Disclaimer: Characters courtesy of Dark Angel; no profits made.

A/N: Two challenges answered in one ficlet! First, this was inspired by the Snippet Challenge on FFN's Dark Angel forum, Blah Blah Woof Woof, with the current snippet topic, food; the other source was Challenge #3 on the Dark Angel Archive site, Raising Hell. Their challenge was to write a story in 500 words or less starting with the line, "He tried to remember who had talked him into this."

And finally: dedicated to all of you who know who you are, for all the reasons you know you deserve it. You complete me. (Bwaaahahahahaha...)

Reviews and any manner of comment you wish to send breathlessly awaited...

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Different Skill Set

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

He tried to remember who had talked him into this.

"Hey..."

Oh. Right. Like this would have been for anyone else...

"How are things go... ohhh." As Max appeared around the doorway, her words stopped as abruptly as her forward momentum did. A wide smile broke through her efforts not to laugh. "What happened here? Another Pulse?"

"No..." Logan's consternation was poorly disguised. "The cake you requested, if you'll give me another hour."

"Logan, how did you ...?" Max's gaze had taken in the entire kitchen, seeing melted chocolate dribbling across the stove top, sticky cherry juice on the counter and a glob of batter on his thigh. But her silence was broken when she saw the scatter shot of white power on a cabinet high above his head...

"Nevermind." Logan scowled. "Do you want this finished or just want to critique my housekeeping?"

"If it ends up in a culinary miracle I don't care how it gets done." She saw his look of doubt and tried, "it will be a miracle, right?"

"That's for sure..." he muttered under his breath. "It will be a miracle if it turns out..."

Max gaped. "You said you had this covered – "

"I thought I did. But..." he grimaced. "I wasn't thinking it would be from scratch. Since when were cake mixes so hard to find? All you'd need is water, eggs, and a box. How hard would that be? Cake mixes were everywhere before the Pulse."

"You've never made a cake?"

He just glared at her.

"Well, why didn't you say so?" Max shrugged, exasperation close to the surface. "You could have just said no."

"I knew you wanted a special cake to take to work," he murmured.

Max rolled her eyes. "It's just for Normal," she reminded him.

"No – it's for Original Cindy, too, and Sketchy and Herbal and Druid..."

Max watched him as he reeled off the names of her friends and co-workers, only one of whom he'd met. I did it for you, Max, she could see in his eyes. With a slow smile of understanding, she shrugged and asked, "well, so – what can I do?"

"Nothing – it's okay; I've got it..."

Max looked at the frazzled baker, caught in this rare, ungainly moment in his kitchen kingdom, and urged, "c'mon, I can clean, at least." She grabbed a nearby sponge and started in on the counter. "Chocolate and cherry?" she encouraged. "This is gonna be some cake."

"Well, I didn't know what Normal's favorites were..."

Her movements slowed, and she turned to look at him. "But you knew mine."

A quiet smile replaced Logan's harried consternation. "At least that way I know one person will like it."

She paused. Then, reaching out to draw her thumb slowly across his cheek, Max lifted it for inspection. "Chocolate," she announced.

Sheepishly, he relaxed into a wide smile. "Maybe I could use some help after all." At her nod, he went back to stirring his batter.

This baking thing might just have something to it, he chuckled...

XOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO