it.

“Sushi!” He picks up a packet of disposable chopsticks and rips it open, pulling out the bamboo chopsticks. “Edible art. Although it is a shame I had to take it to-go.” He holds the chopsticks in the correct position.

Brett is eyeing the food with a slightly disgusted look. “It’s safe to eat raw fish?”

Kailer makes his way back to the seat. “Yes, yes, I’m not attempting to kill anyone here.”

Matteo grabs the plastic bags and begins rifling through them, spotting only packets of chopsticks, soy sauce, and wasabi. He perks up at the scientist. “Where are the forks?”

Jeremy already has opened a pair of chopsticks, scrutinizing them. “How do you use chopsticks—?”

Kailer clicks his chopsticks. “It’s easy to use them.” He picks up a sushi roll in between the tips of the sticks with ease and places it on his plate.

Kale and Brett begin serving themselves dinner with chopsticks while Jake uses his hands.

Jeremy fumbles with the chopsticks in between his fingers with both hands. He snaps them into splinters.

“Can we use forks?” Matteo asks, attempting to place the chopsticks in his hand with his other hand.

Kailer drops his chopsticks with a flat expression. “Fine. How many? Five?”

“I’m good,” Jake muffles, licking his plate to get the sauce from the sushi rolls.

Kale gives a look of revulsion at the goalie. “Ugh.” He flicks his eyes at Brett. “Flame Wave, get your friend to use manners.”

“It’s not my fault he has canine powers,” Brett tells him before stuffing a roll in his mouth.

“So what’s he gonna do next?” Kale grumbles, dipping sashimi in his soy sauce. “Bark?”

Jake perks up from his plate and barks: “Ruff!” He licks his lips happily. “That was good! I could go for some more!” He begins grabbing a handful of the saucy rolls with his hands, making the nearby rolls topple over.

Matteo frowns at the fallen rolls. “I won’t be touching those.”

Kailer returns to the table with five silverware forks in his hands. He settles himself on his chair and places the eating utensils on the table.

Matteo pulls out a soy sauce packet from a plastic bag and holds it out to Kailer. “What’s this?”

Kailer peers at it. “It’s soy sauce. It’s used to enhance the flavor of sushi.” He takes it from the Master and yanks at it, attempting to pull it open. “Ugh, fiddlesticks, I can’t open this.”

Jeremy holds his hand out toward him. “I’ll do it.”

Kailer hands him the packet.

The goalie takes it and with one swift motion, he tears the packet down the middle, spraying the thin, brown sauce in all directions.

He leans back, peering down at his soy sauce-sprinkled self. “Ummm…” He hands the torn packet back to Kailer. “Here you go.”

The small teenager warily takes the packet. “That...works too.” He peers at it, quickly figuring out it is empty. “I’ll be back with the scissors.” He gets up and strolls away from the table.

Jake peers at the contents of one of the boxes, spotting a ball of green paste tucked in the corner by slivers of pickled ginger. “Ooo!” His eyes light up. “Ice cream!” He takes a swab of it with his finger.

Brett gazes at his actions with haste. “Um, Jake Dog, that’s not—”

Jake puts his finger in his mouth, sucking on it. His eyes immediately widen as the sharp, hot, pummeling sensation erupts, shooting through his nose and head.

His hands shoot to his mouth and nose. “IT BURNS! MY NOSE!!!” His eyes begin watering.

Brett turns to him in shock. “Jake Dog! Are you okay?”

“Owie, owie, owie, owie!” Jake stomps his feet against the floor with his eyes now shut closed. “OWWW!!!”

His partner then furiously whirls to Kailer, who is approaching him with a pair of scissors. “What are you trying to do to Jake Dog, Doc?! You’re killing him with your food!”

Kailer peers at Jake’s predicament and shakes his head with pity. “Tsk, tsk, tsk, oh, silly Oettinger--” He sits back down in his place. “--wasabi is used for small bits like this.”

He flicks the tip of his chopsticks against the mound of wasabi, picking some up, then spreading it on the top of tuna nigiri. He then picks up the nigiri with his free hand and pops it upside down in his mouth.

Brett turns to Jake, spotting him calmed down. “Are you okay, Jake Dog?”

Jake wipes his eyes. “Yeah.” He gives the pile of wasabi a glare. “Don’t eat that.” He points to it.

Kailer swallows. “I’ll take that.” He picks up the mound with his chopsticks.

Jake growls at the green substance as the scientist plops it onto his plate.

Across from Kailer, Jeremy has a massive sushi roll on his fork. “This is actually really good! It’s just that—” He puts half of the roll in his mouth and begins to attempt to cut the wrapped seaweed with his teeth to put a decent amount in his mouth. “—eets veey heerd teee—” He gives one last yank, causing the seaweed to snap and his fork and half of the roll to fling out from his grasp and crash into the nearby wall, penetrating it.

Kailer gawks at the crumbling wall. “Bloomin’ heck, is there anything you can’t break?”

“The seaweed,” Jeremy answers after swallowing.

He turns to the goalie, pointing his chopsticks at him. “That is why you stuff the whole thing in your mouth.” He takes a sushi roll in his chopsticks, lightly dips it in the small tray of soy sauce he finally has, and pops it in his mouth.

After chewing, he swallows. “It’s proper manners.”

On the other side of the table, Brett is cutting the same massive roll with his fork. “I’m just cutting it, I don’t wanna choke.”

Next to him, Jake stuffs three rolls in his mouth before swallowing them with ease. He then peers at his surroundings, his eyes darting around the room.

He then turns to the others and asks, “Had you guys seen Zeke?”

Brett turns to him with knitted eyebrows. “Zeke?”

“Yeah, Zeke— My pet raccoon dog.”

Across from him, Matteo halts his eating and points his fork at him. “First off, why wasn’t I notified that there’s a raccoon dog staying in this base? Second off, what the heck is a raccoon dog?”

Jake gasps and clasps his hands below his chin. “Oh, it’s the cutest thing on earth! I love him so much, he’s like my roomie!” He turns to Brett and whispers, “No worries, you’re my bestie!” He places his head on his shoulder with a massive grin.

Brett cranes his head to give his friend some room. “Good to know…” His eyes drift away from him. “I wasn’t feeling jealous toward a raccoon dog at all.”

Jeremy leans over to look at Jake. “How does it look like?”

The goalie straightens up excitedly. “FLUFFY! AND CUTE!”

Kailer holds up his tablet, showing a picture of a small, fluffy, black and gray animal. “It looks like this. It’s a Nyctereutes procyonoides, or in other words, a tanuki.”

Jake points to the screen. “Yes! That’s how Zeke looks like! I’ll look for him after I’m done with this.” He continues eating from the boxes.

Kale is peering at the boxes, searching for what roll to select. He spots one, yet it is, unfortunately, being consumed by Jake.

Brett spots Kale’s situation, giving him a wary expression. “Um…” He flicks his eyes to his friend. “Alright, that’s enough, Jake Dog.” He pulls him away from the boxes. “You had like a hundred pieces already.”

Jake holds his hands out at the sushi with longing eyes as he is being hauled away from it. “Wait, wait, wait, no, no, no—” He is then held firmly in his chair. He turns to Brett and wails, “Now I’m gonna starve!”

“No, you’re not, you ate half of the dinner!” he scolds at him.

Jake immediately dips his head with an ashamed expression. He then perks up with a hopeful look. “Dessert?”

From the other side of the table, Kailer holds up a tray of green tea mochi ice cream. “Yes!”

Jeremy’s eyes light up at an idea. “Oh! You know what?” He pulls out a box of the game Apples To Apples, holding it out for everyone to see. “We can have dessert over this!”

Matteo peers at it with curiosity. “What’s that game?”

The goalie holds his palm out toward him. “Trust me, it’s a lot of fun.” He drops his hand. “When we’re all on dessert, I’ll go over it.”

“I won’t be having dessert,” Kale murmurs lowly, tapping his chopsticks against his plate.

Jake whirls to him with a massive gasp. “HOW COULD YOU NOT HAVE DESSERT?! IT’S AMAZING!”

Matteo eyes him with concern. “Are you sure?”

Kale gazes at him with a serious expression. “Yeah.”

“Can you play Apples to Apples with us?” Jeremy gives him a smile while pointing to the red box.

“No.” Kale pushes himself to his feet. “I’m going to bed. Good night.” With that, he strolls away from the table and to the nearest staircase, exiting the room.

Now it is the five members of the GJHP left in the room.

Jake has a depressed expression at the empty space Kale used to occupy. “He left us…he doesn’t want to be with us…” He peers at the others with large eyes and a frown. “What did we do?”

Kailer flicks his hand carelessly in the air. “Let the man go; he has problems of his own.”

Jeremy has narrowed, sharp eyes at the two besties. “Probably because you two mocked him.”

Brett turns to him with a confused look. “When?”

“‘Chocolate lava cake’?” He raises his eyebrows with an unamused expression. “Really?”

The forward leans back with a smile, his hands flat on the table. “Okay, you gotta admit, it was funny!”

“I can’t have that cake, but peanut butter cake is good!” Jake tells them.

Jeremy shakes his head with a grave mien. “I don’t blame him…”

“We’ll give him some time to warm up,” Matteo speaks up. He then nods to the red box. “But I’m curious about this Apples to Apples game.”

Jeremy’s face immediately lights up. “Awesome!” He begins pulling off the lid from the box. “Gather around, everyone, this is gonna be a blast!”

Notes