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Today Lani was a woman on a mission. A woman of seriousness, grit, and clarity. Not afraid to get her hands dirty and get the job done. What does this particular job entail you might ask? Making the coolest sweet treat for her sweeties here at Orthrus that's what. Leilani stared at their assortment of goods with her hands on her hip, looking quite proud of the spread if she was being honest. [break][break]

Now, Lani was no chef or pâtissier by any means. But she could make a mean smore and she never really had any trouble following boxed cookie recipes. This, however, would be an entirely different challenge but she wasn't afraid. No, rather, Lani looked adversity in the eye and said 'You're not that guy pal, you're not that guy.'[break][break]

At the question of if they really needed all of these things, the answer came fluently with the most confidence she could muster. "Of course!" she grinned brightly at her assistant for the day, Marshall. "In order to make the sweetest treat ever we gotta have all the ingredients."[break][break]

Lani reached for these cute matching pink frilly aprons she purchased for the both of them. "Here, put this on. Don't want our clothes to get messed up. Oh, and wash your hands too." She said as she began to pull her long onyx colored hair up into a ponytail. "Abs and Magi have birthday's coming up so it's suuuuuper important we do a good job on this cake." she said as she grabbed the paper that had the recipe.[break][break]

"After all, how sucky would that be for a birthday present?" she chuckled at the thought, failure not even being a consideration in her mind. "So I have a couple recipes. What kind of cake do you think the boys would like the best?" she askes with bright eyes as she heads over to the sink to wash her hands too.
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At the question if she'd ever baked a cake before Lani could only grin at Marshall. That should be answer enough for him to know . It shouldn't be much harder than making box cookies she was sure. Marshall did say something noteworthy though. "Something they would both like hmm?" she mused.[break][break]

Well it would certainly be better than making two cakes. "Chocolate huh?" she said as she looked over her recipes. "Yeah I have something for that. This could work." she beams at Marshall. "Okay you turn the oven on and I'll set aside the stuff we need." she said as she tied the strap of the apron around her waist tighter. [break][break]

The prep-work was easy. Honestly if the rest of the work would be as easy as this then they had nothing to worry about. Once the ingredients were all in the mixing bowl Leilani was feeling extremely confident this would be smooth sailing from here on out. "See, this isn't so bad." she said to Marshall as she flicked the switch on the mixer. [break][break]

But she wasn't paying attention and flicked the switch to the highest setting. Within seconds flour popped up from the mixing bowl and burst all around them in a flour bomb. Lani shrieked as flour coated her face and hair and clothes. "Make it stop! Make it STOP!" She screamed as she tried to flick the switch off but the piece broke in her hands.
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The switch fucking broke. [break][break]

How the fuck does that even happen?! She didn't even pull on it that hard! Or did she? She was in a panic to shut the thing off after all. Lani could feel her face coated in flour. A quick glance showed her the kitchen resembled a something of a powder bomb aftermath. Leilani was still standing there in shock trying to wrap her head around how things had managed to get so fucked when she heard the snickering.[break][break]

Leilani slowly turned to look at Marshall who was wearing an incriminating shit eating grin on his face and she felt her eye twitch. "You laughing at me?" she asked as she slowly turned to face him. "You think this is funny?" she asked with a narrowed glare in his direction. "I'll give you something to laugh at...c'mere." she said as she stretched her arms out wide and started slowly approaching her friend.[break][break]

"Come give me a hug." she said with a mischievous grin of her own. "You know I give the best kinds." she said fully prepared to chase him around the kitchen if he even attempted to run away from her. This boy was getting flour touched if it was the last thing she did. Since he found it so hilarious. [break][break]

***[break][break]

After playing around they found themselves back on track once more. They had to restart but that was no problem since they had an abundance of supplies. This time however Lani was across the room while the whisk was in Marshall's hand. "Okay we gotta mix the wet stuff and dry stuff together but not all at once apparently. We're supposed to...fold it? The fuck does that mean?" she muttered to herself as she squinted at the instructions. "Whatever. You stir the main stuff and I'll slowly add in the rest of the ingredients. Sound cool?"
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Lani swiped some of the chocolate mix with her finger upon Marshall's question. As she popped her finger in her mouth for a taste her face scrunched up as she stared at the batter. It tasted sour and bitter. Was chocolate supposed be fucking sour? "Uhh..." Lani grabbed the instructions again and pointed at the steps.[break][break]

"I mean we did everything right." she said as she mentally went through the steps in her head. Lani frowned. "Do we try and fix it or trust it and leave it as is?" Lani asked him. In her experience with baking, which wasn't much, but whenever she didn't trust the paper instructions that's when shit would get fucked up. [break][break]

Then again, this was no boxed cookie mix. This batter tasted wrong. But if they were gonna attempt to fix it what should they do? "Add more sugar maybe?" she wondered with a deep crease in her brows. This needed to work out of else this birthday celebration would be a funeral instead.
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Lani watched Marshall nervously as he tasted the batter again. But she sighed in relief once he said it was better. At the mention of pans Lani looked around. "Ah right...now where did I put them?" she muttered to herself as she began to quickly search around the kitchen. Minutes later pans were strewn all across the kitchen countertops and floors before she found what she figured would be satisfactory. [break][break]

"Two round pans!" she huffed triumphantly. "Go ahead and dump them in there and pop 'em in the oven." She said as she stared at the mess around them. "I uh...guess I'll start cleaning." she said with a groan before heading over to fix her mess. While she quickly worked on cleaning up the space they worked on the cakes went in the oven. [break][break]

***[break][break]

Time passed and Lani had finished cleaning and was chatting the time away with Marshall. She had no care in the world. At least until she smelled something funny. "You smell that?" she asked before she jumped out of her seat. "The fucking cakes!" she shouted as she ran to the oven and yanked it open. A puff of smoke billowed in her face causing her to cough. [break][break]

She quickly grabbed the oven mittens and took them out of the oven. They looked like they had seen better days. Lani had forgotten about setting a timer while she was cleaning and then got carried away talking with Marshall. Lani looked completely heartbroken as she stared at the cakes. [break][break]

"M-maybe we can let it cool and cut off the burnt parts?" she asked as she turned to look at Marshall. Leilani's usually confident gaze as now clearly shaken and it almost looked like she was going to cry. She was so sure that these would turn out great. She could've give this to the boss and Abner. [break][break]

One the cakes had cooled down enough she attempted to shave off the burnt bits to salvage the cake. Luckily for them it was mostly the outside that was burnt the inside was still soft. The rest of the process went pretty smooth too. They both used the frosting that she had bought and coated the cake and decorated it. When they were finished it looked nothing like the picture. In fact, it looked pretty sad but they'd worked hard.[break][break]

"I feel like....we should taste it." Lani said with her hands on her hip, her forehead creased in a frown. After the whole battle they went through to get to the finish line, Lani didn't trust the final product. Too much shit happened before they got here.

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