InsaneJournal

Oh you're in for a treat then. We're going to make you a burger and real pizza
Who: Kitty and River
What: Ballet and Breakfast
when: Not long before arriving on Earth
Where: Gym and Mess Hall
Status: complete
Rating: PG for foodgasms



Kitty rubbed her shin, leaning against the bars the holodeck had provided them. She was limber and agile but there was something different between dancing and fighting and her body wasn’t used to it. And she was very, very rusty.

River, though, was gifted and beautiful. She flowed like her namesake, which made Kitty’s stomach get butterflies that she didn’t want to think about. So she didn’t think about them. “When you’re done prancing around like a sugar plum fairy, want to clean up and get lunch?”

"Prancing?" River blinked her eyes, stopping dead straight in the middle of a move that had one leg up in the air behind her, something reminiscent of a figure skater. She'd gotten lost in the music, escaping off into a world of dancing wisps on the wind, and if Kitty hadn't said something she might have stayed in it forever.

Simon had done a lot for her, the medicine he'd tried, but she still sometimes escaped into a fully realised vision of somewhere else. It faded away back into reality, and she giggled sheepishly as she slipped into a more comfortable stance. "Sorry. I forget sometimes. I'm supposed to be trying not to spook anyone."

She gave River a teasing smile, “Prancing. It’s a form of dancing, which you were just doing. But you weren’t spooking me. It takes a lot to spook me.”

And there were no giant bullets or concentration camps or Sentinels to worry about. Less things to spook her.

"Well... you've seen a lot." River replied, nodding her head. She padded her way over to the bar and bent down to pull on some legwarmers, mainly to relieve calf cramps. She threw on a cute little wrap sweater the computer had replicated for her along with her standard ballet set. "But I thought prancing were for reindeer. Can you believe we have one on board? This odd spacial phenomenon sure is funny."

She pulled her bag over her shoulder and bounced on her heels. "I'm starving. I could eat a whole feast! It's still new, this idea of fresh food whenever you want it."

“I’m still jealous I didn’t get to have my dragon on me,” Kitty replied, following River with her eyes. She’d agree about the food. It was a lot different than opening the fridge and she hadn’t yet reached the point where replicated food sucked. She wasn’t sure she ever would.

“What are you interested in?” For food.

"You had a dragon?" River asked, while heading for the door. "We didn't have any pets, couldn't afford to keep them."

She pondered the food question, though, because there were so many more options here on the ship than there had ever been back home, even when she was living in a fairly wealthy area. "I don't know. I like fresh things, we mostly ate out of tins. And lots of packaged protein with no real flavor. What are some of your favorite foods?"

"Sentient space lizard who looks like a dragon, so more of a friend than a pet," Kitty admitted. She swung her arms as she thought about her favorite foods. "Can never go wrong with a burger, unless you're a vegetarian. Then you could try a tofu burger."

she wrinkled her nose at the very idea. "French Fries. Pizza. Sushi. Spaghetti. I love Pho too, which is a kind of Vietnamese noodle meal. And chicken fingers. Not really fingers but they call them that."

"Oh I know soup, and noodles. There was this time that Mal accidentally got married and his new wife made him soup out of our supplies. I heard it was delicious. The rest of the situation was not good." Saffron had driven the men on the ship crazy, made Inara jealous, and had tried to steal the ship. River had mainly just watched it all happen, curious as to the various emotions going around.

"She made buns, too. Burger? Never heard of pizza either. Pancakes, heard of those."

Giving River an amused look, Kitty replied, "Oh you're in for a treat then. We're going to make you a burger and real pizza, Chicago Deep Dish."

She was a proud Chicagoan. Not that that had any meaning to River. "It's not super healthy but if you don't treat yourself once in awhile, what's the point? It's kind of...there's really fancy meals, but burgers and pizza aren't fancy. A burger is ground beef made into a patty, on a bun. You can have various toppings. Cheese and ketchup are popular, so is mustard."

Unless you made them fancy but that was just wrong.

"Beef is a luxury in the 'verse," River commented, while striking off in the direction of the Mess Hall. "We transported cows once, but they hated the cargo hold. It was stuffy and they couldn't move, couldn't be cows. It was smuggling, that's how rare it is."

Ketchup and Mustard were condiments she'd learned about since she'd gotten there, and she could extrapolate what 'deep dish' meant without even having to pick it out of Kitty's mind. "I guess there are all kinds of pizza? Kind of like how there's different types of Bao, depends on where you land."

"I can see how a cow couldn't be a cow in a cargo hold." Kitty wondered how they transported cattle in the Federation. Transporter buffers? Some kind of suspended animation? She didn't think they'd ever done something like that on the Enterprise, but then why have Picard's ship carry cows when there were dedicated haulers.

"Lots of kinds of pizza. People like to argue over which is best. It's kind of fun. A pride thing."

The doors to the mess hall swished open, and Kitty led River over to the replicators. “OKay we’ll start with two burgers, everything on them, and two slices of Chicago Deep Dish Supreme Pizza.”

"Supreme Pizza?" River asked, wondering what was on it. It sounded like some rare, luxurious thing. She eagerly watched the replicator do its work, getting ready to feast upon it with her eyes and get a good long smell of it before even eating it. "Like magic, the way it works. Could have eaten like kings on the Serenity if we'd had one of these. Do you think there's any real calories in food made out of air?"

If it worked the way things did on the ship, where they molded protein into whatever else they were trying to eat, then it all came from the same thing. Probably 'junk food' wasn't nearly as bad for a person as it used to be.

Supreme Pizza turned out to be a triangle of dough and cheese and sauce and a variety of delicious delicious toppings. “They keep a storage of raw material, the replicator changes the base molecular structure to the ingredients in the meals.”

Grinning, Kitty offered River her tray. “Hopefully you like it. If not, we can put it back and replicate something else.”

"I was right!" River was excited to have figured out how it worked so quickly. And it was comforting to know that something here operated at least slightly like it did back home. The pizza smelled amazing, and she suddenly wondered if she was hungry enough to finish it all.

That didn't stop her from accepting the challenge. "It all smells so good, how could I not like it?"

She decided to start with the pizza, picking it up with her hands. She wasn't actually sure that that's how you were supposed to handle the food, but River preferred eating that way. Her first bite of pizza was a combination of amazing flavors and textures, and she almost rolled her eyes into the back of her head. Pizza? That was her new favorite food.

“I spared you the pineapples,” Kitty promised. And technically a supreme pizza and a cheeseburger weren’t exactly kosher but that was one of the things Kitty didn’t follow. “Some people like pineapple on their pizza but it’s an acquired taste.”

She watched River eat, grinning toothily as the younger woman had a sort of foodgasm. “Good, isn’t it. And you’ve already figured out the proper way to eat a pizza.”

"I just like eating everything this way," River admitted, as she set what was left of her slice down to attack her burger. That looked like hand food, too, so she figured she wasn't that wrong. "Connecting with it. Food should be interactive when it can be. Too many don't think, just eat."

She shrugged a shoulder, then bit into the burger and had another entire foodgasm. So many combinations of flavors and textures, some pieces not entirely ones she'd try again, she thought, but still amazing. It wasn't hard to impress her, of course. This kind of food was far beyond anything she'd eaten since she was back home on Osiris.

Also, she had no idea what a pineapple was, but it sounded hideous.

Kitty had picked the right kind of food for River then. Hand food. She kept that mind for other things. “Remind me to introduce you to sushi. I think you’ll like it if you can get over the fact that it’s raw fish.”

Pineapple though, was definitely hideous. She chowed down on her own burger, closing her eyes. She hadn’t actually had one since she’d gotten onto the Enterprise and she’d only had one between leaving the Guardians and then. So she was savoring this too.

Probably the best thing about eating on the Enterprise was the fact that they could eat anything they wanted and maintain a pretty good weight. River wasn't one to slack on exercise regardless, but doing a dance workout and then eating like this was probably a no no in other circles. It definitely would have been a problem in her 'verse.

The burger was completely devoured and River licked her fingers clean. "Raw fish? We don't get a lot of fish, either. Shouldn't be that bad, eating it raw. Maybe a different texture, but I might like that."

“It’s specially prepared,” Kitty assured her. “Usually with some kind of sauce, wrapped in seaweed with rice and other things. If you’re daring there’s wasabi paste. Maybe when we’re on Earth I’ll take you to a real live sushi place!”

"Of course, wouldn't be safe to eat otherwise." River replied, nodding her head. So far, she trusted Kitty not to lead her astray when it came to these things. "You wouldn't take me to eat something that wasn't safe."

She paused and then added, while tilting her head to the side, "Except for the blowfish. We just won't have any. Simon wouldn't like you very much if you accidentally killed me."