Hello everyone, here's the next update. This deals with Merlin's cooking adventure as mentioned in the first chapter. This one is also an outtake from chapter 12 of Just Another Normal Day, taking place between the end of Ros's POV and the start of Merlin's, but I think it can be read on its own. Enjoy!

Pairings and main characters: Merlin, Jo

Timesetting: Outtake from chapter 12 of Just Another Normal Day, in canon with that story.

Summary: Merlin tries his hand at cooking in a modern day kitchen.

Chapter 3

Cooking? Piece of cake!

Jo

Jo was aware of Merlin's eyes appraising her house as they slowly walked towards it from the place she had parked her car. It made her look at it with different eyes. Mostly she hardly paid any attention to it at all, but for Merlin it was all new and strange.

Her house was a normal house, nothing special and most certainly nothing different from all the other houses in the street: One-story, with a lot of windows, a small front garden and a little bigger one at the back.

Nothing extraordinary at all, yet Merlin seemed to think there was. His eyes had widened in surprise and something that appeared to be disbelief. 'All this is yours?' he asked, looking at her.

She bit back a chuckle. 'Yes,' she simply replied. And, to tease him a bit, she added: 'My last house was bigger, but I moved a few months ago.'

It had the desired effect. The warlock's jaw dropped.

'Come on, let's go in,' she suggested. They had halted when Merlin had asked his question. Realising that the neighbours might think this behaviour a bit strange, she ushered them forwards again. The last thing an MI-5 officer must do was attracting attention. That had been drilled into her head since the first day of training. 'I don't know about you, but I'm starving. And if I've got to get a takeaway one more time, I might just go crazy.'

Too late she realised Merlin didn't get this. 'Takeaway?' he asked as they made their way to the front door.

She had once again forgotten how little Merlin really knew about this time. He had made quite an effort to understand, but his attention had mostly been focused on the operation and everything to do with that. Things that were normal to her, like takeaway and the size of her house, were still completely alien to him. Again she tried to imagine herself in his shoes, trying to see the world as he saw it, but she found herself failing. This place must be bewildering. Good grief, it might even feel like a different world altogether. At least she had some knowledge of the past, of his land and age. She would probably be able to cope there, without making too much of a fool out of herself. Merlin and Arthur didn't have that luxury. They had just been thrown (or dragged, after all it was Ros who caught them) into twenty-first century Britain, with no knowledge about it whatsoever. Taken that into account it was surprising how well Merlin handled it all.

She searched the pockets of her jacket for her keys, but couldn't find them. 'Food you can just buy at the shop,' she explained absent-mindedly. 'No need to cook it, just ready to go.'

'Sounds like heaven,' Merlin muttered.

This time she did laugh. 'It's also very expensive when you do it for extended periods of time. Most of it is rather unhealthy anyway.' She promised herself to take him to a McDonalds if they ever had the time for it. That would no doubt be an interesting experience for him. 'And I have just eaten it one time too many lately,' she added. That was the natural result of long hours on the Grid. Most of the time someone would pop out for a while around dinnertime and return in an hour with arms full of bags and boxes, which were emptied and distributed among the working officers. Since Samir's capture she had eaten at home exactly two times.

'I see,' Merlin said, his tone belying his words.

She smiled, still looking for her keys. 'It doesn't matter if you don't,' she told him.

He smiled sheepishly back at her. 'That obvious?'

'Only because I know how to listen,' she assured him. 'And I. Can't. Find. My. Keys!' She had a vague memory of placing them on her desk the previous morning. It was only now that she realised that there was no memory of taking them with her from the Grid. She moaned. 'I think I must have left them at work.'

To her surprise Merlin's smile widened into a grin. 'Let me?' he asked.

'Of course?' Her confusion made that her words came out as a question rather than a statement.

Merlin held out a hand to the door, muttered some inaudible spell and his eyes flashed gold. Jo blinked as she heard the door unlock itself and then saw it swing open. Merlin looked at her as if nothing unusual had happened, shrugging. 'All right?' he asked.

She nodded, trying to hide her amazement. Of course she knew he was a warlock, but to see him actually practising magic was something else entirely. 'Fine,' she replied, beckoning him in. 'After you. The living room is to your right.'

The warlock did a few steps into the hallway, looking around him, and then walked through to the living room, all the while looking at the objects that were still unfamiliar to him. Jo would have thought that, having been on the Grid, he would have seen it all. Everything there was state of the art, while her own home was rather old-fashioned. The only thing new in it was her television set.

'You live here?' Merlin asked, his voice a study in disbelief.

'Yes,' she replied. 'I know it isn't much…'

He cut her off. 'I didn't mean it like that. It's great. Where I live with Gaius is about just the size of your living room and kitchen, nothing more.'

'Do you want a tour of the house then?' she asked.

He nodded, smiling widely, giving the impression of a child who had just found his presents under the tree on Christmas morning. If it was true what he said, and that she didn't doubt, he wasn't used to people having so much personal space. Then that would explain why his eyes had widened so much when he saw her house for the first time.

She showed him round, explaining objects he had not yet seen. Sometimes he asked about things that were completely normal to her and a few times she really had to remind herself that he came from a time where you had to go down to the well to fetch water for your bath and you had to do the laundry all by hand instead of being able to shove it all in a machine, push the right button and wait for it to be finished.

'I'm sorry, is it all too much?' she inquired at a certain moment. They had ended up in the kitchen and Merlin was studying the fridge with barely concealed curiosity.

He offered her a wide smile. It was his way to say that he was all right, she had worked out. 'I'm fine,' he said, making her wonder exactly how many times he had said that over the last twenty-four hours. He said it when he didn't understand something, when he was confused, when it was all too much and when he genuinely meant it. Jo guessed it was just too much to take in right now.

'You sure?' she therefore urged.

'I'm fine, really,' he repeated. 'I guess I understand why there is no more magic in this age,' he added, his happy expression turning to sad. 'You just don't need it anymore. I tend to use magic to get all my chores done in time, but you just have all this machinery to take care of all your household duties. And your weapons are powerful too. You don't need magic to fight your foes.' There was more than disappointment in his voice. It was almost as if he was grieving, she decided.

And she supposed she knew what exactly was bothering him. 'We still need you, you know,' she told him, not even sure why she wanted to reassure him. But she just couldn't bear to see him so unhappy. It didn't suit him. 'There are still things only magic can achieve,' she argued.

'Like what?' he shot back.

Fortunately for her she had an answer ready. 'Like what you did to our cell door,' she replied without a moment's hesitation. 'Magic is still a stronger weapon than any of our guns, I assure you. They wouldn't have been able to damage the door that badly.' And, as he gave her a disbelieving frown by way of a reply, she added: 'There's a reason Harry wanted you on our operation so much, Merlin. He wouldn't have bothered to keep you, go to the trouble of letting us explain all this to you, brief you on a secret operation if he didn't think it would be worth it.' Apart from boosting his self-esteem, it was also true. Harry had been exited, although he tried to hide it, once he was over the initial shock of having to deal with medieval, legendary figures. He had also calmed down considerably. Before Merlin offered his help, Harry had been tense and short-tempered, the direct result of handling such a sensitive operation. Now that he had a weapon his opponents didn't, he was back to his normal self.

The look in Merlin's eyes, however, told her he still seriously doubted that.

To keep herself busy and to give herself the time to think of an answer she inspected the fridge to see what was still in there and, more importantly, what was still edible. The fact that she had hardly been at home and had eaten mostly at work for the past few weeks now resulted in an impressive collection of food gone bad in her fridge and cupboard. 'Shit!' she cursed under her breath.

'What's wrong?' Merlin asked.

'Some stuff gone bad,' she replied, throwing the lot of it in the waste bin. 'But I think there's still enough to make a decent pasta from all this.' She did think she remembered buying pasta some time ago at least.

Merlin shot her yet another quizzical look. 'Pasta?'

'Italian food,' Jo explained. She was glad she had given him a map of Europe earlier that day. 'Tasty, easy to make and probably still unknown in Camelot,' she added for good measure.

That got a good laugh out of him. 'I bet,' he muttered. All of a sudden his expression went thoughtful and then his entire face lit up again. 'If it's so easy to make, shall I cook then?' he proposed.

Merlin

For a moment Merlin wondered if he had somehow spoken in a foreign language. Jo's face had gone blank as she just stared at him. If he had to put a name to her expression it would be disbelief. His host clearly didn't know what to with his unexpected idea.

'I'm a decent cook,' he offered when she remained silent. The knights certainly seemed to think so.

Her ability to speak returned. 'You can cook?'

He smiled at her. 'It's just one of my many talents. And you said pasta was easy to make.' He shrugged, as if it was no big deal, which it wasn't to him. Jo really looked exhausted. From what she had told him the entire team had been extremely busy the past few weeks, getting hardly any time to rest at all. And now she had to put up with him on top of all that while she probably wanted nothing more than to get an early night and have some time to herself. The least he could do was taking the task of the cooking out of her hands.

'Yes…' She still seemed hesitant.

'I can cook,' he repeated. 'Really.'

'All right,' she agreed. 'Do you want me to show you where everything is and how everything works?'

He nodded. If he was to pull this off, he would need that. After all, he had never been in such a kitchen. To tell the truth, he had never cooked in an actual kitchen at all. Gaius didn't have much kitchen to speak of, Arthur's food came from the royal kitchens, all prepared and ready to go (and Merlin doubted the cook would let him even use "her" kitchen) and when he did cook for Arthur and the knights on a quest or hunting trip he had to make do with a campfire. This was so much more than he was used to, but he soon learned that the basics of cooking hadn't changed much over the centuries. It were only the means that had altered. True, he didn't have an actual fire here to heat things up and most of his ingredients were as good as prepared already. This might very well prove easier than in Camelot. There was very little that could go wrong.

'Are you sure you get it all?' Jo asked at the end of her extensive explanation.

The ingredients and equipment lay all before him on the kitchen table. Jo had written down the recipe for the sauce and the instructions for how to make the pasta shells were actually on the back of the box. She truly did make it very difficult for him to mess it up. And even if it all went belly-up (as Harry liked to call it) he was a resourceful person. He had to be with his destiny, so surely he could handle cooking dinner for the two of them.

'I get it,' he said with more confidence than he really felt. 'Why don't you go to the living room and make yourself comfortable?' He threw in his widest smile to convince her that he had everything under control.

'All right?' It came out as a question again.

'It will be fine,' he assured her.

Jo took a deep breath and then nodded. 'All right. I'll leave you to it, then.' She threw one last look at the kitchen to make sure she really had given him all he needed. She then nodded again and left. 'Call me if you need help.'

I won't need it. But since that might sound rather arrogant and presumptuous he didn't say it out loud. He understood Jo's surprise and hesitance to a certain extent. There weren't many men that knew how to cook even a half-decent meal where he came from and it would seem it was no different here. But he wasn't just any ordinary man. He was king Arthur's manservant and he was the powerful warlock Emrys. If he failed to prepare a meal the ordinary way, he could always use his magic to save it, even now that he dealt with a twenty-first century kitchen that looked like it belonged to a completely different world.

He read over the recipe and checked the instructions on the box with pasta shells. The sauce would take the longest to make, he decided. All that needed to be done with the pasta was cooking it for the exact amount of time it said in the instructions. That wouldn't really be difficult.

He turned to look at the vegetables Jo had put on the table. Most of them he recognised from Camelot and that was a relief, he had to admit. He had half started to expect that everything here was different.

He set about it with a vengeance, chopping them up and throwing them in the pan that stood next to it, taking care not to chop his fingers with the vegetables. It would be just like him to make such a clumsy mistake and for half a second he contemplated using magic to do the job. He was sure Jo wouldn't mind. But Gaius had told him just one time too often to not use magic for chores that could be done by hand as well, so in the end he did as his father-figure had learned him.

He was starting to feel slightly pleased with himself by the time he had completed his first task. True, it had taken up more time than he had anticipated, but he had done it without injuring himself and that had to be worth something. He then turned back to the carton that held the tomato sauce, or so the words on it told him. If he was not mistaken that had to go in next. Or was it supposed to be the meat?

He glanced at the instructions again. Unfortunately that was also the moment his legendary clumsiness decided to kick in. He accidentally kicked the tomato sauce over as he reached for the piece of paper, which was not as far away as he had supposed. Red sauce spilled all over Jo's handwritten instructions.

'Oh no!' he exclaimed. The paper was ruined, the instructions on it rendered useless by the sauce, not to mention that the sauce itself had gone completely to waste as well. Arthur would laugh himself sick when he heard about this.

Jo must have heard him. 'Everything all right?' she called.

'Fine!' he yelled back in his most optimistic voice. Had Arthur been here he would have known immediately that something indeed was wrong. Fortunately for him Jo didn't know him that well yet. 'Just dropped something, is all,' he added for good measure. 'I'll make sure to clean it up.'

'Oh. Okay.' She didn't sound totally convinced. 'Do you need help?'

'No, I'll be fine. Really.' Please let her stay there until I've found a way to deal with this.

'If you're sure?' Again, it sounded like a question.

'I am,' he replied hastily. 'Sure, I mean.'

Truth was, Merlin was anything but sure. He let his gaze wander over the mess in the kitchen, analysing the situation. One, he had only less than half of the instructions, two, the sauce was not edible anymore and three, this place now looked like someone had bled to death mere minutes ago. Well, at least he still knew how to prepare the pasta shells and with magic at his disposal it would take up hardly any time at all to make Jo's kitchen look less like a crime scene. No, those things weren't the problem. The sauce, however, was. He had no recipe, so he didn't know how to make it, and even if he had, he had just spilled one of his main ingredients all over the place. There was no way he could still make what Jo wanted.

He briefly considered asking for help, but that felt like throwing in the towel to him, admitting defeat. Good heavens, he had won fights against evil witches and magical creatures. He was not going to be beaten by some misfortune in the kitchen. He did have some pride.

So, what option did he have? Looking at Jo's cupboards and fridge a wide smile suddenly formed on his face. He could do what he always did in situations like this one. Improvise.

The young warlock straightened his back, took a deep breath and accepted the challenge with a wide grin. He was back in his element.

Jo

Jo was severely tempted to just take a quick glance into the kitchen she had been banished from. Merlin had sounded a little too optimistic just now, so she was sure something had gone wrong, but she also understood that he didn't want her to know. So she forced herself to remain on the couch, trying to read a book.

It took her a quarter of an hour to realise that she couldn't actually remember what she had just read. She was too busy listening to the sounds coming from the kitchen. Ten minutes earlier she had heard the sound of cupboards and fridge being opened and closed again. That had made her frown. She was sure she had taken out everything Merlin could possible need. It had her almost convinced she would need to take a look, but then he had started to sing. People who sang were happy, right? Then surely everything was all right.

Get a grip, Jo, she told herself, although her mental voice had copied Ros's tone.

She took up her book again, forcing herself to re-read the last part and let Merlin do what he wanted to do. He was a warlock, she reminded herself. He could deal with it. And even if he couldn't, his magic probably could.

Still, she kept on wondering what was going on in there and in the end her curiosity won out. She tip-toed across the room and peeked into the kitchen. The sight that met her there was enough to make her jaw drop. Merlin stood, still singing under his breath, stirring in a pan. That was about the only normal thing in all this mess. This magical mess. The kitchen table was being set for dinner, but instead of Merlin setting the table the plates were placing themselves on the table. Another pan was stirring itself and some dirty equipment was cleaning itself in the sink. As she watched some of the vegetables still lying on the table flew over to the self-stirring pan, dropping in it on a command of Merlin's hand.

And she thought she had seen it all. How stupid that had been. If previously she might have thought that unlocking the door with only a spoken command was impressive, she now recognised that for what it was: a mere trick.

'Almost done,' Merlin announced.

'Really?' she asked.

The warlock swivelled around, startled, and Jo realised he had been talking to himself rather than to her. 'Jo!' he exclaimed.

'It smells good,' she commented, which was the truth. She leaned against the door post as if she had every right to be there, which she, come to think of it, had. 'It just doesn't smell of pasta,' she added.

'Ah.' His cheeks coloured bright crimson. 'Ehm, about that…' He looked like he was thinking very hard. When he had come up with an explanation his entire face lit up in that dazzling smile again. 'The tomato sauce had gone bad,' he told her.

Jo frowned. For a man with such a big secret he was an awfully bad liar. She remembered him telling her that he dropped something and now suddenly the tomato sauce had gone bad. You didn't even have to be a spook to connect the dots. 'And was that before or after you spilled it?' she wondered.

Bull's eye, she thought as he smiled guiltily.

'I've made you something very special,' he offered. She thought it might be his way of an apology.

'I'm sure you did,' she replied. The delicious smell in the kitchen was proof enough of that. 'What did you make?'

The smile grew wider now that he realised that she wasn't going to fly of the handle and he started listing his ingredients, including a lot of spices and herbs Jo would never have put in her pasta, never mind combining them anyway.

'You just opened the cupboard and added whatever you thought would taste nice, didn't you?' she asked, trying to bite back a chuckle.

She was spot on again. 'I'm sure it's going to taste amazing,' he stated.

Now Jo chuckled for real. 'I'm sure.' She glanced at the self-stirring pan again and then looked back at Merlin. 'But if I've got food poisoning tomorrow you can call Ros and explain what happened.'

That threat didn't seem to impress him at all. Instead his smile got even wider. She was surprised that was even possible. 'Deal,' he agreed. 'So, shall we have some dinner?'

She glanced at her watch. About time. It had taken him two hours to complete it all and her stomach was protesting loudly against so much neglect. 'Let's have dinner,' she agreed.

I just realised I've only done one-shots taking place in London up till now. I think I might place the next few in Camelot.

This is part of my mission to update all my stories before the start of my holiday on Thursday. So, one down, two to go…

As always, reviews are very much appreciated.