Sapphire & Steel/NCIS Crossover: Ducky/OFC To Taste Cake
Title: To Taste Cake
Fandoms: NCIS and Sapphire and Steel
Characters/Pairing: Ducky Mallard (Steel)/Virginia Cavendish (Sapphire) and Timothy McGee/OFC (mentioned)
Prompts:For varietypack100 #39 Taste
Word Count: 616
Rating: K+
Summary: It was back in time; time when you did not need food for sustenance, but the partaking of it helped to assimilate you with the culture you were thrust into.
Author's Notes: Would definitely, definitely help if you read Time Discovers Truth, because I’ve borrowed the premise from there. For a quick recap: McGee’s new girlfriend turns out to be Ducky’s long lost daughter. However, there is one small glitch, the girl isn’t really Ducky’s daughter, but the child of his Elemental Being, Steel. He’s long believed that the only woman he ever loved, his partner Sapphire, was killed during a failed mission. Truthfully, she’s been living in Edinburgh, Scotland, raising their daughter and mourning his death. Their daughter are able to reunite them. This is a moment at the wedding reception for Gemma Cavendish-Mallard and Timothy McGee.
Dedication: For elysium1996. A little while ago I put out a plea for help with my last five varietypack100 prompts and elysium1996 asked for anything in the SnS/NCIS universe that I created in Time Discovers Truth. I came back with the Taste prompt and she suggested how things tasted when he (Ducky/Steel) first got her mirrored with Gemma’s wedding cake. I amended it slightly, but still hopefully what she was thinking of. Thanks for the prompt and the lovely, lovely reviews! You are one of the sweetest things fandom has ever brought me. You make me smile and laugh nearly daily. And, I love that I was a bad influence on you. Hugs, love, and lots of chocolate!!
You remember the first time you had cake. It was back in time; time when you did not need food for sustenance, but the partaking of it helped to assimilate you with the culture you were thrust into. That first cake, given to you by Khufu during a feast for your help with his Great Pyramid, was nothing more than crushed grains and flour bake on a hot rock and sweetened with honey. It was dry and gritty and tasted of the desert sands that mixed with the flour during processing.
Over the centuries the cakes changed, as did what the humans called them, and you learned to appreciate some aspects of them. Especially those that didn’t crunch with desert sand. Still, you never understood the fascination that humans seemingly had with cakes; the reasoning behind using cakes to commemorate every festive occasion. The intricacies and that the expense that went into some cakes never made sense to you, or at least they never made sense to Steel with his cold manner and frozen heart.
You did enjoy one cake during your journey as Steel. It was the cake made by Sapphire in that little house, on that little island nearly thirty years before. She had stoked the fire to warm you after you had cooled yourself to nearly absolute zero to freeze the particles of time that had escaped. Since the fire warmed the stove and the children were hungry, she set about making food. The cake was a treat for not only the children, but the large and boisterous Lead, whose thunderous laugh seemed to still echo across the galaxies. At some point during the night, when the children had fallen into unsettled sleep, Sapphire had slipped a piece of cake in front of you as she slid into the seat next to you. Although you protested that you didn’t need food, soon you were tasting the rich, moist chocolate confection before you. Yes, that cake was your first taste of understanding the human connection to cake.
Today, the taste of fondant and chiffon is heavy on your tongue. The beautiful tiers of wedding cake are slowly being devoured by the thongs of revelers, and you miss the sight of it. Eating the cake is the final step. Your daughter, a young woman who has your eyes and mouth and heart yet hasn’t been a part of your life for two full years, is truly married. Her heart belongs to another man. And you feel like pieces of you are missing, just as pieces of the cake are missing. You wonder how Gemma, and her mother, were ever not a part of your life. You silently rage against the years of birthday cakes you missed and wonder if Virginia made your daughter the same cake as Sapphire made Steel. You wonder if you would have chosen human forms if you had been together when Sapphire learned of your child within her. You wonder if Ducky Mallard and Virginia Cavendish would have exchanged vows and feed each other cake twenty odd years ago, as Timothy McGee and Gemma Cavendish-Mallard did this day. You wonder and rage at all the sweet moments that were taken from you. The sweetness in your mouth turns bitter.
Two pair of long, slender, elegant arms wrap around you. Soft and sensuous lips press a kiss against the shell of your ear, before words are whispered, “Don’t think of the moments lost. Think of the moments gained. Think of the future. Think of our future.”
“I’ll try,” you turn your head, capturing her lips with your own. Her taste removes all bitterness from your mouth, from your heart, from your soul.
Fandoms: NCIS and Sapphire and Steel
Characters/Pairing: Ducky Mallard (Steel)/Virginia Cavendish (Sapphire) and Timothy McGee/OFC (mentioned)
Prompts:For varietypack100 #39 Taste
Word Count: 616
Rating: K+
Summary: It was back in time; time when you did not need food for sustenance, but the partaking of it helped to assimilate you with the culture you were thrust into.
Author's Notes: Would definitely, definitely help if you read Time Discovers Truth, because I’ve borrowed the premise from there. For a quick recap: McGee’s new girlfriend turns out to be Ducky’s long lost daughter. However, there is one small glitch, the girl isn’t really Ducky’s daughter, but the child of his Elemental Being, Steel. He’s long believed that the only woman he ever loved, his partner Sapphire, was killed during a failed mission. Truthfully, she’s been living in Edinburgh, Scotland, raising their daughter and mourning his death. Their daughter are able to reunite them. This is a moment at the wedding reception for Gemma Cavendish-Mallard and Timothy McGee.
Dedication: For elysium1996. A little while ago I put out a plea for help with my last five varietypack100 prompts and elysium1996 asked for anything in the SnS/NCIS universe that I created in Time Discovers Truth. I came back with the Taste prompt and she suggested how things tasted when he (Ducky/Steel) first got her mirrored with Gemma’s wedding cake. I amended it slightly, but still hopefully what she was thinking of. Thanks for the prompt and the lovely, lovely reviews! You are one of the sweetest things fandom has ever brought me. You make me smile and laugh nearly daily. And, I love that I was a bad influence on you. Hugs, love, and lots of chocolate!!
You remember the first time you had cake. It was back in time; time when you did not need food for sustenance, but the partaking of it helped to assimilate you with the culture you were thrust into. That first cake, given to you by Khufu during a feast for your help with his Great Pyramid, was nothing more than crushed grains and flour bake on a hot rock and sweetened with honey. It was dry and gritty and tasted of the desert sands that mixed with the flour during processing.
Over the centuries the cakes changed, as did what the humans called them, and you learned to appreciate some aspects of them. Especially those that didn’t crunch with desert sand. Still, you never understood the fascination that humans seemingly had with cakes; the reasoning behind using cakes to commemorate every festive occasion. The intricacies and that the expense that went into some cakes never made sense to you, or at least they never made sense to Steel with his cold manner and frozen heart.
You did enjoy one cake during your journey as Steel. It was the cake made by Sapphire in that little house, on that little island nearly thirty years before. She had stoked the fire to warm you after you had cooled yourself to nearly absolute zero to freeze the particles of time that had escaped. Since the fire warmed the stove and the children were hungry, she set about making food. The cake was a treat for not only the children, but the large and boisterous Lead, whose thunderous laugh seemed to still echo across the galaxies. At some point during the night, when the children had fallen into unsettled sleep, Sapphire had slipped a piece of cake in front of you as she slid into the seat next to you. Although you protested that you didn’t need food, soon you were tasting the rich, moist chocolate confection before you. Yes, that cake was your first taste of understanding the human connection to cake.
Today, the taste of fondant and chiffon is heavy on your tongue. The beautiful tiers of wedding cake are slowly being devoured by the thongs of revelers, and you miss the sight of it. Eating the cake is the final step. Your daughter, a young woman who has your eyes and mouth and heart yet hasn’t been a part of your life for two full years, is truly married. Her heart belongs to another man. And you feel like pieces of you are missing, just as pieces of the cake are missing. You wonder how Gemma, and her mother, were ever not a part of your life. You silently rage against the years of birthday cakes you missed and wonder if Virginia made your daughter the same cake as Sapphire made Steel. You wonder if you would have chosen human forms if you had been together when Sapphire learned of your child within her. You wonder if Ducky Mallard and Virginia Cavendish would have exchanged vows and feed each other cake twenty odd years ago, as Timothy McGee and Gemma Cavendish-Mallard did this day. You wonder and rage at all the sweet moments that were taken from you. The sweetness in your mouth turns bitter.
Two pair of long, slender, elegant arms wrap around you. Soft and sensuous lips press a kiss against the shell of your ear, before words are whispered, “Don’t think of the moments lost. Think of the moments gained. Think of the future. Think of our future.”
“I’ll try,” you turn your head, capturing her lips with your own. Her taste removes all bitterness from your mouth, from your heart, from your soul.