Chapter 4: Cookies and a Little Mischief

Kayla stood at the island in the center of the kitchen. She had all the supplies out for chocolate chip cookies, the oven was on and was just looking over the recipe. Loki was standing at the edge of the counter on his toes peering up over the edge. Thor had gone and gotten Sif and the Warriors Three, as they were called, and they were all just walking in.

"Alright you guys all need to go wash your hands." A task her and Loki had done just moments before. She started pulling chairs up to the island. One for each of them to stand on. Loki climbed onto one and stood up, his arms just above the counter top. Each of them took their respective places around the counter. "Alright we are going to make chocolate chip cookies. There are a lot of things we need to put in this bowl so we can mix it together." She put her hand on the mixer. "So you are each going to take turns. Let's see you should always let the guest go first and also ladies first. So Sif will start and the we will go through Volstagg, Fandral and Hogun."

"May I go next?" Thor asked. Loki looked up at her and shrugged, then nodded his head.

"Alright Thor can go next then Loki. Okay first we need to put the butter in. Unwrap that out of the plastic and put it in the bowl. A stick of butter was passed to Sif and to Volstagg. Sif quickly unwrapped it and dropped it in the bowl with expert fingers. Volstagg had a harder time but managed to finally unwrap and drop the butter in the bowl. "Alright next comes the sugars, just dump those in." She handed Fandral a small bowl of brown sugar and Hogun a small bowl of white sugar. She had decided to pre-measure all of the dry ingredients just to make it easier.

"Woa this stuff looks quite weird." Fandral proclaimed.

"It's just sugar. It's what makes the cookies sweet." They dumped in the sugar and she turned on the mixer. She grabbed a few measuring spoons while it was working. She turned and shut it off. Volstagg went to stick a finger in the bowl but she grabbed his hand. "You probably shouldn't eat that. Not yet. Alright next comes eggs." She handed Loki and Thor each an egg.

"What is this hard white object you call an 'egg'" She laughed.

"Thor you had eggs this morning for breakfast."

"Nay, I do not believe this trickery. Scrambled Eggs are fluffy and yellow." He muttered holding up to his eye and tapping the white shell.

"Well that's what the stuff in scrambled eggs comes from. You just have to crack it open. Here let me show you." She took his hand in hers and helped him tap it against the edge of the bowl so there was a small crack in it. "Alright now just stick your fingers into the crack and pull it apart. Try not to get any of the hard white part in the bowl though. He did so and now held two destroyed egg halves in his hands. "Go throw those in the garbage." He turned and she quickly reached in and drew out the large shell pieces he allowed to fall into the bowl.

"Alright now you try Loki"

"Alright." He leaned in and tapped the egg on the bowl. He looked at the egg and frowned. "There aren't any cracks in it."

"That's okay you just have to hit it a little harder." She took his hand and helped him put a crack in the egg. He stuck his fingers in the egg and made a face, which made the group laugh. He glared at them and continued to open the egg. Then he waved his hand over the egg and it floated to the garbage can and dropped itself into the can. He glanced into the bowl. There wasn't one eggshell. He smirked triumphantly. "Good Job!" Alright now we need to blend it up again. She turned on the mixer for a few more seconds then shut it off. A few more ingredients were handed around. Sif dumped in salt. Volstagg a mixture of baking soda and water. Fandral poured in the oatmeal.

Then it came to Hogun and he had to put in the vanilla. Kayla measured out a spoon and handed it to him to dump in. He got a small amount on his hand and licked it off. He cringed and then made an odd face. Everyone laughed and Kayla turned around from the sink.

"You ate some of the vanilla didn't you."

"No." He said quietly.

"Well here then you want to try some?" She grabbed the bottle from the other side of the counter.

"No"

"It doesn't taste good does it?"

"No." She laughed

"Here have some of this. It will make the taste go away." The spoon of sugar she handed him quickly went onto his tongue. "Okay we have only a few more things to do and then we can put them in the oven. Thor put this in there. Slowly." Thor took the large bowl and dumped it in. Slow had no meaning to Thor. A large puff of powder came out of the bowl and into his face. He coughed and waved away the smoke.

"What *cough* What sorcery is this? *cough*"

"It's just flour Thor. It just puffs up if you dump it in a little too fast." Loki giggled and studied his brother and the puff of flour. An amused smirk came onto his face and he dragged the large glass jar off flour towards him a little. "Alright and Loki you can dump in these." She handed him a large bag of chocolate chips.

"What is it?" He pondered.

"Oh that's right I forgot you've never had chocolate before. You can each try one." The bag was passed around the counter.

"Well aren't they odd looking." Fandral said.

"They're good!" Volstagg said chomping away at a handfull.

"Don't eat too many or else we won't have any left for the cookies." Loki dumped what was left in and Kayla turned on the mixer. Then after a few seconds she turned it off and started putting balls of cookie dough on sheets. She set one on the left corner turned around and set one on the left corner again. She looked down to see Volstagg with a large glob of cookie dough in his mouth. Everyone else seemed to have a little around the edge of their mouth also. "Alright, Alright that's enough." She rubbed his head. "Why don't you all go wash your hands while I finish putting these in the oven." She turned her head and leaned over to put several trays into the oven.

Loki had a different plan than washing his hands though. He turned around from the back of the line and climbed back up onto his chair. Flour was carefully poured into the bowl and he put down the mixer into the bowl just as he had seen Kayla do. He hopped down and went over to the other side of the room. His hand waved through the air in front of him and the small switch on the side of the mixer moved over to high.

Suddenly a puff of white exploded into the air covering everything in a layer of white. Kayla coughed several times, removing the airborne powder from her lungs. She happened to be closest to the mixer and was covered in a thick layer of white. Most of Thor was covered and the backs of the warriors three. Sif luckily was behind the four boys and barely got a speck of white on her. Kayla whipped around to see Loki with a triumphant smirk on his face. Safely out of range of the flour bomb.

"Alright Mischief you were asking for this one!" She shouted and chased him around the island. She finally caught up to him and swung him up into a large bear hug causing him also to be coated in white. She ran her hands through his hair dying what was usually black white with all the flour. He pushed away from her chest with his hands but was cracking up. She laid him down on the ground but started to tickle him. He laughed even harder.

"St-stop ehehehe p-p-please ehehehehe" He rolled around on the ground, only coating himself in more flour.

"Alright I think you have had enough." She sat back onto her heels. He looked up at her, tears of laughter falling down his face. Then he pounced making her fall backwards. Soon all of the little Aesir were encircling Kayla tickling her sides. "Okay, okay I give up! Go pick on someone your own size." She mumbled through her hysterical laughter. It ended and they were all laying on the ground breathing heavily and looking like someone had bleached all the color from their figures. "Alright, heh, lets go get some clean clothes and by the time we are done we will have cookies." They all picked themselves up and some maids came and got all of the children to clean them up.

Kayla went and took a quick shower and got a change of clothes. She ran her hands through her hair as she was walking back to the kitchen to take the cookies out. She pulled her hands back and looked at them. Globs of wet flour stuck to every bit of her skin. She sighed and rinsed her hands in the sink. It would take another day or two to get all of the flour out of her hair. She pulled out the finished cookies and waited for them to cool as she started to clean up the kitchen. Most of the flour had already been cleaned up while she was in the shower.

She just finished up when everyone walked back into the kitchen. Clean and flour-free. Although Loki's hair still seemed a little lighter than usual. He looked at her and cracked a smile. She knew her gold-blond hair was probably pretty white.

"Cookies are done." Each of them pulled up a chair and sat at the table and plates of sandwiches, cookies and glasses of milk were passed around. Cautious bites of cookies were taken.

"Mmmm. These are good." Sif said

"Yes." Hogun agreed.

"I like to eat them like this." Kayla said and she dunked her cookie into her glass of milk. Everyone tried it. A chorus of delighted noises rose up above the table.

"Well should we make cookies again sometime later?" She asked.

"YES!" rang through the air.