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Amethio heard a knock on his door. At this time of night? Strange. Most of the Explorers would either be getting ready for bed or already asleep; Amethio was only awake because he had only returned from training a short while ago. Curious, he opened the door.
Ah right, Spinel. Mr Nocturnal. Amethio forgot about him.
Before he could slam the door in his face, Spinel shoved a plate of cookies into his chest. Well, less shoved and more gently tapped. "Here."
"What is this?"
"I was making cookies, and I had extras, so I figured you'd want some." Spinel avoided eye contact. "But don't think I made them for you."
"How old are you, twelve?" Amethio looked at the cookies. Round sugar cookies, with pale pink icing and white chocolate drizzled on top. "And these don't look half-bad, either... I didn't know you baked."
"I've only done it a few times before, so I'm not very good. Anyway, are you gonna eat them or not?"
Amethio sighed and took the plate. "Alright, I'll try it, calm down."
Spinel looked visibly excited as Amethio set the plate down and removed one of his gloves to try one. Hesitantly, he took a small bite.
He chewed slowly as he processed the flavour. "You know how I said they didn't look half-bad?"
"Yes?"
"I take that back."
"Oh!" Spinel gasped dramatically, putting a hand to his chest. "My feelings... Amethio... you're so cold..."
Amethio furrowed his brow. "Spinel, what is in this cookie?" It had started normal, maybe a little less sweet than it should have been, but as he kept chewing, the taste was weird in a way that wasn't normal. He should know, Cervantis used to bake together with him when he was a child and it was awful, but it wasn't anything like Spinel's cookie. It gave him an uncomfortable, gritty feeling in his mouth that made him want to gag, nothing like he had ever tasted before.
Spinel responded with a vague hum as he leaned his elbow on the doorframe and continued avoiding eye contact.
"Spinel!"
"It's, uh, it's sawdust," he finally said nonchalantly.
Amethio looked at him, dumbfounded. "You fed me sawdust?!"
Spinel burst out laughing. "It's, it's, it's fine, it's edible sawdust, you're fi─" he cut himself off with a wheeze, doubled over and holding onto the doorframe for support.
Amethio threw the rest of the sawdust cookie at him. He hated that it crumbled more than a normal sugar cookie should have. "You chowderhead! How much sawdust is in this?!"
"Twenty-five percent of the flour by weight," he managed through his laughter. "So─ so about fifty-seven grams."
"Fifty-seven?!" he exclaimed. "Ugh, I'm going to be sick. I'm actually going to be sick. What is wrong with you?!"
"Well, I saw online that you could make cookies out of sawdust and so I wanted to test it out!" Spinel slowly started stepping back. "And I thought, 'You know what? I haven't done anything nice for Amethio recently, and I'm sure that he would appreciate a cookie or two since he was working so hard─' In my defence, the twenty-percent cookie turned out just fine."
"Shut up!" he growled. "I'll kill you."
"Ahahaha..." Spinel took another step back before pivoting and sprinting down the hallway.
"HEY, GET BACK HERE!" Amethio shouted as he gave chase. "SPINEL, YOU'RE A DEAD MAN!"