Chapter Text
Yosano Akiko-sensei was generally known to be a busy person by her peers, since she had a particularly special gift in the world of abilities - the ability to instantly heal a person back to full recovery, as long as they were half-dead.
Of course the possession of this brilliant ability came with absolute respect and fear from those who had the misfortune to be injured or get dissected to their half-deaths by Yosano-sensei in order for her ability to carry out its full effect, although it has to be said that she got a bit too enthusiastic and caught up in her own sadistic tendencies, so she secretly thought she deserved it.
But not many knew about another ability of hers, which was her kindness.
Ironically Yosano had been invited to the Armed Detective Agency because of her kindness and was told by a certain person that her ability was not her defining trait. That same person was the first to recognise and validate her own feelings, not only her ability.
Even now, after all the years, that person still cherished a close friendship with Yosano with mutual kindness and respect, so far as to be one of the only people she trusted without any doubt.
This one person was currently minutes before waking up because of his alarm clock, in his dorm room next door to hers, when he woke up with a sudden jolt.
He turned his head around both sides, trying to figure out what was wrong, before turning off his alarm and looking to the the furthest wall away from him, which was shared with Yosano’s dorm room. The clanging of pans and the sizzle of oil, along with the slightly muffled loud noise of the news on the TV through the wall.
Strange. Yosano-san often stayed up late and woke up late, as he often knew from her late arrivals at the agency, which were often dismissed out of respect for her consistent exhausting work. But for Yosano-san to be awake earlier than him and preparing actual food, given that she usually worked off a strong cup of coffee and a plain bowl of rice in the mornings after oversleeping, was surprising. He deducted that she did not have much work to attend to that day so she was enjoying the rare occasion of eating properly and he thought she rightly deserved it.
He got ready as always when he had to go to work, since he proudly knew his importance at work and often conducted himself in a confident manner to fit it. But once he was ready he decided to pay her a visit and see what she was preparing - after all, she might spare him some food and despite being a doctor, he knew Yosano-san also had a taste for sweet things, especially Japanese sweets - so she might give him some as well.
The overwhelming smell of sweet breakfast foods seeped from under her door as soon as he got there. The kitchen sounded lively with the sound of cooking and combined with the news on the TV, it was a welcoming, homely atmosphere to experience from the outside. He stood there for a moment, entranced in the delicious warm smell, before realising that he actually had to go.
He knocked on the door twice, but Yosano-san didn’t answer. It was no surprise to him though, she was probably occupied by the noise in the kitchen and she wouldn’t have heard him.
“Yosano-san, I’m here!” Edogawa Ranpo declared himself whilst fervently knocking on the door again. “It’s me, Ranpo-san!”
Seeming to have heard the calamity outside of her own, Yosano-san appeared at the door.
“Oh, good morning Ranpo-san! I couldn’t hear you very well over my cooking, sorry.” she greeted him, a spoon dripping pancake mixture in one hand. “What’s the matter? You usually don’t turn up at my door so early in the morning.”
“Well, you usually don’t wake up so early in the morning to make pancakes!” Ranpo-san fired back immediately, with a slightly chuckle to his voice. “I was woken up by the sound of your very nice-smelling cooking this morning.” He swiped some pancake mixture from the spoon into his mouth. “Mmmm, tastes nice now but it’ll be even better when it’s actually cooked.”
Yosano-san smiled and whacked him playfully with her free hand. “Ranpo-san! It’s not good to eat raw mixture, you know?”
“Hmmm, yes, yes, I know, Yosano-san,” licking off the remaining mixture from his finger, “this pancake mixture really is delicious~”
She led Ranpo into the kitchen where there were already some pancakes waiting to be eaten stacked up in piles on plates. It seemed as she’d also prepared various spreads and fruits to go with them, but what was amusing to see was that Yosano had definitely, definitely made too many pancakes for her original intention to eat by herself.
Ranpo grinned knowingly to himself. As expected of his best friend. She was too kind. Even when she had her own opportunity to enjoy herself, she had taken the time to make pancakes for her colleagues and had woken up earlier than usual so she could learn how to make them. Ranpo had sometimes been with her when she bought ready-made pancakes from the convenience store and he could see she was having fun making them homemade.
He figured that Yosano would’ve actually gone around giving pancakes to her colleagues, but he’d unexpectedly come to her first. He could eat the pancakes fresh from the pan, while they were still warm and judging by the raw mixture he’d tried earlier, he knew that they were going to a be a real treat.
“You’re so kind, Yosano-san” Ranpo teased gently, taking a plate of pancakes and settling down into a chair at her table.
“What do you mean? You’re welcome to eat here any time, Ranpo-san, though I know you eat sweeter things than my usual bowl of rice in the morning.” she snickered and turned towards him slightly, holding a pan.
It was amazing to see the concentration in her eyes when she flipped the pancake in the pan and even more delightful to see her stunned face when she actually did it, Ranpo thought to himself. Most people saw her eerie sneer when she used her ability to heal them, or her composed smile she usually carried herself around with, but Ranpo was lucky enough to have seen her at her worst and at her best over the years, as well as all these moments in between. He wanted to try flipping a pancake for himself.
“Ooooh wow, let me try, Yosano-san!”
She passed the pan to him and he tried flipping the pancake, but to no avail. So he tried again, much harder, then the pancake jumped out of the pan and stuck to the ceiling.
They both stared incredulously at the pancake on the ceiling. Awkward.
“Huh, well, oops...at least it’s fluffy, Yosano-san” Ranpo offered, with a guilty laugh. “Besides, there’s plenty of mixture left, isn’t there?”
Yosano sighed, also chuckling. “It can’t be helped.” She turned back to the worktop and once again began pouring pancake mixture into the pan. Ranpo saw she was a bit annoyed but amused with him.
Feeling more guilty than he had been before, he started on another one of his pancakes, spreading some chocolate spread and randomly decorating it with sprinkles. He stood up and walked over to Yosano-san by the worktop.
“Here, for you, Yosano-san” he quickly slid the pancake onto a nearby empty plate. “You like chocolate on your pancakes, right?”
Yosano looked at him and took it up gladly, pausing from supervising the pan for a moment. “Hmmm, maybe I’ll forgive you then, Ranpo-san.” But both of them knew that she had long since forgiven him.
“Ahh that’s great then!” Ranpo said, proceeding to bite into the part of the pancake in Yosano’s hand which she hadn’t bitten into yet.
“Good grief, Ranpo-san!” she snapped, “if you wanted some of it, you could have just said—”
“Umm, excuse me but what’s this nice smell?” A figure appeared at the doorway.