Old Eggs and an Inn

Before long they'd arrived at Yoka. It wasn't hard to get to. Rose was now fairly proficient at driving all around Electopia, and having Sabrina to point out where they were headed helped.

In fact, once they were in Yoka she had basically been entirely at Sabrina's mercy with instructions, since she didn't know where in Yoka they were going.

Once they'd arrived, Rose parked her car in a convenient spot. "Oh. Nice place," she commented.

Hmm...Sabrina hadn't really noticed before, but it actually was a pretty nice inn. Admittedly, she couldn't tell exactly how nice, since she wasn't very familiar with traditional Electopian buildings. But then again..."Yep! My mom wouldn't work for a place she didn't like. Come to think of it, she came here to study Electopian food. Wonder how that's coming along?"

As she got out of the car, it was worth noting that all traces of her wardrobe change in DenTech were now gone; she now looked like the same old Sabrina they all knew and loved. And exactly why she had done so would remain a secret for all eternity...or at least, that's what she was banking on.

Zeo stepped out of the car with an interested look on his face. Yoka... haven't been here in forever. I think I was visiting the zoo last time, he recalled, smiling at the memory. Bustling cities had their own appeal to Zeo, but there was something about places like Yoka, too. Maybe it was the lack of cars, barring the one he was standing beside. The inn completed the area's rural look, and also seemed to be their destination. "Cool," he said simply upon viewing the building.

Looking at Sabrina next, he remembered how she'd ditched everything she'd put on for the DenTech part of the hunt. "Why have you b-" he started tentatively before stopping. Perhaps the answer to that question was better left unknown. "Uh, never mind," he said instead. "So, I guess we... go in now?" Zeo half asked, half suggested. He finally shut the door of the car and took a few steps away from it. There wasn't much else to be done here, so he waited for someone else to lead the way. That someone would probably be Sabrina since it was her mother, but whatever.

Rose left the car and quickly caught up to Zeo. There really wasn't much to see yet; they were standing in a parking lot, and no one had really said or done anything of interest.

She had almost commented on Zeo's unfinished inquiry, but decided against it. While all mysteries were worth solving, sometimes there were better thing to spend time on. In this case, having fun with these two while finishing the mission was Rose's superior alternative.

Rose took this small waiting period to imagine Sabrina's mother. She started with an older Sabrina-esque woman. Then she put her hair down and flipped outwards, and added a chef hat, oven mitts, and an apron. She made her more womanly, and a bit heavier, being a chef and food researcher. Then she added a pleasantly unaware smile to her face. Rose had decided that this eccentric socially unaware relative of Sabrina's would probably be ditzy, but kind all the same.

With this image in her head, she nodded slightly, satisfied with her imagination.

As she waited, Rose turned her mind towards wondering how classic this inn would be. "Will it have staff in yukata? Will there be an onsen?" She wasn't sure, so she'd have to wait for Sabrina to catch up so they could all go in.

"Yep!" With that simple remark, Sabrina led her friends inside the inn's lobby. It was mostly simple Electopian design, though a corner contained a brand new TV for guests. Speaking of which, someone was flipping through the channels on it. And while that alone wouldn't normally get her attention, the person doing it was making highly audible remarks about it.

"Nope...nope...nope...nope...nope...seen it...nope...sigh, I know it's the middle of the day, but you'd think there'd be SOMETHING on!" Suddenly, something slightly less mundane popped up on the screen; a woman who was more than 50% naked doing...something. From that distance, Sabrina couldn't tell what. Though she wasn't exactly interested in watching a woman who was more than 50% naked. She was crazy that way. Apparently, the voice agreed with her. "How did a show like THAT make it on this time of day?!" The TV went black with one last disgusted click of the remote.

"Perhaps we should consult the TV listings before randomly flipping through the channels in a public setting, Lady Josephine..." A yellow Navi suddenly formed above the person in question, vaguely capsule shaped with large arms and no legs. "By the way, the post-lunch rush break is almost over. Perhaps we should return to the kitchen."

"Already? Well, I guess some more experimenting's a lot more interesting than looking at a blank TV screen!" The person that had been called 'Josephine' stood up and stretched, She was, no larger than Sabrina; possibly a little smaller. Her hair was identical in color and straightness to her daughter's, but only came down to her neck, where it suddenly and abruptly stopped. For clothing, she appeared to have a long sleeved, soft yellow shirt, with bright pink pants, and a white apron. At least, it was normally white; for some reason, there was a lot of red splatters on it today. "Well, back to the battlefield!"

"Er, Lady Josephine..."

"Now what? I'm getting in my chef state of mind, here!"

"I'm sorry, but I thought you might want to notice that your daughter is currently by the entrance."

"Hmm? Oh hey, you're right! Hi, Sabrina!" No doubt about it...that was indeed the matriarch of the Jettos. "You're back kinda early. What brings you here?"

Sabrina personally liked the fact the two people with her received absolutely zero attention. But that was her mom for you. "Actually, I wanted to-

"Oh, I'm sorry! Didn't notice you had new friends with you!" ...Or maybe they HAD gotten attention, and she just hadn't said anything about it. "I'm Mrs. Jetto, Sabrina's mother!"

"And I am her faithful Navi and assistant, FieldMan!" The yellow Navi floated forward slightly, and bowed. At least, as well as something without legs could bow.

"Hey, long time no see, FieldMan!" Another Navi formed on Sabrina's shoulder; the stouter of the two options, oddly enough. "It's been a while since we've talked!"

"Ah, Mr. SplashMan! It HAS been a while! You seem...much stronger than before, if I may say so!"

"Thanks! Sabrina and I have done a lot of training lately...I guess it's paying off!"

"Yeah, I'm sure you two have lots of catching up to do, but you can do that AFTER everyone's done introducing themselves, capice?" The elder Jetto looked expectantly at Rose and Zeo, apparently awaiting for that introduction. And Sabrina wasn't going to do it for them.

The odd spectacle taking place in the building's lobby definitely reminded Zeo of Sabrina. Her mother seemed "different" in a different way, though. That didn't even make much sense to Zeo, but he wasn't sure how else to put it. He doubted they'd have any trouble getting help from her, though. Zeo waited in silence with Rose until the older Jetto noticed that they were there, taking note of her Navi's interesting appearance. He wondered whether it was capable of fighting like that, but didn't have much time to think on it.

Once they had been noticed, Zeo waited for a chance to introduce himself. Said chance came with a very direct cue from Sabrina's mother. Yeah, they're related, he thought, amused. He stopped himself from laughing to avoid making the wrong first impression. "Uh, hello. I'm Zeo Yamikagi. A... uh, friend of your daughter, I guess." By now he could probably be called that. "Pleased to meet you," Zeo finished. He hoped the sudden onrush of nerves didn't show on his face. With his short introduction done, he waited for Rose to take her turn and hopefully draw the focus off of himself.

Entering with the other two, Rose was presented with a very interesting scene. It kept her smiling and entertained, for a good deal of time.

First there was the loud woman flipping through a number of channels. Rose had recognized a decent number, but she certainly hadn't seen the rather risqué one at the end of the flipping. She looked away fairly quickly when she saw what was happening, but quickly recovered.

She then got to listen to the cute pill shaped Navi interact with the woman. He was incredibly formal, in contrast. It almost reminded her of SummonerMan, who somehow managed to call her Ma'am all the time.

She turned and Rose immediately placed her as Mrs. Jetto. She looked just like her. "Well, she's thinner than I'd guessed. And she also isn't wearing oven mitts. But otherwise I was pretty close." she mused.

Another note brought on by the revealing of Mrs. Jetto was her shirt color. "It matches her Navi, just like Sabrina's! I wonder if her whole family dresses like that. . ." She did note that Sabrina's mother dressed far more. . . colorfully than her daughter.

And, like she'd thought, the woman failed to notice anything around her. However, after cutting off her talk with Sabrina in order to allow Rose and Zeo to introduce themselves, Rose realized this was her chance to step into the conversation.

Unfortunately Zeo stepped in stallingly, but still faster than her. Rose's introduction came after that.

"Hello. I'm Rose, and I'm also a friend of your daughter's. It's a pleasure to meet you," Rose said this all with a smile and ended it with a polite little bow. She had left off the I guess that Zeo had put in, too. "Yikes, what a faux pas. You don't say "We're friends, I guess." Poor Zeo may be more gentlemenly, but he isn't the most socially aware."

Rose knew he meant well, though, and could tell he wasn't incredibly comfortable in this situation for some odd reason. So she hoped they'd not notice the little slip up and decided to force an extra step in the conversation.

Looking at the apron the woman had donned, she added politely, "I hope we aren't interrupting anything."

With any luck that'd merit a response.

"Well, nice to meet you, Zeo and Rose!" Mrs. Jetto stretched again, as she started looking off in the distance. "Hmm..." A few moments passed, but nothing happened. And yet she continued staring...

"...Mom?"

"Hmm? Oh, hi, Sabrina!"

"Please forgive her, everyone...she's spent the entire morning trying to figure out how to make Netopian food better for Electopian tastes. A sort of combination, if you will, without wrecking either primary food." FieldMan looked around the group as he said this, appearing to be slightly disappointed about something. Perhaps the lack of other Navis existing as holograms?

...Come to think of it, he had weird eyes. They weren't really so much eyes as...some kind of scoreboard looking thing where the lit up parts looked like eyes. Come to think of it, none of the Navis her dad had made had real faces. SplashMan and FieldMan just had eyes, and FlareMan's flamethrower wasn't exactly a real mouth...what was up with that? But Sabrina had other things to worry about, so she tried removing that thought from the front of her mind for the time being. "Anyway, we're here on business. We're trying to find something, and we're wondering if you might know something about it." Dragging out the note once again, she read it over to make sure she'd get the name right. "It's called a Thousand Year-Old Spring-Boiled Egg."

The eldest member of the group once more seemed lost in thought as she appeared to mull things over. "Hmm..."

"Uh, Mom?"

"Don't worry, I'm just thinking. That name sounds kinda familiar to me, like I've heard it recently. ...FieldMan, could you do me a favor?"

"Of course! You know you only need to ask!"

"Could you go ask Kawasaki about that? I want to say I heard it from him.

"The thought occurred to me, as well...I'll be gone for just a moment!" The yellow Navi's hologram vanished, off to another PET.

But as soon as he was, the list was grabbed by his operator. "I'm not one to pry, but mind if I ask what this list is for? It looks to me like someone came up with a bunch of random junk."

"Well-"

"And I'd like someone other than my daughter to answer, since there's no way I'll believe the answer from her, even if she's telling the truth." Mrs. Jetto gave each of them a glance, as if to say 'watch out, I have magical mother lie detector ability!', to try and dissuade any lies. Either that, or she sincerely had no clue about any possible relation between the 7 listed items and just wanted to know really badly. Or possibly even both. Or neither. And perhaps the weirdest part of it all was that all of those things were possible.

Unable to think of any reason why not to inform Mrs. Jetto of their "mission," Zeo started to explain to redeem himself for his shaky introduction. "It's a list of items we were asked to find when we requested an assignment from the GNA." Zeo paused to think for a second. "We uh, don't actually know why the client wants them, if he has a reason aside from being some kind of collector." He couldn't think of much else to add to that, but explaining the situation did make Zeo wonder what use anyone would have for such items.

Nothing came to mind.

Probably just some eccentric collector, his mind waved away the though. Even if he did have a purpose, it's not like these items are dangerous. Unless he plans on beating someone to death with a book. Yeah, like that would happen. Zeo figured that bringing back every item on the client's list might allow them to ask about his motives, but that was still a while away. Therefore, he hoped what little info they had was enough for Sabrina's mother. It wouldn't be enough for me... Zeo thought.

He then realized he'd been silent for a few seconds and quickly ended his explanation. "That's... all we know, unless I forgot something." It didn't seem like it.

Rose was fairly delighted to hear that Ms. Jetto apparently knew what they were talking about and seemed like she'd be able to arrange it for them. " This egg may be the easiest yet!" she thought excitedly.

Suddenly Rose and Zeo were being questioned. Sabrina was apparently being antagonized. "I hope her mother isn't serious. Maybe they have a very casual relationship. Probably part of the eccentric thing. . . I'd probably be pretty thrown off if my mother told me I was untrustworthy, though."

All the same, the woman needed a response. "It's basically a scavenger hunt," she began. And then Zeo went way above and beyond what she'd said. "Or what he said, more specifically," she added at the end.

Zeo had done a good job summing it up, so Rose found that she didn't have anything to add. "I don't think you're forgetting anything," she echoed, attempting to be reassuring, at least.

Mrs. Jetto closed her eyes for a moment as she listened to the reasons provided to her by non-family, as she thought some more. "...Hmm...if I added cheese to that, it might bring out the flavor of the fish..."

"Uh, mom?"

"Sorry...just thinking. Now why are you trying to get all of these things?"

Sabrina really had to wonder if her mother was dropped on her head as a child. And if so, possibly repeatedly. "We signed up for a mission that didn't involve our Navis, and so we wound up doing a scavenger hunt for some guy in ElecTown. If you wanna know why he wants all of that, go ask him!"

"Sounds sorta like something your father would do..." The older Jetto trailed off as she started thinking again, as though what she said had triggered a memory. "Oh! I just remembered something! Sabrina, your father stopped by earlier, and said to tell you he'd be in ACDC Town this afternoon. Maybe he can help you with this, too!"

"Lady Josephine! I'm back!" Once more, a yellow Navi hologram appeared. "I'm sorry I took so long, but Mr. Kawasaki had a slight viral problem."

"I take it you helped him out?"

FieldMan raised an arm, showing off the fact that he had three claw-like fingers instead of a hand, as well as the fact it could conduct electricity. "Of course! I'd receive an ear thrashing if I didn't! But that's not the main concern...indeed, he knew of the boiled egg. He also gave me the recipe!"

Pulling out her PET, Mrs. Jetto took a moment to look it over. "Hmm...well, I've got good news and bad news. The good news is that this is a piece of cake! The bad news is, it'll take a while. As in, hours."

"Hours?!" Sabrina was a bit taken aback by that ETA. "We really need to finish this before it gets dark!"

"Oh, don't worry! I'll have it done before then! Actually, I've got an idea! Sabrina, where are you supposed to meet up with this person you took the mission from?"

"A place called Spark Cafe. Why, are you going to meet up with us when you're done?"

"Of course not! I may be here to study, but I'm still part of the kitchen staff! I've gotta help with the supper rush! Since Christopher's in town, I'll have him deliver it for you. How does that sound?"

"Um...I guess that could work." The younger Jetto turned over to her co-mission takers. "How's that sound? We work on the other stuff, and my dad'll deliver the egg to us when we're done!

It looked like things were coming together nicely. Maybe we'll be finished a lot faster than I thought. Inevitably, that prompted Zeo to think about their next targets. NetVegas or NetCafe... the latter sounds less likely to end with us getting arrested for being somewhere we shouldn't be. That was a positive thought. Maybe it was true, too. But secret menu listings probably aren't the kind of thing that gets handed over easily, Zeo's mind countered. Either way would probably require a bit more effort than this.

"Sounds good to me," Zeo said in response to Sabrina. "We'll get everything done even faster." And someone else was doing their work for them, but if the item really was a cake Zeo couldn't make one anyway. "That just leaves the question of where to go next." Like his mind had reasoned before, he didn't have a preference this time. "I'm fine with wherever's most convenient," he said, though that may not have mattered if both destinations were in another country.

Zeo waited for the others to suggest a destination before realizing he'd forgotten to do something. "And uh, thank you for your help, Mrs. Jetto." Having said that, he waited for the rest of the group to leave.

Everything was working out fairly well. They could now swing back and pick up this target on their way back to Electown after touring Netopia.

Rose gave another quick bow, and thanked Mrs. Jetto politely. Then she waved and wished her a nice day, before turning to follow Zeo out.

She nodded after Zeo's "sound's great" and gave a small "mm-hm." Rose oddly wasn't saying much of consequence so far. She decided to say something unique, since she needed more information before driving away.

"So, Sabrina, do you want to just visit your Father on the way back to the Café, or is he still the next stop?" Rose inquired. Zeo had given up on making decisions, apparently, but that was pretty much ok since it was all up to Sabrina as long as her parents were involved.

"It is convenient, though, for her to have these connections. I really need to work on mine," the reporting socialite in training mused.

She was fairly happy with any option, especially after such a quick and painless visit. They may not have gotten something crossed off, but they wouldn't need to worry about it and that was all that really mattered.

And that was that. Pulling out her trusty pen, Sabrina crossed the egg off the dreaded list. Hopefully, she didn't just jinx it. Though really, her mom's culinary skills were greater than any random problem. "Thanks Mom!"

"Not a problem, everyone! You're not the only one getting something out of this, you know! It might just sound like a regular boiled egg, it actually involves some delicate work. It'll be great for keeping me on my toes!"

"Glad for ya. Anyway, I think we're going to get some of the other stuff now. I know I probably shouldn't say this, but make sure that egg's ready by then!"

"So long as I don't mess up, that won't even be an issue! But I guess I need to start getting ready for it now...after all, I'm going to need to leave the inn to fix it!"

The group's water-based Navi had been pretty quiet once his conversation with FieldMan was interrupted, but now he had a question that was probably on everyone's mind, yet no one bothered to ask. "Mrs. Jetto? What's so special about making it?"

"Glad you asked! You see, the trick is that the egg has to be specially boiled in a hot spring with sulphur, then loaded with various native preservatives, and finally treated with even more sulphur. It's not supposed to be eaten, since all that stuff would probably just make you sick. But, it's said that if it's done properly, it can last for a thousand years! And it'd probably look like it, too...but yeah, once you air it out to get rid of the smell, it makes for a neat ornamental! After I make yours, maybe I'll make one for the kitchen back home..."

"Interesting stuff." Better stop things here before her mother got rambling. "Well, we're off. Bye Mom!"

"Bye hon! Good luck on getting the rest of that random junk!"

"Goodbye, everyone! And SplashMan, what do you say we catch up at the Net's onsen equivalent?"

"Sure thing! Later, FieldMan!" As the three on a mission started walking back to the car, SplashMan's hologram disappeared once again, leaving the operators to themselves.

With a stretch, Sabrina pondered their next course of action. "Well, my mom said he was in ACDC...if I know him, he's probably somewhere by the park. A place where he can kick back and relax as he busts the daylights out of viruses is his kind of thing." She opened the passenger car door, thanks to Rose picking a very good parking spot. "Let's get going!"

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Scavenger Hunt

1- Batch AA-00001 Process Upgrade ~SciLab (Suitachi's Navi Shop)
2- Nil-Zenny Poker Chip ~NetVegas
3- [Neuronomicon], author Maya Frasser ~Bookstore in ElecTown
4- Previous three NetCafe Secret Menu listings ~NetCafe
5- Two (2) Tier-3 Battlechips ~Dad?
6- Thousand Year-Old Spring-Boiled Egg ~Yoka (Mom?)
7- Dentech University 200X Vision Statement Plaque ~DenTech

[Friendship Experience Accrued!]

Zeo/Sabrina [+1]
Sabrina/Rose [+1]
Rose/Zeo [+1]