Prompt #293 - Electricity - A Burn in the Oven - angelswilliam

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Author: angelswilliam
Title: A Burn in the Oven
Fandom: BtVS
Ship/Characters: Andrew, Kennedy, Spike, Willow, mention of Slayerettes
Rating: PG for British profanity
Genre: Gen (sorry, that's all this prompt gave me)
Prompt: Prompt # 293, Electricity from tamingthemuse
Word Count: Approx. 1490, not counting headers
Spoilers/Warnings: SPOILERS: Season 7, I guess? WARNINGS: Carelessness with an electric oven.
Summary: Andrew spent a lot of time in the kitchen, but he was also easily distracted by all the interesting stuff going on in the rest of the Summers' home.
Disclaimer: Not mine. The people who created, wrote, produced, and distributed the original characters and/or plots own everything this writing is based on. This is just me having fun. Besides, I'm broke and you won't get nuttin' from me if you sue.
Feedback: Concrit and stroking are welcome. Flames will get R2-D2's CO2 spray in the face.
Author's note: 1. I'm fairly sure I exaggerated the consequences of this incident. Author's license. :-p - 2. Yep, you guessed it. I screwed up with my oven. Fortunately, all it did was make the area around it warm so that I noticed when I went to do something on the counter next to it and felt like a complete idiot and then thanked the PTBs that my apartment didn't catch fire and I didn't get evicted...or worse. Oh, and I hadn't cooked cookies; I had cooked pizzas for my writers' group, so they had long since been removed from the oven. *wipes forehead in relief*
Distribution: If I'm a member of your archive, community, forum, group, etc., you can have it. Anyone else, comment with an invite. angelswilliam Cross-posted to: tamingthemuse, btvsats_love, buffyfic, jmfun, nekid_spike, non_stop_james, spike_fics, and my friends-only fic/icon journal angelswilliam (same ID at Dreamwidth.

Andrew opened the refrigerator to get a juicebox for himself, and something on the middle shelf caught his eye.

"Oooooh! Chocolate chip cookie dough!"

He decided to make some for himself--correction: for the mighty Slayers-to-be forces--so he snatched the package off the stainless steel rods and carried it over to the kitchen island, humming to himself. He went to the cupboard beside the oven and clanged the bakeware backward until he was able to pull a cookie sheet out from the bottom. Fortunately, everyone was outside and Spike was in the shower, so no one would hear all the noise.

Andrew carried the cookie sheet over to the island, then opened the island drawer and fished out a knife to open the package of cookie dough. After he opened it, he looked at the back.

"Am I supposed to put grease on the--?" He shook his head. "Nope. Good. I hate getting my hands all yucky. It gets under my fingernails and everything. Bleah." With the last, he stuck his tongue out and shuddered.

He pulled the packaging off the cardstock-reinforced dough squares, then set the dough container on the cookie sheet. He grabbed the wrapper and walked over to the sink, opening the cupboard underneath it to reveal a wastebasket. He threw the wrapper away and returned to his task at the island.

He licked his lips. "No one will notice if I take just one." He grabbed one of the squares of cookie dough and popped it in his mouth. "MM." He gripped the edge of the counter and arched his back, his eyes rolling back in his head and fluttering closed as he chewed slowly, savoring each moment of rich buttery chocolate yumminess. Finally, though, he had to swallow.

"Oh, GOD, that was good."

He slowly picked the other squares out of the thick paper guard, placing them on the cookie sheet in neat, carefully spaced rows and columns of 4 across and 5 down--well, except for the one column, anyway. Andrew smiled wickedly to himself and giggled at his little secret.

About to put them in the oven, he realized he'd forgotten to check what temperature he needed to set the oven to. "Oh, poo."

Setting the cookie sheet on the island again, he hurried over to the wastebasket cupboard and grabbed the wrapper out of the trash. "Oh, yeah, 350." He tossed the wrapper back in the waste paper basket and turned around to grab the cookie sheet again. When he got to the oven, he set the temperature to 350 degrees and turned the other dial to bake. He then opened the door and slid the cookie sheet onto the top rack. "Perfect. See who won't be allowed in any Slayer games, now."

Just as he said that, the girls came bursting through the kitchen door from the back yard and stampeded toward the living room.

"Hey, guys, I'm making you some--"

"Later, space cadet," Kennedy called over her shoulder just before she told the Slayers to "have a seat," following up by telling them they "were crap out there."

Andrew snorted. "Like she's the boss of them," he said to himself. "Buffy and Faith, Slayers Extraordinaire, are the only ones qualified to judge their minions. Kennedy will be punished for her insolence upon their return from their epic battles against the forces of darkness this night." Hearing Spike clomp down the stairs, he ran to meet him at the bottom.

"Spike! Oh, mighty vampire!"

Spike sighed heavily, a cigarette drooping from his mouth, and gave Andrew as patient a look as he could. "What d'ya want this time? Fresh outta tales of adventure." He really wasn't in the mood to regale the boy with stories of his life as a soulless vampire--not when he could barely stand to remember them himself.

"No, I just wanted to tell you that Kennedy's bossing the Slayerettes around again."

Spike shrugged. "Seems to me someone's got to. Bunch o' silly teenage girls running about, I'm not going to be the one to keep them in line."

"But--" Andrew whined and stomped his foot. "But, she's being really mean! And, Buffy's supposed to be the one in charge! Her and Faith."

Spike huffed a laugh. "You see them around?" He made a sweeping gesture with his hand, then leaned in. "They're the ones doing the slaying, Andrew. Those girls in there?" He pointed, his cigarette in hand. "They're just fodder. Send them out, they're going to get killed. Some of them already have...on their way here. Or, were you in one of your alternate universes when that happened?"

Andrew lowered his gaze. "No."

"Right. Then stop your whinging." Spike pushed past him and walked through the kitchen to the basement door, disappearing to his private sanctuary beyond.

Narrowing his eyes a second later, Andrew went after him. Maybe he couldn't get Spike to help with the Slayerette thing, but he wasn't going to let him just walk away and leave him bored to pieces. Spike knew Andrew didn't have anyone to talk to.

~~~~~Meanwhile, in the basement~~~~~

Spike had just settled on his cot with his favorite book of Keats poetry when he saw the beam of light from the open door and smelled the pungent scent of Andrew's perspiration. Honestly, did that boy ever bathe or wash his clothes? A moment later, Andrew came thumping down the stairs, clumsy oaf that he was.

"Andrew, trying to have a moment alone, if you don't mind."

Andrew wiggled a little and whined, "But, you're the only one who'll talk to me...or listen."

Spike rolled his eyes and thwacked his book closed, tossing it to the other end of his cot. "All right, then. Let's hear it. What's so important that you need to chat me up this very instant?"

Andrew sputtered, then said, "Well, it's not any one specific thing....I just want to talk is all."

Spike leaned over to a nearby shelf to grab a pack of cigarettes, tapping the end of it until one came out far enough for him to grasp and pull the rest of the way. "About what?" he asked as he put the pack up, pinched the cigarette between his lips, grabbed his lighter and lit it.

Andrew scraped his foot back and forth on the cement floor. "I don't know...."

Spike took the cigarette out of his mouth, blowing a long slow cloud of smoke from his mouth before he spoke. "You come down here, disturb my reading so we can 'talk,' and then tell me you don't know what you want to talk about? You're lucky I have a soul, mate. Get your arse upstairs before the First magically triggers me and I take another sample."

"But, we fixed--"

Just then, the door at the top of the stairs banged open. "Andrew, get your butt up here! NOW!"

Spike's eyes moved immediately to the ceiling, his hands in the air. "Thank GOD."

"What'd I do?"

"You're not moving," Willow, who was the one giving the orders, said in a no-nonsense tone.

"Okay, okay!"

Spike chuckled to himself. What has the boy done this time?

~~~~~Meanwhile, in the kitchen~~~~~

As soon as Andrew reached the kitchen floor, Willow grabbed his arm, dragging him over to the oven.

"Is this your doing?"

The oven door was open, and inside was a cookie sheet full of charcoal briquettes with white frothy topping.

"I--I was making cookies for the Slayerettes." Andrew said in a tiny voice.

Willow nodded, her mouth in a tight line. "Uh-huh. Well, those Slayerettes just spent attention that is much-needed elsewhere putting out the fire you started in the oven because you weren't paying attention to those cookies."

"F--F--F--Fire?"

"Fire." Willow nodded again, indicating the nearby fire extinguisher on the floor, as well as several burnt-through rags and overshirts. "Proud of yourself?"

"I--I was just trying to do something n--"

Willow sighed, her face softening marginally. "I know. But, Andrew, if you're going to cook something in the kitchen, you've got to stay in the kitchen. 'Kay?" She gave him her patented "resolve face."

Andrew swallowed, tears poised to fall. "M-kay."

Willow then went completely soft. "Ng-oh, Andrew, I'm not mad at you." She moved to put an arm around his shoulders. "Just don't do it again, okay?"

"I could've burnt the house down. And then the First would've gotten all of us and The Dark Side would've triumphed over The Light Side."

Willow rolled her eyes but nodded slowly, patting his back. "But, that didn't happen. We're all good. We all look out for each other, yeah?"

Andrew looked up at her, giving her a relieved smile, tears on his cheeks. "Yeah," he said with a small nod.

"Yeah." Willow gave him a chummy shake of the shoulders, then let go. "Why don't you help me get all this cleaned up, and then we'll forget this ever happened...except you'll always remember to stay in the kitchen whenever you cook something. Right?"

He smiled at her. "Right!"

"That's my guy."