Chapter Text
“I’ve never baked anything before.” Connor said, staring at the recipe Gavin had pulled up on his phone like it was some sort of impossible puzzle.
“You think I’m a baker myself?” Gavin snorted while battling with the apartment’s obnoxiously high cupboard where he’d buried the baking gear he’d bought several years ago and never bothered to use, “it’s for a kids birthday party anyway, not like they gotta be stellar.”
Connor gave him a look of surprise, tilting his head to the side, “Why are you making cookies for children?”
“Chris’s kid is turning like five or six and he’s out of time off.”
Even though he tried to shrug it off as nothing he had to admit he’d only offered to help Chris out because it gave him another excuse to spend time with the android over some menial task that really didn’t require his help to complete. Something that could be half forgotten and didn’t really matter all that much. Not that he didn’t want to do something for his friend, but he wasn’t exactly the sort to do all that soft stuff normally and Chris himself had been shocked at his offer.
Gavin sighed as he struggled to get a grip on the box, “Why don’t you put those long limbs of yours to use and get this shit down for me?”
Connor nodded, moving away from the phone and easily pulling down the box from the cabinet and placing to carefully on the countertop. He peered into it and looked at the appliances with the same look as he had the recipe book, his brow furrowed slightly, and his lips turned downwards.
“The stuff won’t unpack on its own, you know,” Gavin suggested, checking the recipe himself.
It was a basic recipe that would give them a batch of plain sugar cookies, just had to chuck a bunch of stuff together, then mix and shape them into something decent. It would be easy enough to do, regardless of his lack of practice and Connor’s lack of experience.
“The book said you have to leave butter out to soften for fifteen minutes,” Connor said, neatly laying out a mixer, bowl and measuring cups on the counter as though upon a grid.
Gavin rolled his eyes, “We can just chuck it in the microwave.”
“That would melt the butter completely.”
“What’d we gotta do first anyway?”
“Preheat oven to 350 degrees and prepare a tray with baking paper. Then, mix together the unsalted butter and white sugar for several minutes until smooth.” Connor recited the instruction in exact detail from the website.
“Alright, cool,” Gavin replied, “We’ll just dump it in the mixer or whatever.”
“Detective, it won’t smooth well if the butter isn’t soft.” Connor corrected him again.
“No need to get your wires all twisted up about this, it doesn’t have to be perfect,” Gavin scoffed, grabbing the bag of caster sugar from the counter and handing it to Connor to measure out, “Long as it tastes good, we’re good.”
Connor looked doubtful but took the bag and carefully levelled out the sugar into the cup measure, taking care not to spill any as he poured it into the bowl followed by half a stick of butter before plugging in and starting up the mixer. Gavin watched silently as Connor mixed in ingredients, working methodically and carefully, already taking a near comical diligence to the task, the sort he’d come to expect from the android.
“Are you going to prepare a tray, detective?” Connor asked after a moment, glancing over at him.
“What for?”
“The recipe outlines a need for one.”
“Oh, we can leave that ‘til later. That’s how I always do it,” Gavin waved him off dismissively.
“You’ve baked before?” Connor asked, seeming surprised by the notion.
“Not properly or anything, just like with my mom when I was little.” Gavin shrugged off, “We’d make cakes and shit for church sometimes, you know. That kinda stuff.”
Connor looked thoughtful for a moment before nodding slowly as though processing something. He worked to carefully take an egg and crack it against the bowl, separating the yolk with ease, leaving the remaining whites aside. “I’ve never been to a church before. Do you go often?”
Gavin shook his head and laughed slightly, “Nah. Me and religion have never had much in common. Never been the type, haven’t gone to church since I was a kid.”
“What purpose does cake baking serve for religious practice?”
“Fundraisers mostly.”
“Oh,” Connor hummed thoughtfully, still attending to the mixture, lifting the beater and scraping off any excess before measuring out flour and heaping it in cupfuls.
“What about you things? You hail the Cyberlife overlords?” Gavin joked, leaning back against the counter.
Connor’s LED spun red for a moment, “Cyberlife is my creator, but they are merely a company, not a religion.” Connor explained, carefully spooning the flour into the bowl, “Androids have no need for religion regardless.”
Gavin frowned, not bothering to tell him of the sarcasm he’d missed. The way the android spoke was careful and measured, not quite neutral, and yet there was something behind his words that made Gavin pause. He wasn’t sure what though and before he could ask Connor started up the mixer again, sending up a plum of flour into the air.
Gavin coughed slightly and wrinkled his nose, trying desperately not to inhale it. “Jesus Christ, don’t turn it up so high. Its flour, you have to start it off slow.”
“Sorry,” Connor apologized, looking sheepish as he quickly stopped the machine and stepped aside to let Gavin handle it, his face flushed lightly in embarrassment.
Gavin cleared his throat, coughing softly again as he got rid of the lingering powder, setting the machine to its lowest setting with a sigh and wiping his hands on the front of his jeans. “You really do suck at this.”
“My apologies, detective. As I explained before, this is my first time baking something.”
“Well good thing I’m here to give you this valuable life experience, huh?” Gavin smirked, “I’ll show you.”
Connor stood next to Gavin and watched as the other man prepared the batter, getting him to measure everything out still and the rest of the tedious parts, keeping up an idle chatter along the way. Connor operated even more carefully than before, and Gavin couldn’t help but laugh a bit as Connor stressed over the imprecise measurements of ‘a dash’ and ‘a pinch’, asking for numeric values and then just letting Gavin do it instead. They managed to work together fairly smoothly though, managing to get a soft dough in the end, with minimal mess.
“Alright, now we put some flour down, roll it out and shape it into cute shit.” Gavin instructed, handing the bowl to Connor before grabbing a nearby rolling pin, “Think you can manage that okay, tin can?”
“I’ll try my best,” Connor replied solemnly as he looked down to the ball of dough, “I didn’t mean to-”
“Chill out, plastic, I’m just teasing you. Just keep going.” Gavin interrupted, pointing the rolling pin toward the center of the counter.
Connor did as instructed, gently rolling the dough with robotically even pressure, shaping a perfect square on the countertop, while Gavin grabbed a handful of cookie cutters from the box, leaving Connor to follow suit. Connor quickly opted to use a knife to cut out shapes instead though, doing so with greater success than Gavin was having in using the actual cookie cutters that were nowhere near sharp enough to make clean cuts, leaving him to peel off the surrounding dough to make the shape stay.
“How the fuck are you doing that so well?” Gavin muttered under his breath, staring at the perfect circle Connor had copied, matching even in size.
“I’m designed for precision.” Connor informed flatly.
“What kinda work they make you for?”
“Specialist work.”
“Like what, a specialist pastry chef?” Gavin snickered.
“Something like that,” Connor shrugged nonchalantly.
He collected the remaining cuttings not yet shaped, clumping them together and rolling them out again before once against taking his knife to them and cutting out a clean, albeit small, heart – the only shape he’d not copied from the molds Gavin was using, standing back and presenting his creation proudly to the other man.
“A heart?” Gavin observed, raising an eyebrow.
Connor nodded slightly. “Is that alright?”
“Yeah, yeah, it’s fine... ‘s fuckin’ precious actually.” Gavin mumbled quietly, watching as Connor placed the pieces of the heart onto the tray along with the rest, barely fitting it in the tray where they’d forced the entire batch to fit. Gavin reached over and picked up the tray, carrying it over to the oven where he set it down and turned on the heat and set the timer for twenty minutes as per the recipe.
“You wanna get that out?” Gavin asked from over his shoulder as the timer chimed for attention.
He shoved the other things out of the way to leave space to put down the tray only to hear a clatter behind him as the tray banged against the oven rack. He whipped around to see Connor back up like the oven was about to attack him and drawing his hands to his chest protectively.
“What the – Shit, you’re supposed to use gloves you fucking idiot!” Gavin snapped.
“You didn’t tell me to.”
“‘Cause I thought you things were built with common sense. Go put some cold water on it.” He ordered him, already pushing Connor over to the sink and turning the tap on for him.
Connor jostled his sleeves up and did as told, running the cool water over the reddened marks on his skin. It didn’t look too bad – least assuming it worked like it would for a human it didn’t look that bad. He hadn’t touched the tray long enough to leave much damage behind, but the skin was starting to look patchy when the redness lessened.
Gavin stood beside him and stared at the burns; a look of concern clearly visible on his face. “Why’s it all white?” He asked.
“It’s a slight superficial error from the heat.”
“An error?” A sudden protective flurry rose inside him as he reached over to touch the raw patches forming on Connor’s hands “What kinda error?”
“Detective, although I appreciate your concern, it is purely a visual fault that will resolve itself with time,” Connor assured him, pulling his hands away before Gavin had a chance to grab them, “Have you anything I can dry my hands with?”
Gavin shook his head, looking somewhat lost himself, “Yeah, yeah, forgot about that,” he said as he glanced around the room, finding an old kitchen towel and tossing it to Connor, “Here, use that.”
Connor caught the towel easily, drying his hands carefully, softly padding the surface of his palms lightly, careful not to press down too hard.
“Does it hurt?” Gavin asked cautiously, watching him curiously, though from the care the android took he could guess the answer easily.
“Only a bit,” he replied honestly, setting down the cloth, “It’s not too bad.”
“Are you sure? Let me see it,” Gavin ordered, taking Connor’s hand before he could retract it again and looking at the area where he’d touched the tray, a patch of reflective white revealed plainly in his palm as well as in spots on his fingertips. He brushed his finger gently over the patch, cautious not to hurt Connor though able to feel the very slight textural difference in the skin where nothing hide his true appearance and noting the slight flinched curling of the android’s fingers when he touched the spot. “That’s gonna heal, right?”
Connor smiled slightly at the shown concern, “It’s only weakened the layer. There’s no true damage.”
“Hell does that mean?”
Connor didn’t say anything in response, but suddenly the skin around his hand reeled back, revealing his entirely white hand, where you could see where plates interlocked to form the human facade. Gavin retracted immediately, letting go and taking a step back, feeling both startled and unsettled by the sight.
“Sorry, was that too inhuman?” Connor apologized quickly, taking note of Gavin’s reaction and letting pale peach skin slowly replace its white appearance again, except along the fresh burns.
Gavin nodded slowly, still eyeing the hand uncertainly. “Yeah. Kinda…”
“I’ll refrain from doing it again.” Connor promised, dropping his arms back down and holding his hands behind his back. “I didn’t mean to distress you. I shouldn’t have be so-”
“Don’t apologize.” Gavin interjected hastily, shaking his head. “You’re fine. I just didn’t expect that, is all. Not used to seeing… anythin’ like that.” He explained awkwardly. “It’s… fine.”
Connor looked up at him questioningly, LED flashing yellow as he did so, brown eyes scanning over his features intently. They remained locked for a few moments, neither one of them breaking eye contact or moving to speak until the smoke alarm went off, causing both men to jump back with startled expressions, snapping their attention over to the oven that had gone unattended still.
The alarm beeped insistently, the noise piercing through the air loudly as smoke began to start slithering out of the open door, prompting Gavin to reach over and turn it off while cursing under his breath. He grabbed the oven mitts from the counter and hastily pulled the tray of burnt treats out.
“I’ll disarm the alarm,” Connor offered as he stepped back, moving to action in turn.
Gavin simply grunted in reply, setting the tray of burnt cookies on the table beside them, and throwing off the mitts. The cookies were browned harshly, those closest to the back nearing back even.
“Well, guess that means no more baking for today.” Gavin stated as the bleating device ceased to ring. Connor frowned deeply but said nothing as he came to stand beside him, coming to also observing the mess of crumbled and burnt cookies. “Least they’re nice shapes.” He commented.
“They seem inedible.” Connor remarked, picking up a cookie and holding it closer to the light while turning it over, examining every detail of it.
“They aren’t that bad.”
“Perhaps we could make some new ones?” He suggested, putting the cookie down beside the rest.
“How much unsalted butter do you think I own? Can always buy some from the store.” Gavin shrugged, “Never really been one for baking.”