Pancake Party: 2 Flour 2 Furious

**Sweet Nothings Bakery, Tuesday August 11, 3:45 PM.**

“You sure the Noodles aren’t gonna disaster bomb this kitchen, too?” Ellen bumps the refrigerator door closed with her hip, placing eggs and milk and butter on the stainless steel countertop.

Atlanta rolls her eyes affectionately, placing measuring cups onto the counter. “They were pre-banned from this kitchen. Mom won’t even let Ernest set foot back here. And even if they were planning on trying to break in to finish their food crimes, Grandy is supervising them cleaning. I think the threat of letting Mom know what they did to her home kitchen is enough of a threat to keep them busy for a while.”

“Oh yeah?” Ellen laughs at the idea of Hero One, *the Hero One*, watching those clowns clean up a mess of what was probably at least half marshmallows. “I thought they retired from hero work? Or do food crimes not count?”

Atlanta laughs. “If they count then I’m an accomplice. And saving three boys from the wrath of my mom is worth un-retiring for, right?” She shakes her head. “I have no idea what they were trying to make for Melody, and I’m not sure I want to know.”

“Long as it’s edible and made of sugar, I’m sure she’ll like it. Speaking of which, what the hell have we got ourselves into?” Ellen checks the recipe on the tablet again, scrolling through the impossible-seeming number of steps all the way to the final image: a towering pile of cream puffs all wrapped up in caramel. The thing has to be 2 feet tall; if they can pull it off, it’ll make Melody’s day.

She looks at Atlanta for guidance, forehead wrinkled with concern.

Atlanta looks at the first step. “Okay, we’ve got all the stuff. Now we just follow the steps. Do you want to watch milk boil or beat eggs?” Atlanta holds up the jar of vanilla beans and the egg carton for Ellen to choose from. “Where did you find this recipe? It’s perfect, but I’ve never heard of it before.”

“I just did an internet search for ‘stack of pancakes but it’s also cupcakes’ and *this* thing came up on a list of over-the-top desserts. Seemed right up Mel’s alley!” Ellen shrugs and considers her options. “I’ll take the eggs. Watching milk boil sounds about as interesting as-” She stops herself from making a comparison from her and Tay’s time in space, “... yeah it just sounds boring. How many eggs, again?” She mumbles and checks the recipe again, focusing on the task at hand.

Atlanta pours the milk and scrapes a vanilla bean pod into a pot and sets it on the stove. She briefly considers heating it up with her powers, like she did in January while baking with Boon, but decides that doing it the slow way is really best to make sure it works properly. Like how microwaving water never really makes it warm enough for tea even if it boils. “Did you get to do a lot of baking in space? I mean, I wouldn’t think so, but I bet there’s got to be such cool baking stuff in the future.”

“Yeah, when we had a legit place to stay, there’s some wild kitchen stuff out there. There are ovens with some kind of gravity thing in them so you can bake all kinds of weird shaped stuff. Like you can load up a model and get a cake that’s a perfect copy of someone’s head or something. And even further than that, uh, I think it was later anyway, there was this kitchen at a hostel where all the stuff was, like, built into the counter? It was-” Ellen turns off the mixer for a minute, both to demonstrate her story and grab the corn starch. “Like there’s just a big flat table, doesn’t look like there’s any stuff in the room, and then you’re like ‘I’m gonna fry an egg’ or whatever, and the top of the table moves and a ring pops up that’s getting hot in the middle and *that’s* your frying pan.” She makes waves and circles around the bowl of whipped eggs for effect.

“You’d love it, Lanta.”

Atlanta’s gaze gets wistful as she listens. Leaning against the counter next to the stove, she tries to envision everything that Ellen is telling her. “Yeah, it sounds amazing. I wish I could see it. I wonder how the gravity cakes are made. Like, is there just a regular recipe and the oven does the shaping, or does it have to be a denser cake in order for it to work…” Atlanta taps her chin, trying to work out the logistics in her head. “Hmmm...an angel food cake that looks like Boon…” She laughs as a better thought hits her. “Or Ophanim.”

Ellen laughs along. “It could work! We had one of those on some holiday, and it was shaped like the parade we’d been walking in earlier. Like, we ate the whole crowd. It was nuts.” She slides the egg mixture over to Atlanta, ready to mix into the milk. “Well, *part of it* was some kind of nut, I don’t remember. I don’t think we have ‘em now… The rest was chocolate.”

She checks the next step and narrows her eyes. “Oh. Hmm. Wait, we have to put that in the fridge for *2 hours*? Is the rest of this gonna take that long?” She scrolls up and down, looking for the cooking time, but that information is missing from the page.

With the milk boiling, Atlanta turns off the stove and sets a timer for 15 minutes. Walking over to Ellen, she looks at the recipe. “It looks like 15 minutes, another 15, and another 15 or so for the caramel. So no. But if we put it in the fridge for an hour and it’s not cool enough, I can always absorb the rest of the heat from it.” Atlanta winks. “Boon and I cheat at baking all the time. Don’t tell my mom.”

Ellen throws her hands to her face in shock. “*Atlanta?* Use her powers to *cheat at baking*? For *evil*? And you call Ernest a food criminal.” She portions out the butter for the custard and slides it across the counter too. “Well, at least we can rest easy knowing your cake of lies still doesn’t make you the evil-est Atlanta. Hey, which pot should I use for the dough. Is there like a special ‘dough pot’ or something?”

Atlanta giggles. “Don’t tell Ernest, either! Hmm.” Atlanta looks at the recipe, then pulls out a pot. “Not really. It just needs to be big enough and can work on the stovetop.” She steps back and gestures at it with a flourish. “For all your pastry dough needs.” The non-cooking part of Atlanta’s brain seems to click on, and she looks at Ellen in confusion. “What do you mean the evil-est Atlanta? Like the adult me who kidnapped you all the other day?”

“Yeah, what a piece of shit move. Like, if she wanted help, why didn’t she just ask? You’re all Atlantas, like you wouldn’t have tried to help for Jasper’s sake. So stupid.”

Atlanta nods. “Yeah. I guess it’s interesting to know that I’ve got the same flaws across multiple universes.” Atlanta ticks them off on her fingers, “Refusing to realize that not asking for help is a bad idea, keeping unnecessary secrets, thinking I need to do everything by myself, being gullible enough that if a sketchy person tells me that I’m hurting my loved ones, I’ll stay in their dimension prison…I wonder…” Atlanta pauses, but decides to continue the thought. “I wonder what would have happened if Sheila hadn’t tripped me.”

“Based on that list, you might still be there. She never told us what happened to her Jasper, but given the lengths she was willing to go to to fix it, it seems like it’ll need a long time to fix, if she ever manages to. Now, if she just could have made it sound *fun*, and less kidnap-y, things probably would’ve been different. Like AJ!” The pot, now even heavier with water, butter, and sugar, hits the stovetop with a satisfying ‘clang’.

Atlanta fishes the vanilla bean out of the milk and pours some into the egg mixture. “Was she the one who hated Ernest or the one who flirted with Boon?”

“The flirting one. Y’know, it was kind of comforting. Like, even being in a weird… liquid tube…” Ellen wrinkles her nose at the memory, “wasn’t bad enough to make AJ *not* flirt with someone. It was pretty badass.”

After dumping the rest of the milk into the egg mixture and starting to mix, Atlanta tilts her head. “Have you met her before?”

“Mhmm. I dunno when, but it was snowy, so a winter? Oh, and she was still living at the apartment, so before your mom- uh, her mom, was back I guess. But yeah, we robbed a wizard party.” Ellen’s attention returns to the water as it starts to boil and she drags the pot to a cool burner to add the flour.

“You robbed a wizard party??? Why? Did the wizard have something bad? What did you steal? Is that where you got your prom outfits???” Atlanta puts the custard on the stove and starts whisking. A perk of doing this in an industrial kitchen is that there is lots of stovetop space. “I wonder how many of them will never get their moms back. You’d think with all the yous running around, I would have thought about alternate mes more, but I haven’t really.”

After a moment of whisking the custard, she asks, “Hey, this might be a weird question, but have you ever asked if the other yous want to go home? Or do they like it here?”

Ellen misses the first round of rapid fire questions, instead focusing on incorporating all the flour into the hot water—the recipe said they’d need to work fast for this part! By the time she’s pretty sure the batter is lump-free, she catches the end of Atlanta’s wondering.

“I mean, at least some of them must want to. If they’re anything like me, y’know, beyond the face and name, they just came here for a job; they’ve got people and places to get back to, probably.” She pauses from adding eggs to the pot, thinking about the Ellen from the forest—the one who wants her Tay back. She shakes the thought from her head and continues cracking eggs.

“Though at this point maybe they just figure it’s easier to stay. Didn’t take *me* this long to start thinking I didn’t wanna leave, maybe they don’t either. It’s not so bad here once you get used to it.” Ellen’s tongue pokes out of her mouth as she focuses on achieving a glossy batter, whatever the hell that means.

“Hmm.” Atlanta gazes down into the slowly thickening custard like it’ll give her the answers to the universe. “I guess, I was just thinking, if I was stuck somewhere else...I’d want to come back, no matter how nice it was there. And what if someone could help me get back…” Atlanta shakes her head and smiles, trying to brush away the thoughts. “Sorry, didn’t mean to get all sad at you. We’re doing celebratory birthday baking, not existential crisis baking.”

“Is that a thing?” Ellen finally stops stirring and tips the pot toward Atlanta for confirmation of adequate glossiness. “Dude, why didn’t you tell me that like… 3? No wait… fuck it, nevermind. Is this shiny enough? Do I need to add glitter to this, I literally have no idea what this means.”

Atlanta takes the spoon to test the density of the dough, and nods. “Yeah, that looks right! And I think the custard is done, too.”

Atlanta turns off the burner and adds a last chunk of butter to the custard, whisking it in. “I got out the piping bag and tip, they’re on the counter. And were you asking why I never told you about existential crisis baking? Why do you think there’s an influx of cupcakes every time I’m upset?”

Thinking back, Ellen remembers all the times a new batch of cupcakes would just… appear at the base, or the community centre, or at school. *Seriously? Every time? Jesus Christ.*

“You’ve got, like, help with that now, right? The existential crisises, not the cupcakes. At least, I don’t think there’ve been as many since we got back, but I could be mixing up times again. You’re ok, though. Right?”

Atlanta shrugs. “I mean, most of them have just kinda...gone away? Like, the Abyss from December has just never come back, Dad’s gotten better about me being a hero, Boon is safe from Sapphomet, Mom’s back, I mean, there’s still the Consortium and Pocket stuff, but Kurt’s helped with that.” Atlanta shrugs and gets out some plastic wrap to cover the custard, unwilling to dwell on some of the worst stuff that’s happened since she joined Big Team. “I do just bake cupcakes because I love it and it’s my job, but it is also my biggest stress relief.”

After setting the custard in the fridge to cool, she gets out a baking sheet. “Want to know the secret on how to tell if I’m stressed or just baking for fun? Barring a special occasion or specialty stuff for work, of course.”

“Yes, please absolutely tell me if I need to feel bad for eating cupcakes.”

“Well please don’t feel bad for *eating* them, but the more intricate the decorations are, the more stressed out I usually am. Because intricate decorations means more time and focus that needs to be put onto what I’m making.” Atlanta grins and puts together the piping bag and frosting tip. She holds it out for Ellen to scoop batter into. “Dough me.”

“Here ya go.” Ellen sings along to the described notes while spooning batter into the bag. “Should we have two of these, ‘cause the recipe says this much batter will make 150 puffs.” She catches a blob of batter from dripping on the floor when Atlanta pulls back to tie off the piping bag.

“Wait, so does making this,” she points to all the components that will eventually come together to make the dessert, “mean you’re really stressed right now, or does this not count as intricate. Because if it’s the second one, what the fuck dude?”

“Oh, good idea.” Atlanta carefully sets down her bag and gets out another set, holding it open for Ellen to put dough into again. “And this is intricate, but it’s both for a special occasion and not cupcakes. Stuff that isn’t cupcakes doesn’t count. Because this is fun because it’s with you and for Melody, but it would be less fun if I was just doing it for myself. Cupcakes I can kinda zone out of making because I’ve made them so often.”

“Alright, that makes sense. Speaking of you, me, and Mel, we’re gonna need more people to eat this thing. I know Mel’s a sugar fiend and all, but this probably isn’t gonna be the first thing she eats today. Ugh, I bet Aman’s gonna take her to get burgers or something. Gonna ruin her appetite for- *oh my god did I just say that*.” Ellen shudders at the mom-ness of her voice.

Atlanta giggles. “Adopt one robot boy and suddenly you’re getting all matronly. Look at you, baking intricate pastries, worrying about Melody spoiling her dinner. Next you’ll be admonishing people about their *language.*”

“Hey, not our fault he’s like a giant 10 year old. Plus, we weren’t always this sappy; I blame the always-do-well hooligans me and Tay spend all our time with. Bad fuckin’ influences is what you are.” Ellen smiles impishly and flicks a bit of batter just wide of Atlanta’s head.

Atlanta sticks her tongue out. “I am the face of corruption and delinquency that your parents warned you about! Just look at me, my entire look says trouble.” With one hand, she frames her face, and with the other she reaches for the open container of flour. Despite her effort at redirection, it’s pretty obvious what she’s doing.

Ellen’s grin widens as Atlanta goes for the flour. She looks around and tries to take stock of nearby ammunition, but all the ingredients are on the other side of Atlanta. With the little time she has left, Ellen throws open a low cabinet door and ducks for cover behind it.

“Bastard! You set me up! This is worse than the attempted kidnapping!”

Atlanta grabs the flour and throws a handful at Ellen just a moment too late, and it hits the cabinet door. “I am a fiend! A lowlife! Cower before me!”

Taking a few steps to the side, she grabs some more flour and throws it at Ellen from an angle where the cabinet can’t protect her. “Aha! You are no match for my dastardly ways!”

“Gah! I’m hit!” Ellen clutches at the patches of white on her shirt. “We need to resupply—I’m going in!” She grabs a saucepan from the cupboard behind her and holds it fast to her head. She barrels past Atlanta, snatching the cornstarch from the counter.

The helmet clatters to the floor as Ellen skids to a stop, spoon in the container of cornstarch ready to launch. She raises an eyebrow to taunt Atlanta. “Best two out of three?”

Atlanta holds out her container of flour like it’s a weapon. “You’re on, Drummond.”

————————————————

Pascal arrives for his afternoon shift at Sweet Nothings, the bakery he’s been employed by for a few months now, a little early. He’d left himself some scones in the fridge before locking up the previous night, and is looking forward to having them with some jam before he starts work.

He pushes open the door and just as he’s about to announce his arrival with his usual greeting, “Hello, it’s me, I’m here for work,” he’s interrupted by a cloud of some kind of white powder—very fine, sweet, must be icing sugar—exploding in his face. He bends down to the floor to pick up the bag that had hit his chest and looks around the kitchen.

The room is a mess: a thin layer of white dust covers most surfaces, except the places where there is instead a smear of rainbow coloured frosting. Sprinkles and cake decorations litter the floor and it looks like some have managed to get on the ceiling. And in the middle of it all are two teenage girls, frozen like deer in headlights, apparently mid-battle.

“Oh uh, hi Pascal…” Atlanta sputters.

The reality of her situation hits her and she lowers the bag of powdered sugar in her hand. Her eyes widen and she looks at Ellen in desperation.

“Um, Pascal, you see, I can explain…”

“Yeah, we can totally explain: we were having a food fight. You want in?” Ellen points at the mostly empty bag in Pascal’s hand. She smiles at Atlanta, but the smile quickly disappears as Ellen realizes that was not the kind of explanation Atlanta had meant.

Atlanta looks at Ellen like *please back me up here,* then turns wide, pleading eyes at Pascal. “Please don’t tell my mom, we’ll get it cleaned up?”

Pascal nods at Atlanta, then stares at Ellen, waiting for her answer.

Ellen hangs her head and sighs. “Where do you keep, like, mops and stuff?”

Pascal, satisfied, nods at Ellen as well. “I’ll go mind the front, but I do want to have my scones soon. Ok, I’m going to work now. See you in a bit.” And with that he walks out of the kitchen into the store.

Atlanta watches Pascal go, then looks around at the mess they made in despair. Mentally, she’s cycling through all the paychecks she’s gonna lose paying for the stuff they wasted, all of the ingredients that are contaminated by other ingredients, how much she’s going to have to clean the gluten free station to make sure it’s safe...and then she starts to laugh. It starts out quiet, but she can’t hold it back and soon she’s laughing so hard that tears form in her eyes.

“We *cannot* let the boys know about this,” she manages to say after a minute. “We’d never live it down!”

“I dunno, this is a pretty good disaster; maybe if we show ‘em pictures it’ll shame them out of ever trying to make a mess again. Let them try to beat this.” Ellen poses triumphantly, taking one of Atlanta’s hands in hers and raising them into the air. “JUST LET ‘EM TRY!” She shouts, earning a concerned peek through the door from Pascal.

He stares at them again, with the combined disappointment and expectation to do better that only a parent can muster.

“Alright, alright! Cleaning!” Ellen stomps off in search of cleaning supplies, mumbling something about “squares” under her breath.

Atlanta gets her giggles under control and turns on the oven. “We could do some marathon cleaning while the cream puffs are baking? Fifteen-minute bursts of cleaning between having to do stuff with them. I don’t think that dough is supposed to set very long after we made it…” Atlanta giggles again. “I guess at least this way the custard is getting longer to set.”

Ellen spins on her heels, extremely glad to have something to do other than cleaning. “Oooooookay, so cream puffs first, then speed clean? Sounds good to me!” She glides across the floured floor to their baking station and waits for Atlanta to demonstrate.

Atlanta dusts the flour and other ingredients off of the parchment paper and baking sheet. “Okay, so you hold the bag like this, and swirl it in a circle like you’re frosting a cupcake, but make them about an inch around, like this.” Atlanta demonstrates as she goes, and very quickly has a line of soon-to-be puffs. “And then we do that 146 more times! Easy!”

“146… damn. Alright,” Ellen rolls her neck and shoulders and sets up her tray just like Atlanta’s, “for Melody.” She holds out her piping bag towards Atlanta like a sword waiting to be crossed.

Atlanta tings her piping bag against Ellen’s like they were champagne glasses and nods seriously. “For Melody.”

One hundred and forty-seven swirls, several baking trays, and a scramble to make an egg wash later, the oven is closed and a timer set. Atlanta puts her dirty apron into the hamper and once again surveys the mess she and Ellen have made.

The kitchen is divided into high and low messes and the two tackle them based on height: Atlanta sweeps and mops the floor while Ellen wipes off cupboard doors and walls. Pascal is even called in for a boost to reach the splashes that somehow got on the ceiling.

When the kitchen is (mostly) clean, and the cream puffs are cool, Atlanta gets the custard out of the fridge, absorbing the last of the heat from it. The girls get into a rhythm for putting the custard into the puffs pretty quickly (flicking admirably little at each other), and before long it’s time for the caramel sauce. Atlanta finishes up a few cleaning projects while Ellen watches it, and when it’s ready, the best part begins: dipping all of the pastries in the caramel, and stacking them on a plate.

“Steady… steady…” Ellen stands as still as she can so Atlanta, sitting on her shoulders, doesn’t topple the impressively tall tower as she places the last cream puff at the top. “Y'know, this doesn’t look nearly this big in the picture. How are we supposed to eat all of it?”

Atlanta gently sets the final caramel-covered cream puff on top and licks the caramel off her fingers. “You know, we probably weren’t supposed to put all 150 into one stack, now that you mention it. The bigger question is how are we supposed to move this to Melody’s house?”

“Oh shit, right? Maybe we can just bring her here? Like, if we can get this downstairs, we can just eat and hang out in there?”

Ellen bends her knees and lifts Atlanta down to the floor. “One of us can go get her and the other can take the leaning tower of pastry to the base. How’s that?”

“If you want? How would you get it down there, though?”

“Uh… with extreme caution? Look, let’s both carry it down for maximum not-dropping-it-ness, and we can grab her and boom. Birthday chowdown.” Ellen gets a firm grip on one side of the plate underneath the tower.

Atlanta nods and grabs the other side of the plate. “Okay. We’re superheroes, how hard can moving a cake tower be, right?”

After one stressful descent down the stairs, and one fetch quest for a certain birthday girl, Atlanta rushes down the stairs to the base beneath Sweet Nothings. "Hurry up!" she yells back up at Melody.

“Damn, Lanta! She’s blindfolded on stairs! At least wait until it's not her birthday to try to lead her into a deathtrap.” Ellen takes slow steps behind Melody, ready to catch her in case she stumbles.

“Pssh, no worries dude. I run down stairs blindfolded all the ti--” The word catches in Melody’s mouth as her leading foot misses a stair. As her weight begins to carry her forward, she immediately shifts her balance back to her grounded leg and readjusts her footing. “--ime. Okay, maybe it’s been a while.”

After a few more hurried steps, Melody reaches the bottom of the stairs and sniffs. “Man, how does every room in this place smell amazing? I know it’s a bakery or whatever, but still. I wish the medlab smelled like cupcakes and cookies and stuff.” Spinning her blindfolded head around, she tries to recall the layout of the base under Sweet Nothings as a big grin spreads across her face. “Now what were you two so excited about? You got me all excited too! This is like, so mysterious. I assume it’s not blindfold training.” She pauses awkwardly before raising her fists into a guard. “Totally down for that though. If that’s what this is.”

Atlanta giggles and sneaks her hand between Melody’s fists to boop her nose. “Don’t be silly. I never joke about surprises. Who do you think I am, your mentor?” She takes Melody’s arm and guides her into position in front of the big table, and Melody’s birthday surprise. After exchanging an excited nod with Ellen, she says, “Okay. You can open your eyes!”

Both Atlanta and Ellen reach into their pockets and throw fistfuls of confetti in the air as Melody lowers her blindfold.

Melody squints as her eyes readjust to the light. Peering through the small shower of confetti, her jaw inadvertently drops as she beholds the towering spire of puffs before her.

“Holyyyyyyyy crap! WHAT IS THAT?!” Melody spins her head back and forth between Atlanta and Ellen as her body begins bouncing up and down with excitement. “I think I’ve seen these on a cooking show before? Like… cr-- c-- something with a fancy name!”

Turning back to the mountain of pastry, Melody stares at it reverently before continuing in a smaller voice. “Aren’t these like... super fucking hard to make? Did-- did you guys make this?”

“Yeah, dude! What d’you think we’re at the bakery for?” Ellen picks up pieces of confetti off the floor and throws them, one by one, at Melody.

“Of course we made it! Do you think I’d *buy* baked goods???” Atlanta puts her hand to her chest like she’s deeply offended, but her huge grin ruins the effect. “Besides, we thought you’d love it. And it wasn’t too hard, although we did get a little…” Atlanta scratches her head and dislodges some sprinkles that were stuck in her hair, “distracted.”

Melody turns around to address Ellen first, but the sight of individual pieces of confetti being tossed at her makes Melody immediately double over laughing. After taking a few moments to catch her breath, Melody beams at Atlanta. “Of course I love it! Just look at it! It’s the coolest baking thing I’ve ever seen! It’s SO BIG!”

As she studies the giant pastry pile again, Melody begins mumbling to herself. “Is there like, a proper way to eat these? Do you start at the top? Do you just grab wherever? Would I die if I tried to eat the whole thing? I’d definitely die. So tempting though. God this must have taken so long to make…”

Suddenly, Melody feels warmth at the sides of her eyes as they begin to tear up. She takes a deep breath before a giant smile crosses her face.

“You guys are the fuckin’ best,” Melody laughs as she wraps her arms around Ellen and Atlanta, pulling them into a crushing hug that lifts them momentarily off the ground.

They barely have time to react to the crying before they are pulled into the hug. “Glad you… like… it.” Ellen feels like the words are being squeezed out of her.

Atlanta giggles as Melody picks her and Ellen up, and hugs back as best she can. “If you died from eating my cooking, I’d be super sad, so please don’t.”

When she’s set back down, Atlanta walks over to the table and holds up some aprons. “We can either get incredibly messy, or wear aprons. I thought about bringing plates down, but I figured we wouldn’t use them anyway.”

“Fuck it, what’s a little more mess gonna do at this point?” Ellen gestures to her black shirt, already covered with smears of flour and errant sprinkles from the kitchen fight earlier. “But, of course, first piece goes to the birthday girl.”

Melody grins as she approaches the mass of cream puffs, then stands on the tips of her toes to grab one from the top of the tower. She marvels at the swirls of caramel around the outside of the puff, then gently squeezes it to see the crust begin to crack and reveal a tiny bit of the custard inside. After a few more moments of amazement at Atlanta and Ellen’s creation, Melody’s expression suddenly turns serious.

“Plates are for the weak.”

In a short series of bites, the cream puff is gone as Melody lets out a loud and contented sigh. “Damn, that was ever better than it looked. And it looked AMAZING.”

As she pulls down another cream puff and begins moving it towards her mouth, Melody sheepishly turns back to the other girls. “You two should really get in on this. Like, seriously, these totally rock. What are these called?”

“Croquembouche!” Atlanta says, crawling up on the table to get herself a puff from the top of the tower. “It was Ellen’s idea.”

“Mhmm,” Ellen confirms, barely understandable through a mouthful of dessert recklessly taken from the base of the pile, “this is like pancake party, but *to the max*.”

Atlanta grins at that. Grabbing a handful of puffs from the top of the pile, she sits with her feet dangling off the edge of the table. This is her favorite part of baking: getting to share what she’s made with her friends. She looks around the base—even just a few months ago, having all this would have seemed like an impossible dream. Things are changing.

“You know, I joined Big Team just about a year ago? Everything is so different…” Atlanta’s smile turns softer. “Not to get all sappy during the *to the max* pancake party, but I really love you both. This time last year I didn’t really have any friends, and now I have so many amazing people…” She trails off and shakes her head. “You both are super special to me. I’m lucky to have you.”

“Hey… we’re, like, lucky to have you too,” Melody responds softly. She looks at the table Atlanta is seated on and attempts to gauge its structural integrity before eventually shrugging and sitting next to her. “I, like… totally get that. I didn’t really have any super close friends before I joined the team either. I mean…” she rolls her eyes, “Aman, but he was like, family friend or whatever. No friends that I actually made at school though. And like… I guess that’s sorta my fault. I’ve always had a hard time opening up and stuff.”

Melody takes a deep breath before nudging Atlanta with her shoulder. “Yeah. Things are way different for me now too. I don’t know who I’d be if I hadn’t met you two, but I know it’s a worse person. Not to get sappy or whatever, but yeah. Love you both. You two mean the fuckin’ world to me.”

Not knowing how to continue, Melody begins awkwardly munching on another cream puff and staring at the ground, her eyes curled up into a smile.

Looking at Melody and Atlanta sitting together, looking almost like sisters, Ellen doesn’t know how to respond, and her thoughts wrestle to be the next thing she says. *I should say the same, we missed them both so much. I should just hug them, that wouldn’t be weird, right? I’m hungry. There’s no more space on that table for me. We should see if there’s a way to take them with us, just for a visit, when Tay and I figure out how to leave again. Ultimately we’re just going to leave them again, aren’t we?*

She settles for a quiet, “Yeah. This is nice,” and smiles softly. She takes more cream puffs to occupy herself with, before she says something she regrets.

“Ellen, get over here. We have to group hug after saying something sappy. It’s a pancake night rule.” Atlanta raps her fist on the table like it’s a gavel. “From this moment forward. I’ve just made it so.”

Hopping down from the table, Atlanta opens up her arms. “Sticky group hug time!”

“Oh, you want a round two, James? I’ll go get some more stuff from the kitchen and Mel can join this time.” Ellen smirks and shuffled over to her friends with arms wide open.

“Yep, she banged something against something, that means group hugs are required by law now,” Melody jumps down from the table and approaches the other girls with opened arms and a grin. As she embraces her friends with a tight hug, Melody giggles. “And I have no idea what we’re doing a round two of, but I’m definitely winning this one.”

“Don’t be so sure, Melody,” Atlanta says from within the group hug. “I’m an expert at food fights. Just ask Ellen, she just lost one to me. But if we have another one, we’re doing it at Melody’s or the base. I think one narrow escape from my mom’s wrath is enough for one day.”

“Hold the fucking phone, you *know* that second round would’ve been mine if 'Tall, Silent, and Judgemental' hadn’t walked in. That makes us even. Plus, I’m pretty much working at half capacity here, so really that first one woulda been ours, too.” Ellen pops another puff in her mouth with a very self-satisfied expression on her face.

“Course, we *could* always settle this after we’re done eating. You still antsy for a fight, Mel?”

Melody responds to Ellen with a devious grin. “Food fight, real fight, I’m always down to let people know what runner-up feels like.”

“Y’know, it’s good to have confidence. High self esteem like that means she’ll probably take the loss better, huh Lanta?” Ellen returns Mel’s grin. “Though she might have the advantage from not being as full of food, so who’s to say?”

Ellen tips her head toward the croquembouche, much smaller than the last time Melody had looked. She waits until the recognition registers on Mel’s face, then bites into another cream puff.

“What?! No! How?!” Melody sprints over to the table and pulls down a row of cream puffs, balancing them on an arm as she begins to shovel a new one towards her mouth. She makes a pouty face at Ellen before biting into the puff, then jokingly angles her body as if to protect the giant pile of pastries that she could never finish on her own.

Atlanta giggles at her friends. “You could use the fight to determine who gets the rest of the stack,” she suggests. “No shadow chains, though. This place is only designed to withstand my mom’s powers.”

Melody and Ellen lock eyes and spring to action, Melody scarfing down the remaining food in her hands and Ellen moving the table with the prize out of the way. They take up familiar positions—Mel’s knees are bent, feet in a stable but agile stance, fists raised and ready, while Ellen rolls her neck and shakes out her limbs—facing each other and waiting for Atlanta to sound the call.

“Ready?” Atlanta takes several large steps back, standing in guard of the trophy, holding one puff aloft like a starting gun.

“Go!”

Croquembouche recipe from Tasty.com