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Second floor common room: Wednesday morning after first period

It was Valentine's day. Jack had it on good authority that it was a day dedicated to love and romance, the inevitable outcome of which was pretty much always sex. That made it his kind of day, and - seeing as he hadn't done anything for his birthday yesterday - he'd decided to do something for Valentine's Day.

Which was why he'd picked up some ~~handwavy~~ supplies after Spy Tech, and commandeered the second floor common room kitchen for the making of pancakes. Heart shaped pancakes, in fact.

This is not easy to do when you've only got the use of one arm, the left one being tucked away in a sling to keep it from moving around. But he was managing, sort of, accompanied by occasional swearing as he missed a flipped pancake.

There was strawberry syrup, maple syrup, chocolate syrup, and lots of whip cream (though it was the kind that came in a can) along with a slowly growing stack of pancakes.

[ooc: open of course - heart shaped pancakes for all!]

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Irulan entered the common room, lured by the sweet smell of food and was very glad to see Jack, the sling as yet, not registering. "Hello!"

River was on her way out, when the smell of pancakes distracted her. She quietly peeked inside the kitchen, saw Jack, and then quickly disappeared upstairs again. Isabel had told her it had been his birthday yesterday, and she did have a present in mind.

She returned as quietly as she had disappeared. The present was pointless to wrap and difficult to hide behind her back, so she just walked up to Jack and handed him the same harpoon that she'd pulled out of his shoulder. "Happy birthday," she said, grinning.

"Irulan, hey!" Jack grinned at her over his shoulder. "Happy Valentine's day. Can I offer you breakfast?"

"Thank you, I would not turn down the offer of food." She said, then turned her head to the side, "What is Valentine's day?"

Jack dropped the frypan with a clatter when he saw what River was carrying, sending a sploop of pancake batter over the edge. "Is that my harpoon?" he asked, looking at it warily as if it might suddenly decide it wanted another taste of him, but he accepted it automatically. "I didn't know you'd kept it."

"As far as I can tell, it's a day to celebrate romance, in all its many and varied forms." He flashed her another grin, feeling pretty good this morning (the dose of pain killers he'd taken before class that morning were helping with that). "And you look gorgeous today, I must say. You couldn't do me a favour, could you?"

"It ended up in the pile of knives Buffy and I kept. And yes, it's yours." River glanced at the frying pan and then back at Jack. "Sorry. About you getting hurt."

Jack held it up for a closer look, and rubbed his thumb across it's smooth surface. "You know," he said with a small laugh. "It felt a lot bigger when it was sticking out of my shoulder. And it's okay, River. Not your fault." He'd already had this talk with Sam, and he knew, no matter what anyone else believed, that it was his own fault he'd gotten hurt.

River shrugged. "You were being you. I should have expected that. Just like Blair was being himself trying to talk his way out of things." She took Jack's hand, sqeezed it, then let go. "You're making pancakes," she commented.

Any compliment from Jack, of course, would only end up in Irulan blushing. "Thank you. What favor do you need done?"

Conquer another world? Easy, Bring down a robotic Empire? easy beans.

Irulan blushing only made Jack smile wider and carefully nudge her with his elbow. "Could you grab a couple of eggs out of there," he pointed at the carton on the counter, "crack them in that bowl, then whisk them up? It's hard to do with only one hand. There was some unpleasantness earlier. Not pretty."

And that's when Irulan notices the sling. "You are injured!"

Oh, pity the fool who caused this injury, the wrath of an Empire would not be enough.

"Yeah, reckless and stupid. I won't be doing it again in a hurry." Jack very carefully leaned the harpoon against the counter, already feeling very attached to it. They did know each other intimately, after all. "You, on the other hand, were incredible," he told her, thoughts a mixture of awe and wonder as he remembered River taking down the Reavers. "And yes, pancakes. Heart shaped for Valentine's Day. Want some?

"Yeah, our little weekend trip off planet ended up with me getting a harpoon in the shoulder." He glared at his shoulder, then wiggled the fingers of his left hand at Irulan. "The sling's just to keep my arm from moving around too much. It kind of hurts when it does that."

Irulan studied the injury with narrowed eyes. "Which planet?"

Jack blinked at her, tilted his head, and didn't smile as he realised she was angry. "A place called Miranda. But the things that did it are all very dead. I promise."

"Pancakes, yes. Please"

River felt oddly flattered by his thoughts. "It's two-edged. What they made me into." She tore her eyes from the pancakes and looked up at Jack. "I think the nightmares are gone."

"Good." Said in all the icy tones of a princess used to death and giving the orders of same. Irulan took the eggs and with one brisk, angry movement of the wrist, cracked the eggs one after the other.

Jack grabbed a plate, set it on the counter, then pulled the stack of pancakes out of the oven where he'd set them to keep warm.

"Yeah, I get that," he said quietly as he recalled the bar fight. But it saved our lives, he thought but didn't say, watching her steadily. "Good, that's good River. That's why we went, to make them stop." He used the flipper to manoeuvre several pancakes onto the plate - making sure she got the most heart shaped ones - and pointed at the syrup and whip cream cans. "There you go, and help yourself to the sweet stuff."

In that moment, Jack believed she was truly royalty, the sweet girl he was used to seeing buried under cold anger. "I think so, too," he said, studying her for a moment. "Now just whisk them gently together."

Irulan did as instructed, doing so with a calming intake of breath. She did not trust her voice to speak yet but as she breathed out she felt her anger leak out.

"I am glad you were not critically injured." She finally managed to say, "It would be... unfortunate to lose you."

The implication, of course, being, unfortunate to the fool who caused the injury. Death was not an easy escape as some might think.

Wondering if she should offer to help him, River decided against it, and let Jack serve her the pancakes. It felt good to know that he didn't seem too frightened by what he had seen her do.

She proceeded to the cream can and added a nice pattern of cream, and on top of that syrup. "Heart shaped. You're going with the theme for this holiday." She grinned and poked Jack - but not on his wounded shoulder.

"Yeah, I'd certainly miss me if I were gone," he teased lightly. "Imagine this place with no Jack around! Where would the fun be?" As he spoke, he stepped sideways until his right shoulder was pressed against Irulan's left one. "I'm really okay, you know. And it was my birthday yesterday," he added, hoping to distract her a bit.

Jack laughed when she poked him, and poked her back. "Yup, it seemed to fit. I think I should have been born on this day, instead of yesterday." He grinned at her. "And I haven't wished you a happy Valentine's Day yet," he added, feigning sadness, and thinking that a proper Valentine's day wish really required a kiss. Just a little one, on the cheek.

River chuckled, with just a hint of nervousness audible. "And to you." She reached up and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek, then took a step back and proceeded to attack her pancakes. "I think Buffy was disappointed by the lack of space vampires," she continued. "But she thinks we should decorate our room with the knives."

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Second floor common room: Wednesday morning after first period

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