so hey.

[shinon]

I'm bored out of my fucking skull and there is no hope of any relief before next Tuesday. I guarantee nothing, but I am open for prompting for shortfics if people are interested in that. We don't have to be in each other's circles or whatever.

ETA 8/15 Matters have not improved. Still open for business.

Comments

I started thinking about kitchen hardware, and therefore

[shinon]

The princes are twelve, and they are In Trouble. The precise nature of this trouble hasn't been communicated to the staff, but both boys are on loan to the kitchen for the day, and His Majesty said, meaningfully, that no task can be too tedious.

Sabin is turning a crank handle and humming tunelessly under his breath. Sabin is a good kid. If he seems to be enjoying himself more than he is Being Punished and Learning His Lesson, no one is likely to snitch on him.

Edgar isn't taking it so quietly. "This is pointless. You could just motorize it." When no one acknowledges him, he says, "I could motorize it. We have parts. Sabin, watch mine for me -"

"Your Highness," says the apprentice cook whose job this would normally be, "if you leave with it half done the ice will melt."

"So I'll get more."

"And it has to be done within the hour, so it can chill until the banquet."

Edgar looks at Sabin, still patiently churning, no help at all. Then he turns back to the apprentice cook, looking shrewd. "Fine. I'll build this machine in five minutes. Tell me something." He leans forward. "Do we not have rat dogs for the stables?"

Reports afterward are consistent: in the disaster that ensued, Sabin never left his post.

*

"Sabin," Edgar says. They're twenty-eight, and along with the rest of the world's population, they are in trouble on a wholly different scale. But set that aside for now. "You didn't."

Sabin shrugs. He looks a little too guileless. "It's my signature dessert. It comes together easy, too."

Edgar lunges at him - seventy percent joking, thirty percent mortified. Or some less exact ratio. "You do not have a signature dessert, you little -"

Sabin holds him off. "Aside from the ingredients, all you need is two buckets, ice, salt, a crank -"

Further attempts at grappling. "I'm warning you -"

"An excited little dog, a thirty-foot leash, only as much animal handling experience as your average twelve-year-old prince -"

Alerted by the sounds of a scuffle, Terra hurries over. "Is something wrong?"

"Hi, Terra. No, everything's fine. Did Edgar ever tell you about the time he got half-frozen custard exploded all over the castle kitchen?"

Edgar, by now physically overpowered, puts in a valiant "The principle was sound!"

"Um," she says. "No. But the ice cream turned out really nice, Sabin. Thank you for making it."

"Of course! It's my signature."

Edgar says something that sounds like, but surely isn't, "Smartass."