Bianca rolled up her sleeves and set the pot down. Phoenix looked at her reluctantly. She was shivering so much from fear that the beads in her braids clacked together.
"Bianca, you really don't have to—"
Bianca raised a hand to cut her off. "Yes. I do. Because apparently…" Bianca leveled an icy glare at the other Hunters, who were all gathered around the campfire and all looked away in shame, "…no one else bothered to correct you!"
Phoenix shrank in on herself. "But… it wouldn't fit!"
Phoenix had made a terrible mistake about fifteen minutes before. While cooking herself some spaghetti, she had snapped the dry spaghetti in half so that it would fit in the pot.
Bianca had made a strangled, choking sound when Phoenix did this—right next to her, nonetheless—before going ballistic. Hands flying, voice shouting, the pot knocked over, cursing in English, Italian, French, Ancient Greek, and Latin. Bianca was thoroughly, thoroughly offended.
After a ten-minute tirade at Phoenix, and another five minutes yelling at the other Hunters who had seen her do this before and said nothing, Bianca decided to show everyone how to properly cook pasta.
Bianca stared coldly down at Phoenix. "Tch! Wouldn't fit! First of all, you use a big pot. Second, if you don't have a big pot, it's spaghetti! It softens! That's the whole point of boiling it! Look."
As she was talking, the pot began to boil. It was the same pot that she had knocked over in her rage. It was too small to fit an entire bundle of dry spaghetti.
Bianca took a portion of spaghetti out from the box and placed one end inside the pot. Then, she took the spoon that she would use to stir it, and gently pressed the ends sticking out into the pot. The spaghetti already in the pot softened, allowing her to push all the spaghetti inside without breaking it. She gazed up at Phoenix, giving her an unimpressed look that said this is the simplest and most obvious thing in the world, how do you screw it up?
Phoenix gulped. "I see what you're saying, but… I feel like it's just easier to break the pasta…"
Bianca stalked up to Phoenix and leaned down so that they were face-to-face. "Let me make this clear. You break the pasta, I break you."
Phoenix gulped again and nodded. "Yes ma'am," she said in a small voice.
Bianca continued to frown, but softly patted Phoenix's cheek twice, like a nonna would. Then she turned around and faced the other hunters.
"Got it?"
"Yes, Bianca," chorused the girls.
Bianca smiled. "Good. Now, let's start cooking dinner. I feel like the Stymphalian Birds we shot down would make an excellent chicken parmesan!"
Author's Note:
A short, silly story where Bianca sets things right. Set in an AU where Bianca lives.
If you wanna read Phoenix's first appearance, where she does the same thing in front of Nico, check out my story Breaking Point, available both here and on AO3!
Please let me know what you thought! Comments are greatly appreciated! :D