Chapter Text
On some level, Gladio knew that this was going to be a bad idea. A whole weekend in close quarters with Ignis? Yeah, definitely a bad idea. Such a bad idea that he hadn’t stopped daydreaming about it since it was decided that they’d enter the contest together. Ignis had taken to this in true Ignis fashion - making sure to study all the rules of the competition and devise a plan of attack. Gladio would be meeting Ignis for dinner to go over their plan and he'd be lying if he said the thought hadn't been distracting him all day. As the end of the day drew near, the fluttering in his stomach had turned into acidic churning, and Gladio found himself taking the scenic route to Ignis’s in order to calm himself down. It wasn’t as though they hadn’t done things together like this before. But it was the first time since admitting to Noct - and himself - that he found Ignis attractive and the thought had his insides twisting in knots. When he arrived, Ignis let him in without ceremony and all Gladio could think was: He doesn’t know. Ignis doesn’t know how I feel and I have to make sure I don’t act weird so that he has no reason to suspect. That was really all it took for Gladio to calm himself down. He would have been surprised but he didn’t let himself dwell on it.
Ignis had turned his dining room into a war room of sorts, the table strewn with pages of recipes and architectural notes that would have been at odds with each other if Gladio hadn’t known what it was they were about to do. On the kitchen counter were various takeout containers - an indulgence that Ignis only allowed himself when he was alone with Gladio. Gladio was, after all, the only one who really knew how much he disliked cooking. Baking on the other hand. Well, Ignis wouldn’t be so fired up about the competition if he hated it. Gladio smiled a bit and helped himself to some of the takeout before walking over to the table to examine the notes. At first glance there was no order to the way the various pages were laid out, but Gladio was more or less proficient in Ignis by now and had no trouble deciphering the content.
“So where do we start?” Gladio took a seat and watched Ignis from across the table. “Have you figured out a plan of attack yet?”
Ignis looked up from the recipe he was reading to look at Gladio. “I’ve got an idea of the basic requirements, but I thought we might make the decisions together.”
Gladio fought off a blush and turned his gaze momentarily to his food. “Yeah? I thought you were the expert here. I’m just an extra set of hands.”
“Extra set of hands or not, your help is invaluable. You should have a say in what we create.”
Gladio nearly choked on a noodle at the praise. “Well, what do I need to know?”
“According to the bake off rules,” Ignis began, “There’s a structural component and a tasting component.” He picked up a stapled packet full of yellow highlighted sentences. “We have prebake the structural component but absolutely no decorating can be done until the event. The tasting element has to be baked on site on the second day.”
“So, I guess we need to decide on a structure, do a ton of baking and then hope it all fits and we remember how to put it all together?” Gladio raised an eyebrow, hoping he was following Ignis’s thought pattern.
Ignis smiled just slightly - a kind of lopsided smirk that hinted at his genuine amusement. “Yes, something like that.” He pointed to some of the architectural images on the table, “I thought that we might spend tonight deciding on a structure, since we’ll then need to pattern it and then bake.”
“Does the structure have to be a specific size?” Gladio hummed thoughtfully, looking over the images that Ignis had selected.
“At least 2 feet in width and length and 3 feet tall.”
“Really making it easy for us, huh? Well alright. What about this?” The image that Gladio had selected was the least clear out of all the others, an ancient looking cathedral that was vaguely reminiscent of the Citadel.
“Interesting choice.’ There was something unreadable in Ignis’s eyes when Gladio looked up to meet them and he found himself starting to frown in response. But then Ignis was continuing on and the feeling faded. “Why did you choose that one?”
“It just seemed like the least likely for other teams to pick. Doing something similar to the others would be… predictable. Even if we suck at this, at least we’ll be unique.” Gladio shrugged and when he looked back at Ignis, he was smiling.
“I felt the same way. It’s quaint in its own way.”
“I didn’t take you for sentimental,” Gladio teased, glancing back at the image of the cathedral with a sense of fondness now that Ignis has made him think of it as quaint.
Ignis was quiet for a moment and then changed the subject with a sigh. “We have a lot of work ahead of us.”
“Yeah. Do you want to start on the patterning?”
“I think I’d prefer to leave it for tonight and clean some of this up instead.” Ignis gestured to the paper covered table. “It’s turned into a much larger task than I anticipated.”
Gladio felt his heart wrench as he realized just how much Ignis had already done and how tired he was. “Hey, you’ve got me. You don’t have to do all of this alone. Lean on me as much as you need to.”
The unreadable expression had settled back onto Ignis’ face. “Thank you, Gladio.”