Fandom: XF/Iron Chef crossover
Disclaimer: CC, Fox, etc. own all things XF. Fuji Television Network owns all
things Iron Chef.  Please don't offer me money for this.
Notes: For the LBD challenge -- too little and too late, but I wanna be on that
page with you all!
Summary:  Don't look at me -- I'm hideous.  *Hideous*

"Battle: Rat"
by The Spike
12/00

He came for the challenge, as do they all.  Like Ron Kon Kay, the Imperial
Chicken, to the sound of dried corn poured from a golden bowl, they come for the
fame, the glory, for the chance to wear the winner's paper crown.  To snatch the
pepper from my hand.  Ah, but this one.  This one was different.

His eyes were like tiny cups of the finest Hatsu Mukashi Matcha before the
frothing -- green, clear and hot -- and oh, how I longed to gaze into their
depths until my thirst was slaked. His lips were full and red and smooth, like
fresh salmon roe rolled in the most delicate of rice noodles, or perhaps as
Sonobe Yoshinobu served it, with Taraba crab and vinegared ikura garnish served
in a most unique peekaboo ice bowl.   His flesh -- ahh, I dream of his flesh
still.  It was as white and smooth as a steamed, no!... a *poached* filet of
Hamo eel, fragrant as fresh ginger, intoxicating as a surprising mixture of
miso, everclear and sake.   He was, in short, the most beautiful challenger ever
to present himself at the door of my manse, deep inside Mt. Fuji (Yes!  Inside
Mt. Fuji!  We have had this discussion before!  Move on.). As I said, the most
beautiful ever to present himself and although I knew he had surely been sent by
one of my many rivals to steal from me secrets more precious than Matsumoto's
recipe for truffle-balls in champagne-caviar soup, I knew I would not turn him
away.  Oh yes, I would have him.  Wanted, craved and needed him.  And yet, my
madness knows no bounds.  For as he came towards me, treading lightly as the
delicate skin that forms on a giant vat of slowly fermenting soybean curd and
becomes natto, that most delightful and healthy of breakfast foods, I held out
my hand and felt my smile turn cruel.

"Wait!" I told him.  "First you must defeat my Iron Chefs!"  He stopped, arched
an eyebrow as perfectly black and smooth as a sliver of shitake mushroom.  Or
possibly a truffle.  No, no, it was definitely like a shitake mushroom, the way
Chin Kenichi sliced them for his third dish in the Battle Shitake Mushroom, the
one where he made it look like a little piece of eel.  Yes, just like that.  My
mouth was nearly watering from my desire.  He merely smiled.

"I can beat your best with one hand," he said, as cocky as a platter of raw
oysters.   I laughed with delight, though my heart beat faster in anticipation
-- could the American from Russia truly make his mark in Japanese cuisine?
Could he please the sensitive palate of Kishi? The knowledgeable tongue of
Korn?  The single, exotic brain cell of Fujitani?  The competition would be
stiff.

"That will take some doing," I replied.  "I'll call Kitchen Stadium immediately
and tell them to start sharpening knives."

I was shocked to hear the leather-clad American laugh, a sound as deeply rich as
Iron Chef Sakai's unexpected Oxtail-Fois-gras croquette.  I felt the sound deep
down in my soul, my penis thickening and stiffening like a geoduck plunged live
into boiling water that had been flavoured delicately with Hosokai Takashi's
trademark anise and fish bones.

"What amuses?" I snapped.  My mystery man just shook his head and reached into
his tight, black leather pants.

"Don't bother," he said, pulling out a knife the size of a sea bream.  "I always
bring my own."

I smiled then, and tossed him a pepper from my bowl.  Yes, from that moment I
knew, no matter whether he won or lost, Alex Krycek would always be the Iron
Chef of my most cherished internal organs: my liver, my spleen and my tender,
juicy heart.

*end*