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Katie hummed loudly while digging through her chest.
“She’s just an uptown girl livin’ in a lonely world-” she sang dramatically, stretching the note as she tossed aside her items. “She took the midnight train goin’ anywheeeeere-”
“KATIEEE!”
She jumped so hard she dropped the crystal bottle in her hands.
Turning around, she saw pink hair approaching at alarming speed.
“Katieeee! Ehhh! Ehhh!” He shuffled side to side, shoulders bouncing.
“Mike!” she laughed, immediately copying him. Her version looked like a human malfunction but her friend didn't seem to mind.
“How are you doing?”
“Great! What are you doing? You look focused, yes?”
Katie clasped her hands behind her back proudly.
“I want to make a gift for Mr. Giggles!”
Mike blinked.
“…Mr… Giggles?”
“Mr. J! Jschlatt!”
“OHHHH!” He snapped his fingers. “O cara bravo! The angry guy!”
“Yes! That's the one! Well, he, heh,” she chuckles, pushing a strand of hair behind her ear, “he's actually not angry with me, I'm his favourite.”
“Whatever you say!” He laughed then leaned closer, squinting suspiciously. "…You are not planning revenge, né?”
“No! Gift!”
Mike immediately switched moods.
“Awwww, amizade!” He clutched his chest dramatically. “I support this. He helped with the KFC didn't he?”
Katie fried chicken was still a sore subject for her, but she still nodded, her smile turning into a bit of a grimace.
“I want to get him a cake, because everyone likes cake, right?”
“Yes, yes,” he rubs his jaw looking at the sky, “Okay, okay. Cake. We make cake. Easy. I watched, like… a cooking video once.”
“You want to help me?”
“Of course I help!” He struck a heroic pose.
Katie gasped. “Really?”
“Yes! It’s going to be-” A few quick rings interrupt his train of thoughts. He pulled out his communicator, frowned, and groaned. “Ah não… I got a message, I got to go.” he sighs, “server things. But I come back! Promise. We make cake!”
“Sick! Wait, before you go, what do I need for the cake?”
“Ehh…Sugar, flour, eggs. Milk?… Eh, probably butter? Butter sounds right.”
Katie wrote everything down, accidentally sending the message on the public message board. “whoops.”
Mike watched her, tilting his head, “…You don’t know how to bake, do you?”
She smiled. “No! Not at all.”
Katie marched toward spawn, humming beneath her breath as she skipped over the stones. She’s halfway to spawn when two figures appear at the corner of his vision.
Katie strains her vision towards them and gasps. She can take a quick detour!
“Oh! Good morning, good morning!”
They both turn to look at her; the avian’s wings flutter when he sees her. “There she is. How you doin’, mate?”
“Oh, nothing much,” she said casually. “Just spy stuff.” She rubbed her hands together. “You know. On a mission!”
“Should we be worried?”
“Not at all! My mission is… uh...” she gets her communicator searching her page, “be-ne-vo-lent.” Then puts it away as Phil cackled, “whatever that means! I would love to sit and all but, like I said, I'm on a mission!” She goes to leave then turns back around, glancing at Phil then at Graf, “Do you have materials to make a cake?”
“Baking, ey? I think I do have some stuff,” he opens his backpack, rummaging through it.
While he searched, Katie turned to the other man. Graf glanced down.
“So! How are you?”
He answered enthusiastically, a smile spreading through his face, but of course, the translator had to fail right there. Because that's just her luck.
No words were coming through. The screen just gave back the polish subtitles with no English.
She nodded confidently. “Right back at ya!”
“…Co?”
Phil snorted.
“Translator broke?”
“... Yes.”
“Happens. Anyways, here you go,” he hands her the materials. Katie carefully has to empty some slots on her inventory so she hands Graf one seed, six oak wood fences and a picture of herself. He mumbles something about it, but Katie is busy picking up the materials from Phil’s hand as the British laughs.
“Thank you so much, Phil!”
“Nah, no problem. So, I'm curious, what’s the occasion?”
“I want to give Mr. Giggles a gift!”
Phil paused, the expression freezing; but the man huffs a laugh, the wings spreading for a second. “That’s actually sweet.”
Katie beams at the approval. “yes! So… uh, I'm leaving. Thanks again for the ingredients!”
They wave her back; the little pink spot disappearing down the hill, her singing slowly fading away.
“czy powinniśmy go ostrzec?”
Phil looks at the translation, shaking his head with a laugh, “I don't think we have to warn him. She’s pretty much harmless.”
Katie I'm so sorry, I got stuck at this thing :(( I cant help today.
The message brought a bit of disappointment but she quickly wrote a quick ‘it’s fine! We can see each other another day!’ with a little heart at the end, receiving a dance emoji back. She understood that from all the people in the server, she was the one less busy with stories and businesses. The only thing she got going on was her KFC and her spy work that was going poorly.
She could do something alone! She’s fine alone!
After a few minutes, the kitchen was a mess but some progress was made.
She wiped flour from her hands, cleared her throat, and pointed her spoon forward like a microphone.
“Country roads, take me hoooome…”
Her voice echoed happily around the kitchen as she moved from counter to counter, swaying slightly while gathering ingredients.
She poured sugar into the bowl, humming between lyrics, then paused to reread the instructions Mike had sent her through the communicator after apologizing.
“Okay,” she told herself seriously. “We follow instructions. We are professionals.”
The egg cracked cleanly into the bowl.
She gasped.
“Yes!”
Katie clapped for herself.
Flour followed...
…Too much flour followed.
She stared at the bowl.
“…We improvise.”
She stirred, singing louder again, occasionally changing volume for dramatic effect as if she were performing to a crowd instead of an empty room.
Halfway through mixing, she suddenly feels watched. She looks around, but nobody is there.
She finds a little pop of color on the corner and turns towards the window.
A white mask stared back at her.
She screamed, her spoon flying into the air, accidently hitting the flour bag, making it puff.
Cucurucho just kept staring as she coughed the flour. He was completely still, just… watching. His dark, empty eyes unblinking.
“Oh! Hello!”
Cucurucho did not move.
She waved cautiously.
“…Do you want to help me?”
Silence.
Katie tilted her head. “Sir, I would like an answer, please.”
Suddenly she pauses.
“…Wait. What are your pronouns?”
Cucurucho remained motionless.
She nodded decisively.
“I’m going to use they. Is that okay?”
A long pause followed.
Cucurucho’s shoulders seemed to lower slightly, the faintest suggestion of a sigh leaving his- their shoulders, then they stepped away from the window and shuffled away.
“…Okay, bye!” She returned to the bowl immediately. “West Virginiaaaa.”
She added milk carefully this time, narrating every movement like a cooking show host trying very hard to stay optimistic at the mess she's looking at.
“And now we mix.”
A bit of batter splashed onto the counter.
“Me.. eh, me when- me when… Your mom.”
The oven warmed as she waited beside it, continuing to sing softly, occasionally encouraging the cake like it could hear her.
“You’re doing amazing. Keep going. Good job.”
When the timer rang, Katie opened the oven slowly.
Inside sat a cake.
It was fucking ugly. All uneven and cracked, but she made it! So its actually not ugly at all.
She found a website explaining how to put frosting over the cake and decorated it with all she had been given by Phil.
Katie lifted the plate carefully.
“Mr. Giggles will like you,” she whispered to the cake.
The door opened after a second. The man he was looking for stood behind it, his hair ruffled around the polished horns. Squinting suspiciously at her.
“Hello, Katie…Why are you smiling like that?”
“I brought you a gift!”
He eyed the cake like it might explode.
“…You baked.”
“Yes!”
"You?"
"Yes, me!"
He took the plate cautiously, turning it around as he stared at it; she got a bit nervous, hoping he couldn't see how messy it really was.
“…Is it gluten-free?”
Katie froze instantly.
Her brain sprinted through every memory she possessed about flour. There were none.
“…Is flour gluten?”
Schlatt snorted, fully opening the door gesturing for her to follow.
“I’m kidding.” She sighed, relieved. “And I also hope you're kidding, because yes: flour has fuckin gluten, the fuck?”
He inspected the cake again.
“I’m supposed to be on a diet,” he muttered. "I'm getting fat.” He sighed dramatically, pulling the drawer and taking a fork. “Whatever. Damage is already done.”
She sat opposite of him and stared as he took a bite of the cake.
“…This is bad,” he said honestly. “Like, impressively bad.”
Katie’s shoulders dropped.
“Oh. You don’t have to-”
He took another bite.
Then another.
“Well,” he said through chewing, “I already fucked my diet, so I may as well finish it.”
Katie watched, confused but hopeful.
He finished the entire cake, set the empty plate down, and wiped frosting from his hands.
“Yeah,” he concluded. “Never bake again.”
“I will never!” She smiled. Katie felt like jumping with joy; yes, he may have hated it, but he never slapped the cake on her face or threw it in the trash! That's a win!
“Now that I have you here…” he stands and walks away; she tries to follow but he points back at the chair, “no, you stay. Give me a fucking minute.”
She sits back down listening as he ranted about baby ducks and shadows. When he comes back he's carrying a little hat with a yellow duck in a blue pond.
“Got this and its so ugly so I knew ‘Katie would 100% wear this shit.’”
Katie beams, her smile widening as she put it on her head, the chicken hat forgotten on the table. “Oh, it's perfect! Thank you, Mr Giggles.”
“Don't fucking call me that,” he muttered, but Katie could see the little smirk.