June - 2012 (T.W.G.)

by The Writer's Group


Roots - Cytotoxin

Author: Cytotoxin

Prompt: Luna and cooking.

Title: Roots


Celestia woke up. Teasing aroma of food wafted in from the kitchen, teasing her nostrils. She pushed away from the table and smacked her lips, stretching. She remembered something about pulling an all-nighter again, but then everything went hazy. Probably, she konked out right at the table. Wait, what?

She looked around warily. Then she rubbed her eyes and looked again. This room... It`s been millenias since she last saw that room. Faded beige wallpaper, simple furniture, server stack... How strange. She reached out to the keyboard, but in the same time, her belly rumbled ominously. Pausing, she looked down on it, considering her inner status. Her belly rumbled again. Food first, she decided, pushing away from the table and trotting to the next room, following aroma by her nose.

"Oh hey, Celly-belly. How are you?" - offered Luna, turning around. She wore an apron and looked positively cute. Or maybe the fact she was holding a trey with pizza increased her cuteness ten-fold for suddenly ravenous Celestia. "...Yawn. Hey, Lulu? What just happened? Why we are at #0 again?" - she asked, sitting down at the table, - "...And since when you can cook, while at it?"

Luna merely chuckled - "Remember that story arc with banishment to the moon? I spent that time to put all kinds of personal skills in. Including baking a pizza from scratch." She reached out, offering Celestia a slice. Older sister accepted graciously, biting into the proffered food with unladylike gusto - "...Oh, yum... That`s pretty damn good, sis, by golly. Still, why are we here?"

Sighing, Luna set the trey on top of the stove and began levitating slices on the plate, one by one. After a few moments of silence, she offered - "Remember that memory leak trouble we found after last patch? Well, it got really bad. Garbage dbrefs all over the place. Our database swelled over five times. We had to shut the whole thing down and roll world DB back to last week`s snapshot." Celestia straightened up, almost choking on pizza - "Gah, no, don`t tell me we lost everything?"

Shaking her head, Luna peeked into the oven, testing something inside with toothpick - "No, no, nothing of a sort. It`s just.. You got all fired up about catching that memory leak and sending bug-report. I`m not sure if you caught it yet or not, I went to bed a while ago. When I woke up, you were sprawled all over keyboard."

Celestia blenched - "So... what, we`re running test world right now?" Luna nodded - "Yes. I think you pulled an all-nighter, too. When I woke up, you were all over keyboard." Older sister heaved a long sigh. "Marvelous. Just marvelous." - she muttered, - "So much downtime. How unseemly. At least you`re making the most of it." With a chuckle, Luna turned the oven off, and donned mitts, reaching into it.

"Somehow, I think you`re the one who`s going to make the most of it." - she offered, pulling out a pie. Celestia sniffed it cautiously and beamed. "...Blueberry pie. Lulu, I love you. Any chance you`ll keep the culinary tagged this time in-sim?" Younger sister shrugged, leaning to pat Celestia`s shoulder - "I suppose I can indulge your little fantasy this time." - she offered jovially, ignoring the dirty look Celestia shot her, - "Just don`t forget to restart the primary world, mmhm? Because we`re only running test right now."

Celestia quirked her brow. "A world where`s only me, you and blueberry pies?... Y`know, now that I think of it, our world DB could use some advanced maintenance. Lots of crossed calls and index inconsistencies to fix. And aren`t you using external library for cooking?" - she mused and weathered the dirty look of her own, courtesy of Luna. "Pff, you`re a glutton, Celly-belly.... Tell you what - if you fix everything and restart the world servers today, I`ll let you compile culinary lib into alicorn kernel. Fair enough?"

Blinking, Luna stared at the stool that was just occupied by her older sister. "You got it, Lulu! Ten seconds flat!" - was faintly heard from the server room. Letting out a chuckle, Luna set the pie on the windowsill to cool down a little. "And another day is saved by the supercook Luna." - she muttered softly, smiling.