driftfleet | ii - action/video

Who: Eugene Woods
Broadcast: Video
Action: the Wonderduck
When: Tuesday Evening

[Eugene has been on a ship full of teenagers long enough - it's time he delivered on the promises to actually feed them adequately. Which is why he's now broadcasting from the galley, flour-speckled and far, far too pleased with himself. So pleased, in fact, that he'll just go ahead an monologue at the rest of the fleet.]

Some of you out there may have heard a saying, that there's no such thing as bad pizza. Now maybe you haven't heard this - say, for instance, if you come from a world that doesn't actually have pizza. But if you do, this is probably a pretty common truism. Whether you agree with it or not-? Well. That's a matter of taste.

[Pun fully intended, as the little curl of his lips and glint of his eye gives away. But he continues, because in space, there's no one to cue a laugh track.]

But in a hermetically-sealed tin can drifting through the cold vacuum of space, I think we can all agree that standards change. And in celebration of finally creating something that sort of, basically behaves like cheese . . .

[Camera pan to the oven, which he opens with a showman's flourish to reveal . . . a pizza! Basically. Sure, the cheese is a little more yellowish than usual, and the toppings are mostly diced canned meat product and mixed vegetable compound. But it's close enough for him to grin as he shuffles a hand into an oven mitt and withdraws his creation to rest on the stovetop.]

Voila. One down, and another five pies' worth of dough and cheese ready for the crews of the Wonderduck and Vanquish. Not exactly a New York slice, but hey, if anyone wants the next best thing this side of Alpha Centauri? Let's talk.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

How long did it take you to make that?

How long in terms of prep and cooking time? Or how long in terms of research and development?

That took research?

Oh, yeah. They don't give us anything that really acts like cheese, so that took a lot of trial and error. And the sauce is a whole bunch of things mixed together until it tastes decent. I've been working on this for well over a week.

How is cheese supposed to act?

[For once, Asuka's not being dryly sarcastic. She's barely had real cheese before.]

Solid at room temperature, stretchy without being too liquid at hot-food temperature. And chewy, but not too chewy, once you melt it. [He huffs a laugh under his breath.] It's weird stuff. Tasty, but hard to fake.

[Asuka chews on that for a bit, frowning. She'd been too busy popping those bits of cheese into her mouth a couple of planets ago to notice many of the finer details therein.]

[Maybe she's steering the conversation where she didn't expect it to go, but she doesn't care, curious as she's become. His enthusiasm is almost contagious.]

... Do you have a favorite?

A favourite cheese? Oh boy, that's choosing between like, dozens of really good ones. [He whistles, looking up at the ceiling.] Some of the ones I like the best actually don't even fit the description I just gave you. But of the ones that do-?

[He actually has to think a moment.]

There was this local shop, back where I used to live, and they made this great dill havarti. Buttery, sort of sweet - like milk is sweet, not sugary-sweet - and just tart enough to really compliment the dill.

[Asuka nods along, the frown on her face not seeming quite as etched in as before. She doesn't know what dill is, either, but figures it has to be some sort of spice or garnish. There's never a reason to broadcasting her ignorance to anyone, stranger or not.]

So what does yours taste like, then? The one on the pizza. [A pause.] You got the augment for cook, didn't you? [Given his interest, it wouldn't make sense if his augment didn't match up, but that's no guarantee.]

I did. I probably couldn't have done this without it, honestly. [It may have a variety of flavors, but the dispenser-protein does not like to behave like any conventional foodstuff that Eugene is familiar with.] As for the cheese, it's . . . a little creamy? Salty, sharp, slightly nutty. Strong enough to stand up to the other toppings, anyway.

Have you had pizza before?

I've had synthetic pizza before I was on the Fleet, but it didn't look like yours. [Honestly, it had looked like a cracker with a glop of red sauce on the top. His version seems much more appetizing.] If you don't have any left, don't worry. I think every ship's going to demand your food.

What? Oh, no no no. The people who haven't had even half-authentic pizza are the ones who need to try this the most. This food is internationally popular on my world for a reason.

[Besides, he wants to hear more about this overtly 'synthetic' pizza, seeing as a lot of mainstream pizzas are pretty synthetic already.]

What ship are you on?

The Red Fish.

[She's about to protest again-- she doesn't need to eat, so it would be better if her taste of it went to someone else-- but the pizza looks too appetizing for her to argue too much.]

Only if you think you have enough.

If the cupboard starts looking bare I might ask for a little flour and milk powder back, but these things aren't too resource-intensive, honestly.

[That and his crew hadn't really been using the flour and milk powder for much of anything, so there was a bit of a surplus.]

Are any of your crewmates going to get restless if I don't bring enough to share?

Not if we don't tell them.

Sneaky.

[He approves. Less cooking for him to do, anyway.]

Okay, then. What kind of toppings do you want?

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