Title: The Outer Zone's Weekly Pizza and Punch Party.
Characters: Cain/Glitch, DG, Azkadelia, the Queen, Ahamo
Warnings: DG teaches the leading figures in the O.Z. how to make pizza. Hilarity, pizza sauce spooning, and sausage jokes ensue.
Disclaimer: Don't own Tin Man. If I did, G/C would be canon…wait they so totally are.
"It's been forever since I had a slice of pizza…" DG said wistfully as she picked at her roast. She hadn't noticed that everyone seated at their rather intimate dinner had ceased their eating to look at her. When she finally glanced up it was to the half marbled question of Glitch.
"What's pizza?" he asked, his head cocked at a strange angle, like a dog when his owner says 'treat'.
"You guys have seriously never heard of pizza?" Her tone was surprisingly flat as she appraised the table. Her mother at the end looked at her interestedly with her hand locked in Ahamo's over the corner of the table. Glitch still had the interested, but not quite comprehending why he has so, look on his face across from her. Her sister Azkadelia looked at her lovingly, and Cain at the other end just ate another mouthful of roasted carrots.
"No, DG, what exactly is it?" Ahamo spoke up when his artistic curiosity was piqued.
"Well, it's Italian…" The blank faces staring back told her that that meant nothing to them. "Erm, it's a bread crust with tomato sauce, and cheese and anything else you want, really. When you bake it the cheese melts and…" The blank faces remained rather blank, empty but nonetheless interested. Except of course, Glitch. He seemed to have forgotten all about the mysterious 'pizza' and took to tugging on his messy curls. "I'll have to show you later." She concluded and went back to picking at her roast, thinking that it was time to give the O.Z. an American culture lesson.
The next day at about the third bell past noon Glitch found his way into the dining room, later than he was expected, to find Cain, Ahamo, the Queen, and Azkadelia all waiting and rather confused as to why.
"Hello Everybody! What's going on?" And for once his lack of knowledge about current events was met with a general shrug of shoulders and "I'm not really sure…"s, rather than the usual "Who let the headcase out of his cage?" looks. The door he had just came in through opened suddenly behind him and he jumped into the nearest person, who just so happened to be a particularly beautiful blonde Tin Man.
"Why…!" he started, angry at the rough hands that had grabbed his shoulders to steady him, but upon looking up into those blue eyes ended with a seductive "…heloooooooo." The man just shook his head.
"Watch it, Sweetheart." He said.
"Sorry Cain." Glitch snapped back to the reality at hand. Something about the way Cain said 'sweetheart' always fixed his glitching tendencies.
"I have a surprise for everyone! Come on." DG spoke from the door she had just busted in through, and once again shocked the headcase.
"What is it DG?" asked Azkadelia.
"A surprise, duh." She said flatly and grabbed her sister by the hand, pulling her out of the room. "Just follow me!" Ahamo and his dear wife exchanged looks, but followed their daughter despite their apprehension. Glitch, not wanting to be left out grabbed Cain by the arm, and dragged him roughly out of the room laughing about ponies, and new musical instruments, most especially excited about dancing to the latter and riding the former.
Azkadelia felt quite ridiculous standing in the kitchens wearing a large white apron over her pale sage green dress. She looked around the surprise setup, thinking that her sister had done quite well in organizing a 'pizza' making session. There were three cupboards arranged in a triangle, each decked with bowls of measured ingredients among other cooking implements. Her mother and father were at the adjacent surface also dressed in aprons, to the joy of Ahamo, and the deep chagrin of the majestic queen of the O.Z. Across from her was Glitch and Cain. The headcase was a little too happy to be faced with a table of food, but Cain looked as though he would cut the throat of the first person who mentioned anything about his clean white lace trimmed apron. (DG had managed to use her eyes as big blue weapons and convince the Tin Man that her frilly apron was too long, and that he should swap with her. The Gods only know how he accepted, but somehow his paternal instincts couldn't turn down her simpering voice.)
Everyone in the room couldn't help but smile as the masculine Tin Man stood stock still, murderous intent on his face, listening to Glitch ramble on about his fantastic cooking skills which just so happen to come directly from the soul.
DG seemed very pleased with herself, and her use of ultimate princess power to embarrass her companion. She also snickered at her idea to give most of the cooking staff the night off, so that no one would be able to back out of making pizza. She had even managed to find some rare and much coveted pepperoni for authenticity.
"Ok everyone…God I feel like one of those TV cooking show hosts…" DG began to explain, but only succeeded in mild confusion. "Right, no TV in the O.Z. Anyways I decided to show you all how to make pizza. It took me all day to set this up, but I finally beat the location of some pepperoni from the cooking staff…"She meant it in jest, but no one doubted that she could beat the truth out of someone. "Okay, so take the bowl of dough and cover your hands in flour. When you pick up the dough stretch it slightly and using the tips of your fingers toss it a little." She threw the dough expertly, and watched as Ahamo and Glitch patted their hands in the flour on the table and attempted to follow as DG did, the attempts being slightly more successful on Ahamo's part than Glitch's.
"Sister? How do you know how to do this?" Azkadelia asked a sweetly smiling DG.
"Oh. My first job was at a local pizza parlor. I didn't actually make them, but I learned a lot."
"Cain! Quit trying to toss my dough!" Glitch's voice whined. Everyone but the queen, whose royal nature didn't allow for laughter at such a crude innuendo, laughed at the silly comment. Apparently after a few feeble attempts to spin the pizza dough by Glitch, Cain got fed up and tried to take the dough away to do it himself.
Glitch didn't like that idea much.
"Uh, alright then, if you want, you guys can just put the dough down and roll it into a circle." She demonstrated, and everyone else got the idea that this was quite a bit easier and followed suit. Glitch threw the dough down childishly into the floury surface and a fine cloud of white dust poofed up around him. Glitch sneezed and wiped the back of his hand across the bridge of his nose, leaving it even whiter.
"Glitch…" Cain murmured sounding quite like a protective mentor. He reached up to wipe the flour off of his nose with a thumb.
"Thank you Cain, but why are you touching my nose?" Glitch asked, obviously thinking that maybe Cain had a thing for noses.
"There was…never mind Glitch."
"Okay, next for the sauce." DG said after she saw that the others had more-or-less flattened their pizza crusts. She pulled a bowl of thick red paste, and a wooden spoon towards her from the pile of various ingredients. "This one you get to taste to make sure you do it right." Glitch stole the bowl from Cain's side of the table before the Tin Man even had a fighting chance. Ahamo gracefully handed his to his beautiful wife, who stood beaming at him.
"Dump the sugar in, that the bo….Glitch, it's the white stuff." She cooed to the headcase who was attempting to pour sliced mushrooms into his tomato paste. Cain yanked the bowl out of his hands and handed him the sugar.
"Right, of course I knew that…didn't I?" Glitch asked pointedly to his sugar bowl.
"Alright, then add the minced garlic, and thin it out with a little bit of red wine." She handed each ingredient as she said it to her sister, who had remained silent throughout, watching DG with loving eyes. "Be careful not to thin it out too much…Glitch that's too much." Cain wordlessly grabbed the bottle of wine from him, and smacked him on the arm.
"Hey!" He yelled back and grabbed his arm in frustration, even though everyone knew that Cain would never strike Glitch to hurt him.
"Wyatt, Ambrose. Please stop acting like children." The Queen cooed with a gently smile.
"Apologies you majesty." Cain retorted, hitting Glitch again to get him to stop glaring at him. DG smiled.
"After you add the last of your herbs, taste it to make sure it's okay, before spreading it in the center of the pizza." She did so with the sauce that Azkadelia had silently finished. Glitch had the bright idea to take a large spoonful and shove it in Cain's face for him to taste. The result was pizza sauce covering most of the lower half of his face, and even on his nose. Glitch giggled a little.
He leaned forward and licked it off from the side of the mans mouth, turning the Tin Man's ear's as red as the sauce. The others in the room decided it was best not to look, and only heard soft giggles from Glitch and even a chuckle from Cain. Ahamo cleared his throat rather loudly. They chanced a look over to see a smiling Tin Man wiping the little bit of remaining sauce from his chin and blushing, and a Smiling Glitch licking his lips satisfactorily.
"Alright then…"DG started again, a little unnerved by the recent public display of affections. "You can start spreading cheese on the sauce, leave some crust exposed around the edge, and after you put on the cheese you can top it with everything else you want." Ahamo and the Queen exchanged soft laughs as they decorated their pizza, rather enjoying the time they got to spend with their daughters and closest companions. Az and DG, being sisters liked the same stuff and even covered the pizza in pepperoni and vegetables. Az was muching on a pepper slice when she looked up to see an angry Tin Man glaring at a Glitch who had taken control of topping the pizza and was proceeding to cover it with every type of meat available.
"Sweetheart. You're putting too much sausage on it." Cain said dryly, not that he disliked meat, but he had done absolutely nothing to make the pizza except correct Glitch's mistakes.
"Oh Cain, you know you love my sausage!" Glitch replied simply.
Even the Queen burst out in a fit of un-queenly giggles at this. The sisters blushed, and DG's loud obnoxious laugh could be heard through out the palace. Cain just looked at him, torn between expressions of "Yes, yes I do." And "Glitch, you idiot." Ahamo barely disguised his guffaws of laughter behind a cough, but soon no one could handle it, and everyone's laughter was obnoxious, infectious, and downright confusing to someone with half a brain. Glitch stood there, pepperoni slices in his hand, waiting for someone to explain to him why everyone was laughing and there was a strange round meat covered disk on the table before him.
Cain, only too happy to be rid of the frilly apron sat in the great hall beside Glitch, waiting for the cooking staff to finish cooking the pizzas they had made, and listening to the headcase regale tales of his youth on the O.Z. National Junior Dance Squad. He was fairly sure that such a thing had never existed, but decided to keep silent. Suddenly the hall doors burst open and three members of the kitchen staff came in carrying the pizzas on trays, already cut and ready for the green crystal dinnerware of the head table.
"Hey, they look good!" DG said brightly, a hungry look in her eyes for a taste of her old world. As much as she preferred the O.Z., she still grew up on the other side.
Everyone agreed that the pizza looked delicious and thanked DG for the surprise. Glitch looked at his pizza loaded about three inches thick with meat, and then gazed longingly at DG's perfectly decorated pie. He reached out a hand, which was almost immediately slapped by the Tin Man and a large slice of meat pizza set on his plate.
"Aw, but Cain the other pizza is much prettier…" Glitch whined. Cain just looked at him with general annoyance.
"Glitch, just eat the damn thing." He helped himself to a slice of the meaty one, and with difficult managed to take a bite. "It's actually quite good." He muttered with a mouthful of pizza. "Too much sausage though." He said after swallowing.
"Cain, you know you lo…" A rough hand clamped over his mouth before he could finish.
"Later, Sweetheart."