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thiswasinevitableid · 5 years

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Kitchen Nightmares

Prompt for the 25th was: Sabotage

“Alright” Mama stands, hands on hips, surveying the pairs lined up in front of her “here’s the rules: y’all got two hours to make us dessert. And whichever one we like best, that team don’t got to help with clean-up from big fall dinner next week. Any questions? Aubrey?”

“How come Ned doesn’t have to compete?”

“Because, friend Aubrey, gentlemen of mine and Thacker’s ages are in no condition to do such difficult labor.”

“Ned, you fuckin crashed a jetpack once. Cleanin up would be a piece of cake.”

“To be fair” Barclay says, “you haven’t seen what dishes look like that day.”

“And I banned Arlo from the kitchen ten years ago on account of the gorp incident.” Mama holds up a whistle, while Juno readies a stopwatch.

“On you marks, get set, go!”

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“Alright ‘Drid, what should we make?”

“Hmmm, oh! I rather enjoy Jell-O, can we make that?”

“No, goofus, I meant what gives us the best chances of winnin?”

“I can’t tell just yet, as the others have not decided on their dishes, so the futures are all in flux. And I don’t want to lose precious time by waiting on them.”

“Good point.” Duck taps his chin, snaps his fingers, “got it, Juno’s got a weak spot for pumpkin cream cheese brownies, used to eat half a pan of them herself whenever my mom made a batch.”

“Brownies it is. Do I get to lick the spoon?”

“Of course, sugar.”

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“Why are you even competing, aren’t you doing most of the cooking that day?”

“Yeah, but assuming because I cook everyone else will do the dishes has backfired, big time, before.” Barclay shudders, then smiles “plus, didn’t want to leave you without a partner, agent.”

“What are we making?”

“Pumpkin doughnuts. Mama loves ‘em and...is that a X-files patterned apron?”

“Yes. I bought one because I wanted to help you in the kitchen.”

“You’re such a nerd, I love it, now hand me that mixing bowl.”

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“Okay, so, we’re making bee-sting pudding.” Hollis cracks their knuckles as they stare at the spice rack.

“Do you, like, need me to go round up some bees?”

“No, Jake, I need you to grab some honey and some whiskey.”

“Can do!”

“.....Did you just heely over to get that?”

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“What is our battle plan, Leo Tarkesian? For I wish to be victorious, and also to charm Madeleine Cobb!”

“Uh, my ma used to make these real nice pumpkin cookies. Was thinkin we make some fillin to go in ‘em and make us some whoopie pies. Y’know, do ‘em up fancy-like.”

“Very well. We shall make whoopie!”

“Pies, Minerva, whoopie pies”

“It is not sporting to eavesdrop, Wayne Newton.”

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“We could make cookies? Oh! What if we did them in the shape of Dr. Harris Bonkers?”

“I think we lost our rabbit cookie-cutter in the blender incident, firebug.”

“Damn it.”

“We could make cupcakes. Barclay taught me his basic recipe, and I can modify it a little to be fall-ish.”

“You’re so smart.” Aubrey kisses her nose, “okay, you bake, I’ll decorate.”

Dani starts mixing ingredients together, while Aubrey takes stock of the sprinkle situation. As she’s doing so, she spots Hollis whisking something over the stove while Jake hands them ingredients. Whatever it is smells delicious, so good that she wants to lick the air.

Hmm, that’s not great in terms of their odds.

With practiced sleight of hand, the sugar at the Hornet station becomes salt. Jake will forgive her for the prank. He loves pranks.

Two minutes later, she hears Hollis make a “bleh” sound.

“What the fuck, this is salt!? I know I got sugar out.”

Her giggle gives her away.

“Aw, what the heck bro!”

“All’s fair in love, war, and dish-duty avoidance, Jake.”

“That so?” Hollis cocks an eyebrow, and it distracts Aubrey from the handful of flour that Jake launches her way.

She shrieks out a laugh, shakes the powder from her hair and flicks a cloud of it towards him with spell.

Unfortunately, said spell goes a bit wide and hits Indrid, coating his glasses.

“Oh, bother.” He reaches for them.

“‘Drid wait you’re right by-”

Clang

“Ooops, sorry Barclay, I didn’t mean to knock your bowl over.”

“Uh huh, sure.” Barclay smirks, eyeing first their brownie mix and then the nearby jar of chili powder.

“Don’t you dare.” Red eyes narrow.

“Wayne Newton, your consorts’ wing is getting feathers in our batter!”

“Minerva, for fuck’s sake, you can call me Duck.”

“Duck!”

“That’s betterACKfuck.” Duck splutters, spots the culprit in the form of Leo holding a formerly full bag of powdered sugar.

“That was a dirty trick old man!”

“What’re you gonna do about it?”

“Gonna make sure you get flour where the sun don’t shine.” He dives after an escaping Leo, leaving their station unattended. Barclay steps over and calmly dumps most of the chili powder into it their bowl. Turns back to his station, only to find Indrid holding his and Sterns batter out of the agents reach.

With a wide grin, Indrid unfurls his tongue.

“Don’t even think about it.” Barclay growls. Indrid locks eyes with him as he jams his tongue into the bowl and repeatedly licks the mixture.

“Gah, that’s so unsanitary!” Stern yells. Barclay takes off his bracelet, and as soon as he’s in his Sylph form Indrid drops the bowl and tries to run.

“Oh no you don’t, not letting you get moth cooties on more of my ingredients!”

Indrid chirrs in amusement, flapping his wings to keep Barclay at bay and sending up a cloud of dry ingredients. It settles just in time for Stern to see Jake trying to steal their remaining yeast. So he grabs the sprayer nozzle from the nearby sink and points it at the younger man.

“C’mon bro” Jake takes off his disguise, “you couldn’t possibly hurt this face.”

Stern sprays him, covers his mouth with his hand to laugh as Jake shakes the water from his fur and poofs up.

Jake shrugs, “your loss dude.”

“What do you mean my- Hollis get back here with that dough! The kitchen is no place for stunts!”

“Fight the power!”

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“Duck, Indrid, you’re up first.”

Indrid sets the plates down with a triumphant flourish. Juno’s face lights up.

“Oh hell yeah, Mama Newtons brownie recipe.”

She takes an enormous bite. The frantically grabs for her water.

“Blegh, Duck, why are they so spicy?”

“There was an incident with some spices and we did not have time to make new batter.”

“That got anythin to do with why Duck is covered in powdered sugar.”

“Yes.”

“Huh. Well, nice try fellas and- Indrid would you stop lickin him-I can see what you were goin for, but let’s see what Hollis and Jake did.”

As Jake sets out the bowls, Hollis says, “we made bee-sting pudding, with bourbon whipped cream on top.”

“Why friend Hollis, that’s a remarkably refined dish, bravo.” Ned eyes his pudding happily.

“Thanks. I think. Anyway.” They point to the bowls. All four judges take a bite, and proceed to make rather comical faces.

“Hollis, is it supposed to be this salty?” Thacker rubs his tongue with a napkin.

“No.”

“Oh, uh, I see.”

Minerva and Leo are up next, with the warrior taking extra care when setting Mama’s plate in front of her.

“Leo?”

“Yeah, Juno?”

“Please tell me the black feathers are made of chocolate or something?” She eyes the whoopie pie worriedly while Mama picks feathers off of hers.

“Can I get away with sayin their garnish?”

Thacker, Ned, and Juno all push their plates back. Mama takes a small bite, “I mean, the parts that don’t got feathers in ‘em are good, but that ain’t all that much of ‘em. Good try.” This she directs at Minerva with an odd little smile.

“Barclay, whadaya got?”

“Nothing.” The cook grumbles.

“We lost one batch of dough to, ah, contamination, and the other to some ‘stunts.’”

“O-kay. Aubrey, Dani?”

“Tadah!” Aubrey sets a plate of cupcakes down, all frosted in bright orange with black, glittery sprinkles.

Ned nibbles one rather daintily to keep frosting out of his beard (Thacker makes no such attempt), Juno takes one bite and moans, and Mama downs hers and says, “thank fuck.”

“Gonna go ahead and say it;s unanimous. Aubrey and Dani, you win.”

“Woohoo!” Aubrey shouts, then dips Dani in a celebratory kiss.

“Wait, hang on a second, they’re the ones who started the whole mess back there.” Duck protests.

Mama regards the pair, who don matching sheepish expressions, “That so? Well, they still win this, so they ain’t cleanin up from dinner next week.”

The others groan.

“They are, however, cleanin up from whatever the hell went on back there today.”

#promptober #TAZ Amnesty #Indruck #sternclay #danbrey #hollice #hijinks

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