ST:AOS Fic: Where No Knives Have Gone Before, Episode 2
Title: Where No Knives Have Gone Before: Episode 2
Fandom: ST:AOS fusion with Top Chef
Rating: Overall: NC-17. This chapter: a very naughty R.
Characters/Pairings: Ensemble and then some; the overall story is leading up to Jim/Spock; Top Chef judges, including Padma Lakshmi and Tom Colicchio. This chapter: Jim/Gaila/Gary Mitchell
Spoilers: None
Content Notice: Reality TV AU; food porn - do not read while hungry.
Word Count: ~6100
Summary: Jim (and his Team) face the ultimate test: The Kobayashi Maru. Only this one’s a food truck.
Master post on LJ
On AO3
A/N: It’s kind of hard to imagine a “no-win situation” in cuisine, so bear with me on this one. Just trust that Jim finds an interesting approach to the challenge.
----
Episode 2: The Kobayashi Maru
Sigh.
Jim was not at all surprised to feel as exhausted this morning as he had last night.
Sigh.
He was much more surprised to discover he was not alone in bed.
Mmmm.
The fact this last sound was from a third person was wholly unexpected, however. He quickly evaluated his position. Lying on his side, head resting in the crook of someone’s neck. Someone else’s head resting between his shoulder blades.
He opened his eyes to a bright flare of red - Gaila, there was no mistaking it. “Huh,” he said softly, his breath stirring her soft curls, and shifted himself a bit more. The person at his back sighed again and turned away to lie on his back. His back, Jim belatedly realized, as the voice and the scratchiness of the man’s whiskers on Jim’s back a second ago ought to have been a dead giveaway.
Relatively freed up now, Jim levered himself up and sideways, removing himself from the bed with a litheness that an Olympic gymnast would have envied. Standing there naked, he was mildly surprised to see that the man was Gary-something (Mitchell?), who responded to Jim’s sudden absence in the bed by snuggling up closer to Gaila, who turned herself slightly as well, to enjoy the warm spot left in Jim’s wake. Taking stock of his situation, Jim thought he could discern the sour aftertaste of tequila in his mouth and the skull-splitting beginnings of a migraine just behind his right eye.
Well, at least that explained it - he and tequila were not a match made in heaven.
He backed slowly out of the room and found the bathroom, took a quick piss and then padded across the hall to his own room. Finding a t-shirt he thought was more or less clean, a pair of running shorts and his running shoes in the dim, early-morning light, he made his way down to the kitchen.
Grabbing a bottle of water from the fridge, he downed half of it in front of the open door, turning away to shut it only when he needed to come up for air.
“Gah!” he exclaimed, when he saw that he was not alone. Spock sat at the kitchen table, facing him, a half-consumed smoothie at his elbow and the newspaper spread out in front of him.
“Jesus, warn a guy, will ya?” Jim said, hand over his heart. A raised eyebrow and a flick of the eyes downward from the other man reminded Jim that he was standing there in the altogether, and he could feel his cheeks burn as he dropped his sneakers and shirt and scrambled to pull his shorts on.
“Sorry about that,” Jim muttered, pulling the tee over his head and using his palm to straighten out the wrinkles; he noticed he’d grabbed his “Makin’ Bacon” shirt - the one with two hogs screwing - and shifted his weight from one foot to the other. Looking up, his eyes met Spock’s, which did not move or react in any appreciable way.
“Goin’ for a run,” Jim said lamely, pushing his feet into his sneakers and indicating the outside with a thumb. “Care to join?” Spock blinked, once, which Jim took for a no, and then he headed for the door.
Ah, JEEZ! Jim thought as he made it to the street and hastily began to stretch. That was the second time Spock had seen him bare-assed in as many days, what must the guy think of him? Not that Jim normally cared what people thought of him, except that he kind of cared what Spock thought of him. Aside from Bones, Spock was the one chef in the entire competition so far that Jim thought he might be able to respect, and whose respect he might want to have in return.
Oh well, FUCK IT! he told himself as he took off up the block, did he really care? Much? More to the point, what the hell had happened last night?
He had vague memories of drinking tequila shots and laughing, getting lost in the relief and simple joy of having dodged the great, big bullet known as “Elimination.” That was followed by further memories of him kissing someone and being kissed, then having his dick sucked by one - no, two - no, ONE (definitely, maybe) - person; but after that, it was mostly a blur that he hoped would resolve itself before any uncomfortable encounters with his two bedmates.
The throbbing in his head subsided at about mile five, and he turned to head back. By mile six he was getting better-resolved flashes of the previous eight hours, and by the time he arrived back at the house, loose-limbed and feeling a lot better thanks to the endorphins floating around in his brain, he thought he had all the pieces of the puzzle reassembled into something like a complete narrative…
There had been a group of them drinking shots, Jim had gotten distracted watching Scotty and Spock play a game of chess, and when he returned to the den, Gaila and Gary were alone and making out on the couch.
“You didn’t wait for me?” Jim said to her, mock-disappointed.
The two of them parted and sat up, and Gaila pouted. “You made me wait,” she chided as Jim approached, eyebrow lifted.
Jim didn’t take his eyes off her as he took Gary’s chin in hand and planted a sloppy, wet one on him. Gary gasped once in surprise, but then began kissing back in earnest, pulling Jim closer with his hands in his shirt and practically humping his leg. Jim pressed him back against the couch, forcing his tongue into the man’s mouth to inspect the quality of his dental work for him. Gaila snaked a hand up Jim’s shirt minutes later, then pinched his nipple until he yelped and gave her a reproachful glare. A toss of her head reminded him they weren’t alone (the blinking red light from the camera mounted on the ceiling by the door being their constant companion), and the decision was made to retire to an empty bedroom.
Gary grabbed the tequila bottle, and Jim was doing his second body shot from between Gaila’s tits before he realized his pants were missing and Gary’s head was in his lap.
The rest went on from there, and while it wasn’t the best blowjob he’d ever gotten, it was the latest, and Jim was grateful.
----
Jim arrived at the house to find that the chefs’ call-time had been moved up to 9:00, and so the place was total chaos as sixteen people struggled to hit two bathrooms in less than two hours. Given that, it wasn’t until they were leaving for the Fairmont that Jim even caught a glimpse of Gary or Gaila.
“Hey!” he greeted the former warmly as they were buttoning up their chef’s coats on the sidewalk outside, waiting for the corporately-sponsored SUVs to take them to their destination.
“Hi,” Gary said quietly, not able to look Jim in the eye.
“Feeling OK today?” Jim asked blandly, trying to be cool, because when a guy’s sucked your dick, there should be some level of familiarity, right? Gary merely averted his eyes and wandered over to stand next to Cupcake.
“I think he’s embarrassed, maybe,” Gaila informed him, stepping up on tiptoes to speak in a low voice into his ear.
“He shouldn’t be - he’s got some skills.”
“So have you,” Gaila said with a leer, but then her face got serious again. “But that’s not what I’m talking about. He’s got a fiancé at home.”
“Oh.” Shit. “Wish I’d known that.”
She shrugged. “He’s a big boy.” But Jim hated the thought of having been with someone who was otherwise attached. It must have shown on his face, because Gaila punched him on the shoulder. “It wasn’t as if he mentioned it, either.”
“But you already knew,” Jim guessed.
“I told you, I know everything.”
“Jesus, Gaila, you might have warned me.”
“Oh, sorry, I didn’t know you had such a highly developed moral center -it might not have been so obvious when you were shoving your tongue in my -“
“Consider yourself informed then,” he said testily and stalked away, opting to take the “Surly-mobile” to the hotel with Cupcake, Nero and that guy Decker.
----
Jim brooded all the way through the Quickfire challenge, where they were given 15 minutes to create a Fast Food entrée for some douchebag from Bob’s Big Boy or Friendly’s or something. He wasn’t sure - he was too wrapped up in his head to really even give a shit.
All the euphoria he had the night before, after coming off his first, successful day of competition, had evaporated in the wake of the morning’s revelation. Damn it, he wasn’t even sure why he was letting it get to him all of a sudden - they were all adults, and what was he supposed to do, check people’s relationship statuses on Facebook before jumping with them into bed? But of the few, hard lessons he’d learned in his life, one was that cheating hurt people, usually very nice people, and if he was going to be that guy, he at least wanted to go into it with his eyes open.
All this brooding was distracting, and before he knew it, he had sliced into the pad of his left thumb with the blade of the food processor he couldn’t seem to get the hang of. “FUUUCK!” he exclaimed, and he would’ve shoved it into his mouth to suck on it comfortingly if it wasn’t gushing blood like a mother.
He looked up as someone threw a nitrile glove at his head - Bones, God bless him. “Thanks,” he called.
“Focus, shithead,” McCoy hissed, and Jim nodded. Eyes on the prize, Jimmy, he told himself, tying off the wound with a bit of paper towel and shoving his hand clumsily into the glove before running to find a clean bowl for the FP.
During judging, Padma pronounced his duck breast burger with plum-ginger jam and Napa cabbage a tasty treat, though the Visigoth from Denny’s or whatever thought it was undercooked. Jim suppressed the urge to shove his thumb- the good one - in the man’s eye and said, “Thank you,” like a good boy.
At the end of the challenge, they lined up for the judging and, as he suspected, Jim wound up in the middle of the pack - not in the top three nor the bottom either. Of the top three - Spock (again), Gaila and Nero - Nero was declared the winner with some sort of bratwurst or some such, Jim didn’t know, but had to give the guy props for making sausage in 15 minutes.
After the judging was over, the chefs milled about for a few minutes awaiting their next challenge. When a PA approached, and asked them to follow him to the service elevator, Jim wondered what the heck could be up. Eventually, they found themselves in the loading dock of the hotel, where a mini set had been set up in front of a set of closed bay doors, where two more knife blocks sat on a table. It took a few minutes to set the shot, but they were finally asked to gather around to draw for the next day’s Elimination challenge. Jim wound up second in line and found a green piece of tape on his, on which the words, “Kobayashi Maru” were written. He frowned; it sounded Japanese - would they be asked to work in a sushi restaurant?
He looked around as the others all drew - there were apparently going to be four teams of four. In addition to the one he’d pulled, there were “Grillennium Falcon,” “Dog is Love,” and “Suzie’s ‘Cue.” All of the chefs began to gravitate towards the others with the same knives, and Jim soon realized he’d be teamed with Spock, Gaila, and Scotty. Bones had wound up in the “Suzie’s ‘Cue” group with Sulu, the Russian kid Chekov, and Cupcake. Carol, Saavik Janice Rand and Decker pulled “Dog is Love,” and the rest - Uhura, Nero, Gary (Jim was relieved not to be on the same team with him) and Christine Chapel were on team “Grillennium Falcon.”
Padma called for their attention. “As you all know, San Francisco is a city well-known for its cuisine. From Chinatown to Fisherman’s Wharf, an adventurous diner can find whatever they’re looking for. Perhaps better than that is the food that finds you.” She stood back and the loading bay door was thrown open dramatically. As the chefs moved out into the sunshine, they were treated to an amazing sight.
“Food trucks!” Sulu enthused, fairly hopping up and down with excitement.
“That’s right!” Padma laughed. “Each of your teams has been assigned to one of these trucks. You will need to design a menu around the theme of each of them - Asian, grilled cheese, barbecue and hotdogs - and take them on the road tomorrow to sell your wares on the streets of San Francisco. You’ll have three hours to prep today, plus three tomorrow before heading out for the lunch rush. The winner for the challenge will be chosen from the team that sells the most, the loser from the team with the lowest sales. Your time starts now!”
With that, the four teams headed to their waiting SUVs to drive to the supermarket. Jim sat in the passenger seat, thinking through the dish he wanted to prepare, and was only vaguely aware of the conversation his other teammates were having about the theme and their own dishes. He told himself he wanted to stay focused for this challenge, because he wanted to win, but mostly he was still feeling off-balance from Gaila’s revelation that morning.
Jim had very few rules. Primary among them was that bacon made just about everything better. But as high as that was his no-cheating rule.
Don’t get him wrong, Jim would be the first to admit it to a certain laxness of moral character when it came to the prospect of a fun hook-up. But there were certain lines that he preferred not to cross. It was something that happened when he was young and, he’d like to say, too stupid to care, but he’d seen the aftermath of that thoughtless act and it had changed his life. He swore never to do it again.
Well, lesson learned - he’d have to be a lot more careful now.
“Aw, Jimmy, are you still mad at me?” Gaila said later during prep, leaning across his cutting board, eyes large and imploring.
He looked at her for a beat, then swept the bell pepper matchsticks he was cutting into a bowl and smiled. “I’m madder at myself,” he said quietly.
“Why?” Her voice was gentle and he met her eyes finally. Her manner switched immediately from playfully flirty to serious and interested.
“I told myself I’d never be that guy.” Again.
“You’re not,” she said, her voice kind, and just like that they were friends again.
----
That night, Jim resolutely stayed away from all liquor and nursed a beer instead, sitting quietly at the kitchen island as several conversations unspooled around him. At the kitchen table, a rather cutthroat game of Scrabble was going on, the fact that the kid Chekov was not a native English speaker apparently not hindering him in the least. Uhura, for her part, was also playing to win, her apparently extensive world travels as a child having given her a stellar vocabulary. Bones kept shouting them both down as cheaters, kept checking an online Scrabble dictionary to prove it, and then mumbling viciously into his beer when he was proved wrong time after time. Sulu just drank and kept pluralizing everyone else’s words with a smirk on his face; he only had eyes for Chekov, who sat there, oblivious to it.
In a corner of the family room, Sabine Saavik was trying to teach Scotty some Swedish phrases, but he just kept trying to get her to translate curse words for him. Nero and his band of Scowlers - Cupcake, that guy Decker, and now Gary Mitchell - were once again set up on the deck, talking quietly and giving dirty looks to whoever passed. Gaila and the remaining women, including Carol, Rand and Christine Chapel, had donned bikinis and immersed themselves in the hot tub for the evening.
There was one other person that had subtly removed himself from the group as Jim had done, he noticed. Spock sat in an armchair in the family room, close enough to Scotty and Saavik to appear to be a part of their conversation to a casual observer, but far enough away that he was clearly keeping to himself. He was typing something intently into his cell phone, Jim noticed, possibly Skyping or texting with someone.
Jim took the opportunity to get a good look at the man over the end of his beer bottle, who was seated facing slightly away from him. He was probably Jim’s biggest competition for the title of Top Chef - hell, he was anyone’s biggest competition - and Jim should be wary of him, perhaps even aligning himself with Nero, who had made no secret of his open animosity toward Spock, though his reasons were not at all clear. But Jim wasn’t built that way - he was basically a friendly guy, and always would be. And Spock seemed like a guy in need of a friend.
Or so it seemed to Jim. On the outside, Spock was quiet, reserved, even aloof. But that calm exterior hid a lot of passion, which Jim had already seen. When he’d talked with the judges about his food the other night, it was as if he was lit from within, and that mood had been contagious, making Jim want to get to know him better, to see that flame lit again and again. Spock kept to himself, sure, but he also gave small smiles to those around him when they cracked jokes, and sat for long stretches with Uhura, talking quietly and fervently with her, about what Jim did not know. If Jim didn’t know they had been lovers, he would never have guessed - Spock kept a respectful space between them, one that seemed to pain her, though she strove hard to hide it from him. If he noticed, he didn’t show it. Jim wondered if he was doing it so that he didn’t hurt her, but maybe that was splitting hairs. He rarely touched her.
But probably he was just seeing what he wanted to see, because the truth of the matter was Jim had a bit of a crush on Spock.
And why not? For one thing, Spock was very easy on the eyes, with wide shoulders and slim hips, and Jim was dying to know if his whole chest was as hairy as the bit that was visible over the tops of his t-shirts. Jim wanted to know if his fingertips would get tangled in that hair. He wondered if Spock’s nipples were as dark in reality as they were in his imagination. And then he wondered when he’d turned back into a 15-year old boy, because what the hell, was he going to get a hard-on fantasizing about sex with everyone in the cast?
Well, he seemed to be on a pace to have sex with everyone in the cast, he reminded himself ruefully, and felt his face color at the thought. Jim chided himself, shaking his head, What makes you think Spock would even want anything to do with that, even if he wasn’t straight?
That was the rub, wasn’t it? Twice now Spock had caught Jim with his pants down - quite literally. And with that single raised eyebrow, he’d managed to communicate everything he was too polite to put into words - Jim was a man-slut, it was kind of sad, and Spock was merely tolerating his presence.
“Well, fuck me,” he said aloud, miserable, and went to bed early.
----
Jim got up even earlier the next day, before dark, wanting to clear his head with another run before the madness of a lunch rush he hoped they were going to be ready for. They had an on-set call for 7:00 AM, which had had nearly everyone grumbling the night before. He (and Spock) were the first out the door, standing on the curb waiting before the SUVs had even arrived.
“Ready?” Jim asked, trying to break some ice - the two of them were on the same team, after all - maybe they should try to communicate.
“I am operating at optimal levels.”
“Aces.”
Ten minutes later, they were all loaded in, and the conversation in the car inevitably turned to the challenge at hand.
“Well, this thing makes me about as nervous as a long-tailed cat in a rockin’ chair factory,” Bones said from the way-back.
“How so?” Gaila asked.
“You know how much one’a these trucks makes in a day? $1,000. That’s a lotta sweet tea and pulled pork. Town like this one, they don’t much like their red meats.”
“Come on, Bones, you didn’t just make pulled pork,” Jim said; McCoy’s Moroccan-spiced pork shoulder was just this side of a religious experience - Jim had tasted it himself.
“I just wish it was about the food.”
“I must concur that there are many intangibles and unpredictable circumstances that will affect the outcome that make this seem a daunting challenge,” Spock supplied.
“Then you just have to plan for them,” Jim said.
“I fail to see how that is possible, as they are, by definition, changeable.”
“I dunno about you, Spock, but I don’t get out of bed without a contingency plan or two in mind. It’s what makes a good chef.”
“Or an ill-prepared one. To properly plan for what may happen, one must take important focus from what is likely to happen, which leads to missteps in preparation and follow-through.”
“Keeping your eyes on the prize?”
“I believe that colloquialism is fitting, yes.”
“Who said you couldn’t do both?”
----
The morning prep flew by, and Jim was pleased with the flavor that had developed in the sauces and garnishes he’d prepared the day before for his catfish banh mi with Asian slaw, pickled chiles and mint. If his bread would remain fresh, he’d have a decent dish, if not the winner. He was more nervous about them selling enough to win, and even about their price points - their dishes were on the pricey side when compared to hot dogs and grilled cheese sandwiches.
Through a quirk of simple fate, they were the last truck to leave the hotel’s loading area, and followed the others to the street where they were to set up, somewhere in a business district. Jim had decided to drive, and when they were ushered into a parking spot by a member of the production, he could see already there would be problems.
He got out to test his hypothesis, walking up the block and back until he was convinced that he was right. The trucks were set up one after the other, with a space of about twenty feet between them. From the flow of foot traffic and the placement of the nearest buildings, the Kobayashi Maru would be the last truck that patrons would see, the last one in line, the last one considered by a very discerning San Francisco lunch crowd. Compounding the matter, the block where they were parked was on a curve, and their truck wasn’t all that visible in the distance from the first one in line. Jim didn’t like their chances, and the stony look on his face when he re-entered their truck communicated as much to his team.
“What is it, lad?” Scotty asked, looking up from his prep.
“We’re in a shitty spot.”
“What do you mean?” Gaila asked.
“We’re at the end of the line - we’re not going to get as much traffic as everyone else.”
“Surely the diners will be more discerning as they choose their midday meal,” Spock pointed out. “Our food is clearly superior.”
Jim looked down on the man’s pork belly char siu bibimbap and Gaila’s tuna and compressed watermelon poke with mango ginger puree and was inclined to agree. “But it doesn’t change the fact we’re at the end of the line. The winner of this challenge will be chosen from the team that sells the most. Regardless of whether our food is the best - and it is, I have no doubt - we’re still at a disadvantage. It’s a no-win situation.”
“Still, we must endeavor to perform at top effectiveness.”
Jim looked at him sideways and then at the cameraman. “Do we really have any choice, Camera Guy?” he asked the man.
“I’m not allowed to talk to you.”
“So we’re supposed to just stay where they put us and take it in the shorts?”
The cameraman pressed his lips together in a tight line, as if illustrating his previous point.
With a growl, Jim went on to finish his prep, muttering under his breath the entire time.
Thirty minutes into service, they settled into a rhythm - Gaila on the window, taking orders and payment, Scotty packaging the food, and Jim and Spock finishing the dishes. They had a respectable lineup of customers, but when Jim took a minute to do another recon, he saw that customers were standing three-deep around the first two trucks, and a similar crowd was building at the third. It didn’t take a math genius to realize that people weren’t even really seeing their truck down here, and Jim’s prediction that the Kobayashi Maru would go down in metaphorical flames was about to come true.
“I don’t believe this,” Jim muttered. “I knew this would happen,” he added to no one in particular.
“Yeah, but what can we do?” asked Gaila.
“We can find another spot,” Jim said boldly.
“Don’t be daft,” Scotty said.
“We do not have the time to spare to relocate,” Spock pointed out. “Lunch service concludes at 2:00.”
“That still gives us two hours.”
“Surely we are not meant to leave our assigned spot.”
“Did you see anything on the rules sheet that said we couldn’t?” No one on the team could answer. “Neither did I. Camera Guy, is there anything on the rules sheet that says we can’t take this show on the road?” The camera man kept his mouth shut. “See?” Jim said to his team, a crazy glint in his eye that would not be argued with.
Jim pulled the keys from his pocket and took his seat behind the wheel. “Secure the food as best as you can - I’m taking us somewhere where we’ll be noticed. Camera Guy, you might want to tell the guy at the other end of your earpiece we’re taking control of this ship.”
“Ship?” Gaila asked Scotty, puzzled.
“Forget it, he’s rolling,” he answered.
It was a short drive to their destination, and Jim was gratified to see a lot of foot traffic in the area as he pulled into a parking spot on the street. “All right, we’re here. You guys, take ten minutes to get re-started. I’m gonna go out and drum up some business.”
He stood and unbuttoned his chef coat, then hung it behind the driver’s seat. Next, he removed his t-shirt and pulled a small tube of something from his pocket and unscrewed its cap. Squeezing out a copious amount of whatever-it-was into the palm of his hand he began to smear it over his chest and abs, which began to shimmer and glow, even in the low light inside the truck.
“What the?” Gaila protested, taking up the tube and reading aloud, “Glim’r Body Glitter?” She smacked him on the arm. “Jim, did you steal this from my room?”
“What did I say about contingency plans?” He worked what remained of the glittery goop into his hair, making it spiky, and pulled at the waist of his cargo pants so that they were riding lower on his hips, showing off his well-defined pelvic muscles. “There - how do I look?”
“Like an aging twink,” Gaila replied.
“Perfect. I’ll be right back.” He left the truck without another word, and bounced up the block, inviting passersby in a loud voice to come and sample his wares.
“I don’t get it,” Scotty said.
“Where has he brought us?” Spock asked, looking perturbed.
Gaila, who’d followed Jim to the door, leaned against it and laughed. “Better get ready for a rush of customers, guys,” she said.
“I do not understand what would lead you to that conclusion,” Spock said. “We have lost vital time and momentum with this relocation - it is most illogical.”
“Don’t you know where we are?”
Scotty leaned out the window and peered at the street sign. “What’s Castro Street?”
“A place where they like what Jimmy’s selling,” Gaila said and went to start prepping some of Jim’s and her own food.
----
The shit was already hitting the fan when they pulled the Kobayashi Maru into its parking spot behind the Fairmont. While they’d still been visited by the judges, their stunt had apparently caused much consternation for the production. Not only did they have to shoot in two places, they didn’t have the proper licensing for either the food truck or filming in the Castro. While they hadn’t encountered any issues during filming (and Jim had scored not one, but two phone numbers from police officers), the producers were off having a conniption behind the control room door.
“Camera Guy, tell me how much trouble I’m in,” he said in a low voice.
“Hard to tell. Better hope you win,” he said and left to offload his footage.
Team Kobayashi Maru filed into the Stew Room, where the other three teams had already gathered.
“What the hell?” Bones exclaimed, getting to his feet and walking over. “Where’d you guys run off to?”
“We didn’t like where they put us, so we found a new spot,” Jim replied
“We?” Spock questioned.
“I?”
“Jim got creative, we went along for the ride,” Gaila said, finding some middle ground.
“How’d you do?” Bones asked.
“I don’t know,” she replied. “They took the cash box before I could count it.”
“We earned in excess of $1,500,” Spock said with certainty.
“$1,800 if you count my tips,” Jim supplied. He’d been sure to shove what cash he’d been given into the box before the production assistant had taken it away.
“You made $300 in tips?” Gaila asked, incredulous.
“I earned every penny,” Jim said wearily, then went to find a beer in the coolers the production supplied, and sank into a folding chair with a sigh.
It was another whole hour before they were joined by Padma, who stood in the doorway with a grave expression on her face. “We’d like to see Team Kobayashi Maru,” she said once she had their attention.
Jim felt his stomach drop at the stony expression on her face. Surely he’d be out on his sweet ass before the day was up. They were ushered to Judges’ Table and given their marks to stand on, then made to wait while establishing shots were filmed. Jim noticed none of the judges were looking at him, and he felt a trickle of sweat stream down his back.
“Chefs,” Tom began, a hard glint in his eye. “We have a troubling matter before us. Evidence has been submitted to the judges, suggesting that you violated the rules of this challenge. Is there anything you care to say before we begin?”
Jim was careful to keep his face expressionless, and straightened his chef’s coat out with a tug at its hem.
“Your team left the location that had been set aside for you. How do you answer this?”
“Did we win?” Jim asked, looking Tom in the eye.
“That is immaterial.”
“I actually don’t think so. We saw an opportunity to get a better result and we went for it. Did we win?”
“You drove the truck to a new location without conferring with the production,” said another voice.
Jim turned his head in surprise to Spock, who was looking at him with that damned eyebrow cocked. “Your point being?”
“In academic vernacular, you cheated.”
As Jim turned to face him, Scotty took a step back so that he wouldn’t be caught in any crossfire.
“Let me ask you something I think we all know the answer to. We were at a clear disadvantage, weren’t we? You yourself said this morning that location was a key to success in such a challenge.”
“Among other factors,” Spock allowed.
“We had the worst location among the four teams.”
“That remained to be seen.”
“It was a no-win scenario. I don't believe in no-win scenarios.”
“So not only did you violate the rules, you also failed to understand the principle lesson.”
“Please enlighten me.”
“The point of the challenge was to compete against three other teams. When you removed the Kobayashi Maru from its asigned location, you changed the parameters of that test. We will never know if we were the most favored among the trucks in that case, as we did not have the opportunity to be held up in comparison among the population of available diners. Your actions negated the conditions of the challenge.”
“The restaurant business is not about controlled conditions,” Jim said, and he could feel his cheeks getting warmer. “It’s cutthroat. What I did was employ basic market research and publicity tactics to ensure the success of our venture.”
“But we will never know how we would have been measured against our competition.”
“I don’t think you like the fact I was thinking outside the box.”
“I do not like the fact you did not confer with the rest of your team.”
Jim had no answer to this, which was just as well because Tom took this opportunity to wrest control of the conversation back. “You guys through?” he asked.
“Yes, chef,” they both answered in unison.
“You ready to hear our decision?”
“Yes. Sir.” Jim replied, taking a breath and holding it, trying to keep his anger with Spock in check. Of course the man was right, but so was Jim, and if his gut instinct had anything to say about it, they were standing here because…
“With a tally of $1,850, your team won this challenge hands-down,” Padma told them. “Congratulations.”
Thank Christ, Jim thought, clenching his fists and letting out the breath he’d been holding.
“Who made the pork dish?” Tom asked, and the usual progression of praise or criticism for the chefs’ dishes began. Jim barely registered what was happening, his head was swimming too much - with excitement, relief, disappointment, even, that he’d acted so unilaterally, even if he’d been successful.
In the end, Scotty’s haggis potstickers were the surprise winner, and he was given a check for $5,000 from some sponsor or other.
Jim walked with his teammates out to the Stew Room to summon Team Dog is Love to the chopping block (Decker would eventually be asked to pack his knives and go), enduring Gaila jumping up and down excitedly while pulling on his arm the entire way. As he walked, he watched the back of Spock’s neck, and the man seemed stiff, rigid. Jim could practically feel the disapproval pouring off of him.
He took a seat and leaned back against it, letting Gaila lean into him joyously and enthusiastically as the rest of the cast chatted around them. The conversation seemed to revolve around what the judges had had to say. Gaila was quick to point out that there could not have been any rule breaking since there wasn’t a rule against moving. She seemed happy to regale the others with tales about what the team had done, and the tactics the team had pulled off to sell their food, and Jim was inclined to let her tell the story any way she wanted. He didn’t much feel like celebrating their win, not in the least.
Because across the room from him, Spock sat with his legs crossed, resolutely not looking at Jim at all.
----
Thank you for your time.
Fandom: ST:AOS fusion with Top Chef
Rating: Overall: NC-17. This chapter: a very naughty R.
Characters/Pairings: Ensemble and then some; the overall story is leading up to Jim/Spock; Top Chef judges, including Padma Lakshmi and Tom Colicchio. This chapter: Jim/Gaila/Gary Mitchell
Spoilers: None
Content Notice: Reality TV AU; food porn - do not read while hungry.
Word Count: ~6100
Summary: Jim (and his Team) face the ultimate test: The Kobayashi Maru. Only this one’s a food truck.
Master post on LJ
On AO3
A/N: It’s kind of hard to imagine a “no-win situation” in cuisine, so bear with me on this one. Just trust that Jim finds an interesting approach to the challenge.
----
Episode 2: The Kobayashi Maru
Sigh.
Jim was not at all surprised to feel as exhausted this morning as he had last night.
Sigh.
He was much more surprised to discover he was not alone in bed.
Mmmm.
The fact this last sound was from a third person was wholly unexpected, however. He quickly evaluated his position. Lying on his side, head resting in the crook of someone’s neck. Someone else’s head resting between his shoulder blades.
He opened his eyes to a bright flare of red - Gaila, there was no mistaking it. “Huh,” he said softly, his breath stirring her soft curls, and shifted himself a bit more. The person at his back sighed again and turned away to lie on his back. His back, Jim belatedly realized, as the voice and the scratchiness of the man’s whiskers on Jim’s back a second ago ought to have been a dead giveaway.
Relatively freed up now, Jim levered himself up and sideways, removing himself from the bed with a litheness that an Olympic gymnast would have envied. Standing there naked, he was mildly surprised to see that the man was Gary-something (Mitchell?), who responded to Jim’s sudden absence in the bed by snuggling up closer to Gaila, who turned herself slightly as well, to enjoy the warm spot left in Jim’s wake. Taking stock of his situation, Jim thought he could discern the sour aftertaste of tequila in his mouth and the skull-splitting beginnings of a migraine just behind his right eye.
Well, at least that explained it - he and tequila were not a match made in heaven.
He backed slowly out of the room and found the bathroom, took a quick piss and then padded across the hall to his own room. Finding a t-shirt he thought was more or less clean, a pair of running shorts and his running shoes in the dim, early-morning light, he made his way down to the kitchen.
Grabbing a bottle of water from the fridge, he downed half of it in front of the open door, turning away to shut it only when he needed to come up for air.
“Gah!” he exclaimed, when he saw that he was not alone. Spock sat at the kitchen table, facing him, a half-consumed smoothie at his elbow and the newspaper spread out in front of him.
“Jesus, warn a guy, will ya?” Jim said, hand over his heart. A raised eyebrow and a flick of the eyes downward from the other man reminded Jim that he was standing there in the altogether, and he could feel his cheeks burn as he dropped his sneakers and shirt and scrambled to pull his shorts on.
“Sorry about that,” Jim muttered, pulling the tee over his head and using his palm to straighten out the wrinkles; he noticed he’d grabbed his “Makin’ Bacon” shirt - the one with two hogs screwing - and shifted his weight from one foot to the other. Looking up, his eyes met Spock’s, which did not move or react in any appreciable way.
“Goin’ for a run,” Jim said lamely, pushing his feet into his sneakers and indicating the outside with a thumb. “Care to join?” Spock blinked, once, which Jim took for a no, and then he headed for the door.
Ah, JEEZ! Jim thought as he made it to the street and hastily began to stretch. That was the second time Spock had seen him bare-assed in as many days, what must the guy think of him? Not that Jim normally cared what people thought of him, except that he kind of cared what Spock thought of him. Aside from Bones, Spock was the one chef in the entire competition so far that Jim thought he might be able to respect, and whose respect he might want to have in return.
Oh well, FUCK IT! he told himself as he took off up the block, did he really care? Much? More to the point, what the hell had happened last night?
He had vague memories of drinking tequila shots and laughing, getting lost in the relief and simple joy of having dodged the great, big bullet known as “Elimination.” That was followed by further memories of him kissing someone and being kissed, then having his dick sucked by one - no, two - no, ONE (definitely, maybe) - person; but after that, it was mostly a blur that he hoped would resolve itself before any uncomfortable encounters with his two bedmates.
The throbbing in his head subsided at about mile five, and he turned to head back. By mile six he was getting better-resolved flashes of the previous eight hours, and by the time he arrived back at the house, loose-limbed and feeling a lot better thanks to the endorphins floating around in his brain, he thought he had all the pieces of the puzzle reassembled into something like a complete narrative…
There had been a group of them drinking shots, Jim had gotten distracted watching Scotty and Spock play a game of chess, and when he returned to the den, Gaila and Gary were alone and making out on the couch.
“You didn’t wait for me?” Jim said to her, mock-disappointed.
The two of them parted and sat up, and Gaila pouted. “You made me wait,” she chided as Jim approached, eyebrow lifted.
Jim didn’t take his eyes off her as he took Gary’s chin in hand and planted a sloppy, wet one on him. Gary gasped once in surprise, but then began kissing back in earnest, pulling Jim closer with his hands in his shirt and practically humping his leg. Jim pressed him back against the couch, forcing his tongue into the man’s mouth to inspect the quality of his dental work for him. Gaila snaked a hand up Jim’s shirt minutes later, then pinched his nipple until he yelped and gave her a reproachful glare. A toss of her head reminded him they weren’t alone (the blinking red light from the camera mounted on the ceiling by the door being their constant companion), and the decision was made to retire to an empty bedroom.
Gary grabbed the tequila bottle, and Jim was doing his second body shot from between Gaila’s tits before he realized his pants were missing and Gary’s head was in his lap.
The rest went on from there, and while it wasn’t the best blowjob he’d ever gotten, it was the latest, and Jim was grateful.
----
Jim arrived at the house to find that the chefs’ call-time had been moved up to 9:00, and so the place was total chaos as sixteen people struggled to hit two bathrooms in less than two hours. Given that, it wasn’t until they were leaving for the Fairmont that Jim even caught a glimpse of Gary or Gaila.
“Hey!” he greeted the former warmly as they were buttoning up their chef’s coats on the sidewalk outside, waiting for the corporately-sponsored SUVs to take them to their destination.
“Hi,” Gary said quietly, not able to look Jim in the eye.
“Feeling OK today?” Jim asked blandly, trying to be cool, because when a guy’s sucked your dick, there should be some level of familiarity, right? Gary merely averted his eyes and wandered over to stand next to Cupcake.
“I think he’s embarrassed, maybe,” Gaila informed him, stepping up on tiptoes to speak in a low voice into his ear.
“He shouldn’t be - he’s got some skills.”
“So have you,” Gaila said with a leer, but then her face got serious again. “But that’s not what I’m talking about. He’s got a fiancé at home.”
“Oh.” Shit. “Wish I’d known that.”
She shrugged. “He’s a big boy.” But Jim hated the thought of having been with someone who was otherwise attached. It must have shown on his face, because Gaila punched him on the shoulder. “It wasn’t as if he mentioned it, either.”
“But you already knew,” Jim guessed.
“I told you, I know everything.”
“Jesus, Gaila, you might have warned me.”
“Oh, sorry, I didn’t know you had such a highly developed moral center -it might not have been so obvious when you were shoving your tongue in my -“
“Consider yourself informed then,” he said testily and stalked away, opting to take the “Surly-mobile” to the hotel with Cupcake, Nero and that guy Decker.
----
Jim brooded all the way through the Quickfire challenge, where they were given 15 minutes to create a Fast Food entrée for some douchebag from Bob’s Big Boy or Friendly’s or something. He wasn’t sure - he was too wrapped up in his head to really even give a shit.
All the euphoria he had the night before, after coming off his first, successful day of competition, had evaporated in the wake of the morning’s revelation. Damn it, he wasn’t even sure why he was letting it get to him all of a sudden - they were all adults, and what was he supposed to do, check people’s relationship statuses on Facebook before jumping with them into bed? But of the few, hard lessons he’d learned in his life, one was that cheating hurt people, usually very nice people, and if he was going to be that guy, he at least wanted to go into it with his eyes open.
All this brooding was distracting, and before he knew it, he had sliced into the pad of his left thumb with the blade of the food processor he couldn’t seem to get the hang of. “FUUUCK!” he exclaimed, and he would’ve shoved it into his mouth to suck on it comfortingly if it wasn’t gushing blood like a mother.
He looked up as someone threw a nitrile glove at his head - Bones, God bless him. “Thanks,” he called.
“Focus, shithead,” McCoy hissed, and Jim nodded. Eyes on the prize, Jimmy, he told himself, tying off the wound with a bit of paper towel and shoving his hand clumsily into the glove before running to find a clean bowl for the FP.
During judging, Padma pronounced his duck breast burger with plum-ginger jam and Napa cabbage a tasty treat, though the Visigoth from Denny’s or whatever thought it was undercooked. Jim suppressed the urge to shove his thumb- the good one - in the man’s eye and said, “Thank you,” like a good boy.
At the end of the challenge, they lined up for the judging and, as he suspected, Jim wound up in the middle of the pack - not in the top three nor the bottom either. Of the top three - Spock (again), Gaila and Nero - Nero was declared the winner with some sort of bratwurst or some such, Jim didn’t know, but had to give the guy props for making sausage in 15 minutes.
After the judging was over, the chefs milled about for a few minutes awaiting their next challenge. When a PA approached, and asked them to follow him to the service elevator, Jim wondered what the heck could be up. Eventually, they found themselves in the loading dock of the hotel, where a mini set had been set up in front of a set of closed bay doors, where two more knife blocks sat on a table. It took a few minutes to set the shot, but they were finally asked to gather around to draw for the next day’s Elimination challenge. Jim wound up second in line and found a green piece of tape on his, on which the words, “Kobayashi Maru” were written. He frowned; it sounded Japanese - would they be asked to work in a sushi restaurant?
He looked around as the others all drew - there were apparently going to be four teams of four. In addition to the one he’d pulled, there were “Grillennium Falcon,” “Dog is Love,” and “Suzie’s ‘Cue.” All of the chefs began to gravitate towards the others with the same knives, and Jim soon realized he’d be teamed with Spock, Gaila, and Scotty. Bones had wound up in the “Suzie’s ‘Cue” group with Sulu, the Russian kid Chekov, and Cupcake. Carol, Saavik Janice Rand and Decker pulled “Dog is Love,” and the rest - Uhura, Nero, Gary (Jim was relieved not to be on the same team with him) and Christine Chapel were on team “Grillennium Falcon.”
Padma called for their attention. “As you all know, San Francisco is a city well-known for its cuisine. From Chinatown to Fisherman’s Wharf, an adventurous diner can find whatever they’re looking for. Perhaps better than that is the food that finds you.” She stood back and the loading bay door was thrown open dramatically. As the chefs moved out into the sunshine, they were treated to an amazing sight.
“Food trucks!” Sulu enthused, fairly hopping up and down with excitement.
“That’s right!” Padma laughed. “Each of your teams has been assigned to one of these trucks. You will need to design a menu around the theme of each of them - Asian, grilled cheese, barbecue and hotdogs - and take them on the road tomorrow to sell your wares on the streets of San Francisco. You’ll have three hours to prep today, plus three tomorrow before heading out for the lunch rush. The winner for the challenge will be chosen from the team that sells the most, the loser from the team with the lowest sales. Your time starts now!”
With that, the four teams headed to their waiting SUVs to drive to the supermarket. Jim sat in the passenger seat, thinking through the dish he wanted to prepare, and was only vaguely aware of the conversation his other teammates were having about the theme and their own dishes. He told himself he wanted to stay focused for this challenge, because he wanted to win, but mostly he was still feeling off-balance from Gaila’s revelation that morning.
Jim had very few rules. Primary among them was that bacon made just about everything better. But as high as that was his no-cheating rule.
Don’t get him wrong, Jim would be the first to admit it to a certain laxness of moral character when it came to the prospect of a fun hook-up. But there were certain lines that he preferred not to cross. It was something that happened when he was young and, he’d like to say, too stupid to care, but he’d seen the aftermath of that thoughtless act and it had changed his life. He swore never to do it again.
Well, lesson learned - he’d have to be a lot more careful now.
“Aw, Jimmy, are you still mad at me?” Gaila said later during prep, leaning across his cutting board, eyes large and imploring.
He looked at her for a beat, then swept the bell pepper matchsticks he was cutting into a bowl and smiled. “I’m madder at myself,” he said quietly.
“Why?” Her voice was gentle and he met her eyes finally. Her manner switched immediately from playfully flirty to serious and interested.
“I told myself I’d never be that guy.” Again.
“You’re not,” she said, her voice kind, and just like that they were friends again.
----
That night, Jim resolutely stayed away from all liquor and nursed a beer instead, sitting quietly at the kitchen island as several conversations unspooled around him. At the kitchen table, a rather cutthroat game of Scrabble was going on, the fact that the kid Chekov was not a native English speaker apparently not hindering him in the least. Uhura, for her part, was also playing to win, her apparently extensive world travels as a child having given her a stellar vocabulary. Bones kept shouting them both down as cheaters, kept checking an online Scrabble dictionary to prove it, and then mumbling viciously into his beer when he was proved wrong time after time. Sulu just drank and kept pluralizing everyone else’s words with a smirk on his face; he only had eyes for Chekov, who sat there, oblivious to it.
In a corner of the family room, Sabine Saavik was trying to teach Scotty some Swedish phrases, but he just kept trying to get her to translate curse words for him. Nero and his band of Scowlers - Cupcake, that guy Decker, and now Gary Mitchell - were once again set up on the deck, talking quietly and giving dirty looks to whoever passed. Gaila and the remaining women, including Carol, Rand and Christine Chapel, had donned bikinis and immersed themselves in the hot tub for the evening.
There was one other person that had subtly removed himself from the group as Jim had done, he noticed. Spock sat in an armchair in the family room, close enough to Scotty and Saavik to appear to be a part of their conversation to a casual observer, but far enough away that he was clearly keeping to himself. He was typing something intently into his cell phone, Jim noticed, possibly Skyping or texting with someone.
Jim took the opportunity to get a good look at the man over the end of his beer bottle, who was seated facing slightly away from him. He was probably Jim’s biggest competition for the title of Top Chef - hell, he was anyone’s biggest competition - and Jim should be wary of him, perhaps even aligning himself with Nero, who had made no secret of his open animosity toward Spock, though his reasons were not at all clear. But Jim wasn’t built that way - he was basically a friendly guy, and always would be. And Spock seemed like a guy in need of a friend.
Or so it seemed to Jim. On the outside, Spock was quiet, reserved, even aloof. But that calm exterior hid a lot of passion, which Jim had already seen. When he’d talked with the judges about his food the other night, it was as if he was lit from within, and that mood had been contagious, making Jim want to get to know him better, to see that flame lit again and again. Spock kept to himself, sure, but he also gave small smiles to those around him when they cracked jokes, and sat for long stretches with Uhura, talking quietly and fervently with her, about what Jim did not know. If Jim didn’t know they had been lovers, he would never have guessed - Spock kept a respectful space between them, one that seemed to pain her, though she strove hard to hide it from him. If he noticed, he didn’t show it. Jim wondered if he was doing it so that he didn’t hurt her, but maybe that was splitting hairs. He rarely touched her.
But probably he was just seeing what he wanted to see, because the truth of the matter was Jim had a bit of a crush on Spock.
And why not? For one thing, Spock was very easy on the eyes, with wide shoulders and slim hips, and Jim was dying to know if his whole chest was as hairy as the bit that was visible over the tops of his t-shirts. Jim wanted to know if his fingertips would get tangled in that hair. He wondered if Spock’s nipples were as dark in reality as they were in his imagination. And then he wondered when he’d turned back into a 15-year old boy, because what the hell, was he going to get a hard-on fantasizing about sex with everyone in the cast?
Well, he seemed to be on a pace to have sex with everyone in the cast, he reminded himself ruefully, and felt his face color at the thought. Jim chided himself, shaking his head, What makes you think Spock would even want anything to do with that, even if he wasn’t straight?
That was the rub, wasn’t it? Twice now Spock had caught Jim with his pants down - quite literally. And with that single raised eyebrow, he’d managed to communicate everything he was too polite to put into words - Jim was a man-slut, it was kind of sad, and Spock was merely tolerating his presence.
“Well, fuck me,” he said aloud, miserable, and went to bed early.
----
Jim got up even earlier the next day, before dark, wanting to clear his head with another run before the madness of a lunch rush he hoped they were going to be ready for. They had an on-set call for 7:00 AM, which had had nearly everyone grumbling the night before. He (and Spock) were the first out the door, standing on the curb waiting before the SUVs had even arrived.
“Ready?” Jim asked, trying to break some ice - the two of them were on the same team, after all - maybe they should try to communicate.
“I am operating at optimal levels.”
“Aces.”
Ten minutes later, they were all loaded in, and the conversation in the car inevitably turned to the challenge at hand.
“Well, this thing makes me about as nervous as a long-tailed cat in a rockin’ chair factory,” Bones said from the way-back.
“How so?” Gaila asked.
“You know how much one’a these trucks makes in a day? $1,000. That’s a lotta sweet tea and pulled pork. Town like this one, they don’t much like their red meats.”
“Come on, Bones, you didn’t just make pulled pork,” Jim said; McCoy’s Moroccan-spiced pork shoulder was just this side of a religious experience - Jim had tasted it himself.
“I just wish it was about the food.”
“I must concur that there are many intangibles and unpredictable circumstances that will affect the outcome that make this seem a daunting challenge,” Spock supplied.
“Then you just have to plan for them,” Jim said.
“I fail to see how that is possible, as they are, by definition, changeable.”
“I dunno about you, Spock, but I don’t get out of bed without a contingency plan or two in mind. It’s what makes a good chef.”
“Or an ill-prepared one. To properly plan for what may happen, one must take important focus from what is likely to happen, which leads to missteps in preparation and follow-through.”
“Keeping your eyes on the prize?”
“I believe that colloquialism is fitting, yes.”
“Who said you couldn’t do both?”
----
The morning prep flew by, and Jim was pleased with the flavor that had developed in the sauces and garnishes he’d prepared the day before for his catfish banh mi with Asian slaw, pickled chiles and mint. If his bread would remain fresh, he’d have a decent dish, if not the winner. He was more nervous about them selling enough to win, and even about their price points - their dishes were on the pricey side when compared to hot dogs and grilled cheese sandwiches.
Through a quirk of simple fate, they were the last truck to leave the hotel’s loading area, and followed the others to the street where they were to set up, somewhere in a business district. Jim had decided to drive, and when they were ushered into a parking spot by a member of the production, he could see already there would be problems.
He got out to test his hypothesis, walking up the block and back until he was convinced that he was right. The trucks were set up one after the other, with a space of about twenty feet between them. From the flow of foot traffic and the placement of the nearest buildings, the Kobayashi Maru would be the last truck that patrons would see, the last one in line, the last one considered by a very discerning San Francisco lunch crowd. Compounding the matter, the block where they were parked was on a curve, and their truck wasn’t all that visible in the distance from the first one in line. Jim didn’t like their chances, and the stony look on his face when he re-entered their truck communicated as much to his team.
“What is it, lad?” Scotty asked, looking up from his prep.
“We’re in a shitty spot.”
“What do you mean?” Gaila asked.
“We’re at the end of the line - we’re not going to get as much traffic as everyone else.”
“Surely the diners will be more discerning as they choose their midday meal,” Spock pointed out. “Our food is clearly superior.”
Jim looked down on the man’s pork belly char siu bibimbap and Gaila’s tuna and compressed watermelon poke with mango ginger puree and was inclined to agree. “But it doesn’t change the fact we’re at the end of the line. The winner of this challenge will be chosen from the team that sells the most. Regardless of whether our food is the best - and it is, I have no doubt - we’re still at a disadvantage. It’s a no-win situation.”
“Still, we must endeavor to perform at top effectiveness.”
Jim looked at him sideways and then at the cameraman. “Do we really have any choice, Camera Guy?” he asked the man.
“I’m not allowed to talk to you.”
“So we’re supposed to just stay where they put us and take it in the shorts?”
The cameraman pressed his lips together in a tight line, as if illustrating his previous point.
With a growl, Jim went on to finish his prep, muttering under his breath the entire time.
Thirty minutes into service, they settled into a rhythm - Gaila on the window, taking orders and payment, Scotty packaging the food, and Jim and Spock finishing the dishes. They had a respectable lineup of customers, but when Jim took a minute to do another recon, he saw that customers were standing three-deep around the first two trucks, and a similar crowd was building at the third. It didn’t take a math genius to realize that people weren’t even really seeing their truck down here, and Jim’s prediction that the Kobayashi Maru would go down in metaphorical flames was about to come true.
“I don’t believe this,” Jim muttered. “I knew this would happen,” he added to no one in particular.
“Yeah, but what can we do?” asked Gaila.
“We can find another spot,” Jim said boldly.
“Don’t be daft,” Scotty said.
“We do not have the time to spare to relocate,” Spock pointed out. “Lunch service concludes at 2:00.”
“That still gives us two hours.”
“Surely we are not meant to leave our assigned spot.”
“Did you see anything on the rules sheet that said we couldn’t?” No one on the team could answer. “Neither did I. Camera Guy, is there anything on the rules sheet that says we can’t take this show on the road?” The camera man kept his mouth shut. “See?” Jim said to his team, a crazy glint in his eye that would not be argued with.
Jim pulled the keys from his pocket and took his seat behind the wheel. “Secure the food as best as you can - I’m taking us somewhere where we’ll be noticed. Camera Guy, you might want to tell the guy at the other end of your earpiece we’re taking control of this ship.”
“Ship?” Gaila asked Scotty, puzzled.
“Forget it, he’s rolling,” he answered.
It was a short drive to their destination, and Jim was gratified to see a lot of foot traffic in the area as he pulled into a parking spot on the street. “All right, we’re here. You guys, take ten minutes to get re-started. I’m gonna go out and drum up some business.”
He stood and unbuttoned his chef coat, then hung it behind the driver’s seat. Next, he removed his t-shirt and pulled a small tube of something from his pocket and unscrewed its cap. Squeezing out a copious amount of whatever-it-was into the palm of his hand he began to smear it over his chest and abs, which began to shimmer and glow, even in the low light inside the truck.
“What the?” Gaila protested, taking up the tube and reading aloud, “Glim’r Body Glitter?” She smacked him on the arm. “Jim, did you steal this from my room?”
“What did I say about contingency plans?” He worked what remained of the glittery goop into his hair, making it spiky, and pulled at the waist of his cargo pants so that they were riding lower on his hips, showing off his well-defined pelvic muscles. “There - how do I look?”
“Like an aging twink,” Gaila replied.
“Perfect. I’ll be right back.” He left the truck without another word, and bounced up the block, inviting passersby in a loud voice to come and sample his wares.
“I don’t get it,” Scotty said.
“Where has he brought us?” Spock asked, looking perturbed.
Gaila, who’d followed Jim to the door, leaned against it and laughed. “Better get ready for a rush of customers, guys,” she said.
“I do not understand what would lead you to that conclusion,” Spock said. “We have lost vital time and momentum with this relocation - it is most illogical.”
“Don’t you know where we are?”
Scotty leaned out the window and peered at the street sign. “What’s Castro Street?”
“A place where they like what Jimmy’s selling,” Gaila said and went to start prepping some of Jim’s and her own food.
----
The shit was already hitting the fan when they pulled the Kobayashi Maru into its parking spot behind the Fairmont. While they’d still been visited by the judges, their stunt had apparently caused much consternation for the production. Not only did they have to shoot in two places, they didn’t have the proper licensing for either the food truck or filming in the Castro. While they hadn’t encountered any issues during filming (and Jim had scored not one, but two phone numbers from police officers), the producers were off having a conniption behind the control room door.
“Camera Guy, tell me how much trouble I’m in,” he said in a low voice.
“Hard to tell. Better hope you win,” he said and left to offload his footage.
Team Kobayashi Maru filed into the Stew Room, where the other three teams had already gathered.
“What the hell?” Bones exclaimed, getting to his feet and walking over. “Where’d you guys run off to?”
“We didn’t like where they put us, so we found a new spot,” Jim replied
“We?” Spock questioned.
“I?”
“Jim got creative, we went along for the ride,” Gaila said, finding some middle ground.
“How’d you do?” Bones asked.
“I don’t know,” she replied. “They took the cash box before I could count it.”
“We earned in excess of $1,500,” Spock said with certainty.
“$1,800 if you count my tips,” Jim supplied. He’d been sure to shove what cash he’d been given into the box before the production assistant had taken it away.
“You made $300 in tips?” Gaila asked, incredulous.
“I earned every penny,” Jim said wearily, then went to find a beer in the coolers the production supplied, and sank into a folding chair with a sigh.
It was another whole hour before they were joined by Padma, who stood in the doorway with a grave expression on her face. “We’d like to see Team Kobayashi Maru,” she said once she had their attention.
Jim felt his stomach drop at the stony expression on her face. Surely he’d be out on his sweet ass before the day was up. They were ushered to Judges’ Table and given their marks to stand on, then made to wait while establishing shots were filmed. Jim noticed none of the judges were looking at him, and he felt a trickle of sweat stream down his back.
“Chefs,” Tom began, a hard glint in his eye. “We have a troubling matter before us. Evidence has been submitted to the judges, suggesting that you violated the rules of this challenge. Is there anything you care to say before we begin?”
Jim was careful to keep his face expressionless, and straightened his chef’s coat out with a tug at its hem.
“Your team left the location that had been set aside for you. How do you answer this?”
“Did we win?” Jim asked, looking Tom in the eye.
“That is immaterial.”
“I actually don’t think so. We saw an opportunity to get a better result and we went for it. Did we win?”
“You drove the truck to a new location without conferring with the production,” said another voice.
Jim turned his head in surprise to Spock, who was looking at him with that damned eyebrow cocked. “Your point being?”
“In academic vernacular, you cheated.”
As Jim turned to face him, Scotty took a step back so that he wouldn’t be caught in any crossfire.
“Let me ask you something I think we all know the answer to. We were at a clear disadvantage, weren’t we? You yourself said this morning that location was a key to success in such a challenge.”
“Among other factors,” Spock allowed.
“We had the worst location among the four teams.”
“That remained to be seen.”
“It was a no-win scenario. I don't believe in no-win scenarios.”
“So not only did you violate the rules, you also failed to understand the principle lesson.”
“Please enlighten me.”
“The point of the challenge was to compete against three other teams. When you removed the Kobayashi Maru from its asigned location, you changed the parameters of that test. We will never know if we were the most favored among the trucks in that case, as we did not have the opportunity to be held up in comparison among the population of available diners. Your actions negated the conditions of the challenge.”
“The restaurant business is not about controlled conditions,” Jim said, and he could feel his cheeks getting warmer. “It’s cutthroat. What I did was employ basic market research and publicity tactics to ensure the success of our venture.”
“But we will never know how we would have been measured against our competition.”
“I don’t think you like the fact I was thinking outside the box.”
“I do not like the fact you did not confer with the rest of your team.”
Jim had no answer to this, which was just as well because Tom took this opportunity to wrest control of the conversation back. “You guys through?” he asked.
“Yes, chef,” they both answered in unison.
“You ready to hear our decision?”
“Yes. Sir.” Jim replied, taking a breath and holding it, trying to keep his anger with Spock in check. Of course the man was right, but so was Jim, and if his gut instinct had anything to say about it, they were standing here because…
“With a tally of $1,850, your team won this challenge hands-down,” Padma told them. “Congratulations.”
Thank Christ, Jim thought, clenching his fists and letting out the breath he’d been holding.
“Who made the pork dish?” Tom asked, and the usual progression of praise or criticism for the chefs’ dishes began. Jim barely registered what was happening, his head was swimming too much - with excitement, relief, disappointment, even, that he’d acted so unilaterally, even if he’d been successful.
In the end, Scotty’s haggis potstickers were the surprise winner, and he was given a check for $5,000 from some sponsor or other.
Jim walked with his teammates out to the Stew Room to summon Team Dog is Love to the chopping block (Decker would eventually be asked to pack his knives and go), enduring Gaila jumping up and down excitedly while pulling on his arm the entire way. As he walked, he watched the back of Spock’s neck, and the man seemed stiff, rigid. Jim could practically feel the disapproval pouring off of him.
He took a seat and leaned back against it, letting Gaila lean into him joyously and enthusiastically as the rest of the cast chatted around them. The conversation seemed to revolve around what the judges had had to say. Gaila was quick to point out that there could not have been any rule breaking since there wasn’t a rule against moving. She seemed happy to regale the others with tales about what the team had done, and the tactics the team had pulled off to sell their food, and Jim was inclined to let her tell the story any way she wanted. He didn’t much feel like celebrating their win, not in the least.
Because across the room from him, Spock sat with his legs crossed, resolutely not looking at Jim at all.
----
Thank you for your time.