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Kung Lao had one task today. One.
Build a gingerbread house.
And for some reason, he took that assignment like it was a divine calling from the Elder Gods.
The two of you sat on your kitchen counter surrounded by sugary carnage. Tubes of frosting lay everywhere like fallen soldiers, gumdrops rolling around like they were trying to escape whatever crime Lao was committing. He was hunched over his half-assembled house, tongue sticking out as he tried to line up the walls with surgical precision.
It would’ve been adorable if it wasn’t so stupid.
You sipped your cocoa, snorting.
“Behold!” Lao suddenly declared, slamming his frosting tube down like a judge with a gavel. “The world’s greatest architect comes alive!”
You blinked at him.
“It’s a cookie house, Lao.”
He ignored you, naturally.
“This gingerbread house shall be the gingeriest of them all! Built by yours truly.” He bowed like he’d just solved world hunger.
You eyed what he proudly called “construction.”
One wall was visibly slanting. Another was beginning to detach. The entire structure was seconds from becoming a sugar-coated crime scene.
“Hell of a job, Michelangelo,” you laughed, nodding at the slowly collapsing disaster.
Meanwhile, your own house sat next to you—perfect walls, perfect angles, roof ready to be decorated. Everything neat. Everything structurally sound.
A direct insult to his entire bloodline.
He decided he needed to take it personal.
He committed the gravest culinary war crime in human history.
He cheated.
You watched—frozen, horrified—as Kung Lao casually glanced between the two gingerbread houses and simply swapped them.
Just. Swapped. Them.
Like a thief in broad daylight with zero shame and even less brain cells.
He immediately started decorating your house like it had always belonged to him.
Your jaw dropped so hard it nearly cracked the counter.
“Excuse me!?” you gasped, voice going up an octave.
Lao didn’t even flinch. Didn’t even blink.
He was already piping frosting along the roofline with the focus of a man performing emergency surgery and adding gumdrops like he was curating an art exhibit. He's probably planning the gingerbread family’s mortgage situation in his head.
“LAO! That was my house!” you whined, slamming your mug down and shoving his shoulder like he’d just committed treason.
He waved you off.
“Don’t interrupt the artist, Y/N,” he scolded, tone dripping with fake authority. “Besides… we must use all available resources to our disposal.”
“I’m not an available resource, Lao!” you snapped. “You literally just STOLE my house. Mine. I built that!”
He gave you the filthiest, smuggest evil little grin known to mankind.
“Who’s gonna believe you?”
You stared at him.
He stared back.
A single gumdrop fell off the edge of his stolen roof.
And then you launched yourself at him like an unhinged feral cat, ready to commit justified homicide.
Kung Lao yelped like you’d stabbed him, stumbling backward until he hit the floor with a thud. You followed immediately, tackling him with all the righteous fury of someone whose property had been desecrated.
What followed could only be described as a feral brawl between a very angry housecat and a golden retriever who didn’t understand what he did wrong.
“Y/N!!” Lao yelped as you smacked at his shoulders, “IT’S JUST A HOUSE!”
“IT’S MY HOUSE!” you screeched, trying to pin him by the wrists.
“I WAS ENHANCING IT— OW!”
Your palm connected with his thick head.
“SHUT UP!” you roared, wrestling him like your life depended on it.
He tried to wiggle away. You latched on harder. He tried to sit up. You shoved him back down.
Gumdrops were raining. Frosting was smeared across the floor. One of the gingerbread walls slid off the counter and shattered dramatically beside you.
It was pure, unfiltered holiday carnage.
And honestly?
Neither of you had the dignity to stop.
Eventually, the war ended.
You sat on the counter, mug back in hand, glaring daggers at Kung Lao—who now sat slumped in a chair with a bag of frozen peas balanced on his head like some kind of culinary casualty.
“It was just a house,” he muttered under his breath.
You didn’t even blink.
“I will deadass beat you up again, Lao.”
His mouth fell open. “You’re mean!”
“You stole my house. My house. Do you understand the vision I had for that thing? The lore? The backstory? You robbed an entire gingerbread bloodline of their future, you sugar-coated tyrant.”
Lao stared at you with the biggest, fakest, guiltiest puppy eyes on earth.
You refused to look at him.
“Come onnnnn,” he whined, scooting his chair closer. “I said I’m sorrryyyyy. Let’s build another one. Together. We’ll decorate it your way this time.”
You turned your head painfully slow, glare sharp enough to skin him alive. He flinched like you threw a knife.
After a beat, you sighed, slid off the counter, and grabbed another gingerbread kit from the pantry.
“Fine,” you said, pointing a threatening finger at him. “But I swear to gods, if you mess this one up, what I just did to you will look like mercy.”
Lao raised both hands in surrender, grinning like the menace he was.
“Yes ma’am,” he mocked sweetly.
You didn’t hesitate.
You plucked up a stray gumdrop and chucked it at his face.
It smacked him directly in the eye.
“OW!!” he yelped, falling backward out of the chair like he’d been assassinated.
You smiled—slow, satisfied, petty.
Then calmly opened your new gingerbread kit.
Serves him right.