Active Magic (TatlTails and othyrworld)

"Yay!" Luke cheered, taking both of S'oya's hands and carefully pulling her inside. This was gonna be so much fun, having a friend who wanted to cook with him! She'd had to think about it for a minute though, so hopefully she wasn't too nervous.

"Don' worry, I make sure you do good jobs." He nodded at her as they got close to the kitchen, just in case that was what she was worried about. "Share work, do it right, all good. No worry. ...Whaddaya wanna make?"

Of course he was gonna give his friend first choice! She was gonna help make it, it should be something she liked! Plus he always had a hard time choosing stuff by himself, without anything to give him ideas. If he didn't have any guests to get ideas or requests from, he usually just flipped randomly through his cookbooks until something caught his eye. But it was so much more fun when he got requests, because then he knew for sure he was making someone happy with his food.
 
Oh dang. Sequoia had no idea what kind of stuff people ate for breakfast besides waffles. Like... bacon maybe? Eggs? Did people like eggs? No, those were too plain. What was a really fancy breakfast food? Apparently, some people ate steak, but that felt a little too fancy. Beef was a strict lunch and dinner food anyway. "French toast, I guess. Do people like french toast?" She shrugged to show that she didn't really care and prayed it was easy to make. Just because things couldn't go super wrong, didn't mean things would go amazingly right. Knowing her luck she'd leave shrapnel in whatever was getting cooked and end up murdering someone. Hopefully, she wouldn't kill someone she liked.
 
"Ooo, yeah! French toast!" That was perfect to make today! It was super tasty, had some jobs S'oya could do, and could have a whole bunch of extra fancy stuff if it got too easy.

Luke pulled S'oya all the way into the kitchen after she made the choice, then ran up to the fridge and started pulling out some eggs. "French toast real tasty. I teach you how to make. Get a big bowl, please?"

They needed something to put the eggs in, and helpin' grab stuff was the perfect first job for S'oya. Then he could show her the steps.
 
"Sure!" Sequoia searched through the cabinets until she found a huge metal pot, which she set on the counter. She had no idea what she was doing or what went into french toast. Obviously bread, but beyond that, she had no clue. Eggs? Syrup? Hopes and dreams? Hell, she hadn't eaten french toast in years. All she remembered was it was sticky, sweet, and not all that filling. Her favorite kind of food. "What now? Do we need any other supplies?"
 
Luke managed to drag out a loaf of white bread by the time Sequoia finished her task, but when he heard the dull metal thunk on the countertop, he stopped in place for a moment. That didn't sound right...

He turned around, and saw a pot. Like a pasta pot. Not a bowl. And S'oya looked all proud of herself... Oh no.

"Umm..." Was all he could say at first, because the only other thing he could say, he really didn't want to because he might say it wrong and really upset her. But it was all he could think to say, so eventually he blurted out "Tha's not a bowl. Tha's a pot. For cookin' hot stuff. We don' need that one for French toast. Thank ya though."

He set his stuff down carefully on the counter, then pulled out a mixing bowl and set it next to the pot. "This's a big bowl. We mix stuff up in this one. Now you know. I teach you. Also need a whisk an' a pan."

He pulled those out real quick, while making sure to tell his friend "I's okay. Learnin' new stuff can be scary sometimes, but I help you. No angry or nothin'. You learn lots soon, promise."
 
"Oh! Okay, that makes sense." Sequoia shoved the pot back into the cabinet, feeling less and less sure of herself by the minute. A pot was obviously different from a bowl. Sure, she hadn't been in a kitchen for a while, but she still knew the names of everything. The bowl tared up at her and the shine of the lights on its shiny surface looked like a frown. This was going to be an amazing morning. She could just feel it.

"Hey, do we need anything else? I know french toast doesn't need much, but we need eggs right?" She hoped she was right. If she made one more dumb decision she was going to die of embarrassment. People can be clueless but she would be pushing the limits of true stupidity.
 
"Yeah!" Luke replied, really glad that S'oya wasn't mad he'd corrected her. He pulled out the eggs, then brought them over to the bowl and said "We gotta crack 'em, then mix 'em up. I crack the eggs, cause it's hard if ya haven't practiced a whole lot. Can ya find the flavors for me? All in that door."

He pointed at the spice cupboard, then listed "Cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, sugar. They all got their names on the jars. Pull 'em all out, then we mix 'em in the mix. Then we add milk, mix all up, dip the bread, fry the bread, toppin's, done. Easy."
 
Sequoia delved into the pantry, muttering the spices like a mantra. Cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, sugar. Cinnamon nutmeg allspice sugar. Cinnomannutmegallspicesugar. Cinnomennutmegallspice...sugar? Cinnamon... allspice... Fuck. It was gone. She grabbed cinnamon. That was on the list, it was the first item. Then... allspice, right? Yeah. What the hell was allspice? A combination of all the spices? If it was, why did they need all these other spices?

After allspice came sugar. At least, she was pretty sure it was sugar. Couldn't she just ask Luke? She smacked her forehead with her hand. How had she survived long when she had literally three working brain cells? "Hey Luke, I have allspice and cinnamon. What else did I need?"
 
Luke had to stop before he cracked his last egg to answer S'oya's question right, just to make sure he thought it through. Cinnamon and allspice were got, so...

"Nutmeg, sugar." He told her, before cracking the egg and getting the shells out the way. "Yep, they all gonna deepen the flavor. Workin' together. Like us!"

Yeah, he liked cooking with other people. With friends. Working together made everything go faster and smoother. Like multitasking, but easier. Sometimes Luke like working alone better, some days paying attention to people was harder than focusing on doing things, but on days like this, it was nice to work together with a friend.
 
Nutmeg and sugar. Wonderful. Sequoia quickly found the nutmeg and grabbed it, setting it near the other spices. "Okay, cool! We're going to be the best team. Ever." She was kind of babbling, but it didn't really matter. All that was left was sugar. Where could that be? Even after scanning the pantry she couldn't find it. Maybe it was on a top shelf? A quick glance at all the higher shelves confirmed that. Fuck. As a short person, Sequoia felt discriminated against. How dare this sugar be on a shelf taller than her? How fucking dare?

Not for the first time, she wished she had wings like Flora. She could just fly up to the sugar, snatch it, and fly back down. Sadly, she wasn't a fairy. The shelf was only half a foot out of her reach, maybe less. She could totally jump it.

The loud smash her head made against the shelf confirmed that she could not- in fact- jump it. She could give herself a nosebleed though. Goddamnit. "Hey Luke, do you have any paper towels?" She peeked out of the pantry. At least the sugar was within reach now. Her head slam had been good for something. It was gathered up off the floor and set near the rest of the spices, now stained with dark red fingerprints.
 
Luke was busy starting to stir the eggs while S'oya grabbed the sugar, but a big thump made him jump. He didn't dare look at the bump, he was too froze to do anything but start stirring again. He only really stopped when S'oya asked for paper towels, so he reached over to get them and-

"Eek!" Oh no oh no oh no red spots that was blood blood was bad no no no "Here!"

Paper towels would help! He quickly pushed them to S'oya and tried to cover the blood that was on her face while trying not to hurt whatever hurt was making the blood. "So so sorry, you okay? You hurt? Ohh blood, blood blood blood. Not good. We clean, you feel better soon. Better, all better. Blood gone soon..."
 
Sequoia tilted her head back, holding the paper towels to her nose and trying not to snort too hard while she struggled to breathe. It didn't hurt bad enough to kill her or anything but it was still pretty fucking painful. Luke seemed to be freaking out so she set her thoughts to comforting him. "I'm fine. I'm fine. It's.. well actually..." She was going to tell him that it wasn't broken but realized she hadn't confirmed that. A few quick taps, much to her relief, revealed that her nose wasn't broken. It was just smooshed and bleeding. Great. This kitchen was probably cursed. Cooking in it definitely was. "Yep! It's not broken. Everything's okay."
 
S'oya was okay? Not broken, not really hurt...? She said that, she sounded not too scared, the paper towels weren't gettin' redder too fast... so she was okay.

"Oh, okay." He let out a breath, the bad feelings draining away as he tried to calm down. She was okay, she was okay... "Good. Glad. You res', I'm gonna finish cleanin'. Wait for more better-feelin' before you do more work, I work instead. No more hurtin' for S'oya, jus' rest."

His hands were shaky as he slowly let go, but once he scrubbed his hands in the sink they shook a lot less. Enough for him to go scrub the blood off everything else. Including the sugar bag, ohh... That might be germs in the sugar, better move it to a jar. That wouldn't be hard, just get out a jar with a lid and pour it all in. There, now no blood on the sugar. Good. Good, no more blood...
 
"Hey, Luke, I don't mean to be rude or anything, but I don't wanna cook anymore. Of offense to you, this kitchen is totally cursed and I'm not going to stick around in here and accidentally hurt myself again." Sequoia grabbed some new paper towels and wetted them, swapping out the dry ones, which she promptly tossed. Wet paper towels felt much more comfortable *and* got most of the blood out of her nose.

She popped onto the counter, where she sat and did her best not to wince or groan. The paper towels were swapped out a few times before she felt he could put her head down without watching the red river bust from her nostrils. "If it's okay with you, I'm gonna go now."
 
Luke tried to stay out of S'oya's way while she took care of herself, but when she said she wanted to go? He stopped in place, so he could say "Okay. You got hurt, you don' hafta cook anymore. I'm sorry you got hurt, though. You still gonna come back to eat?"

He really hoped she wouldn't be too scared to eat in the kitchen anymore. He'd understand if she was, but it would be really sad not to have her at mealtimes or anything. It'd be harder to get her to eat too, and that was important for new friends. He just didn't want to have messed everything up and hurt his friend...
 
"Oh totally! I love your food and everything. I just refuse to cook in here anymore. Eating won't be a problem. There's never been a force in the world that could keep me from my food." Sequoia winked playfully. It was true really, food was like... her third favorite thing ever. If anyone tried to keep her away from it there would be some serious problems. Things would definitely get violent. But that wasn't going to happen here, she was about 70% sure of it. People here wanted Flora and her to get better.

"You can wrap up without me, right?" She snorted. Luke was a cook. He knew how to do things. Without her here he'd probably go faster. "Pssht, of course, you can. I'll just go now." She hopped out the door, ready to snuggle up next to Flora and fall asleep until breakfast.
 
Luke could only nod at all the stuff S'oya was saying. She was solving her own problems, he didn't need to say anything to help her. He just needed to make sure she knew he was OK, which he was. As long as his friends were alright, Luke was alright, so he was okay with S'oya leaving if that would make her alright.

As Sequoia was leaving, though, Clarisse stumbled out of the basement in one of the spare hoodies Madi'd left in there for her. The hood was tugged low over her eyes because yikes sunlight, so she didn't even notice the witch until her not noticing almost bumped them into each other.

"Oh shit, dude!" Was the first thing out of her mouth cause she had no impulse control, but her next inhale got a... certain smell up her nose, so the conversation immediately shifted to "You okay?"
 
Sequoia bounced back from bumping into Clarisse pretty quickly, accepting the apology with a quick 'it's fine' and straightening out her ruffled shirt. Thank god she hadn't spilled any blood on it. Blood was impossible to wash out. Plus this was a comfy shirt and she liked it and she'd never be able to wear it again if it had a gross red-brown stain down the front. The rules of common courtesy wouldn't allow it.

It took Sequoia a few seconds to remember that the rules of courtesy also instructed people to answer questions. "Yeah. I tried to help Luke cook and ended up headbutting a shelf. My nose isn't broken or anything, I'll be fine. I was actually going to go back to sleep. What's up with you?" The thought that Clarisse- a vampire- might notice al the blood and react to it never even crossed her mind.
 
"Uhh..." Okay she wasn't gonna lie, Clarisse was a bit thrown off by Sequoia not even seeming to realize blood and vampires was a bad mix. I mean, she had way more self-control than the monster movies and sexy fanfictions made it seem (blood was like food and water to her, not crack cocaine), but Sequoia just looked like she hadn't even thought about it. It was... kinda refreshing, as well as depressing to realize she'd already gotten used to people being scared of her.

But yeah, that meant she had to take the opportunity and not fuck up a simple conversation. "I was just about to... get somethin' to drink, an' go to bed. I was studyin' shit all night, after I hung out with Flora anyway. She seems cool, I get why you're together."
 
Sequoia's eyebrows furrowed at that last sentence. Clarisse's mention of needing a drink flew right over her head when she heard the word together. Together meant dating, at least, in Sequoias understanding. While she and Flora were close- almost exceedingly so- they had never been anything more than friends and didn't really want to be. Sure, Flora was like an extra limb and without her Sequoia would be devastated, but they weren't dating. It would be like dating her sister. Probably even weirder."Together?"
 
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