“You’re beautiful,” Serenity Ko said, her long billowing dress clinging to her hips.
“Thank you. You look great, too,” I said.
My cheeks felt warm, and I busied myself by ducking behind the counter and opening one of the chillers. Neat stacks of Feast cubes were piled within the freezer, resolutely unremarkable but now utterly fascinating as I struggled to shut her out. Prolonged eye contact with Serenity Ko was dangerous.
Serenity Ko stifled a sigh. She pulled out a chair and propped her feet on it, knocking a carefully folded serviette onto the floor in the process.
“One drama queen aside,” Courage Praia said, gesturing at Serenity Ko, “we bring you some good stuff. XP Inc. managed to rent some replicas from the Museum of Primian History for tonight’s pop-up.”
“Ooh, yes!” Courage Nenna squealed, producing a set of flowmetal packing cubes from her backpack. Some of them decompressed into larger boxes. She passed her palm over a scanner and they popped open with a rippling wave. “Tons of artefacts for interior décor – some flowmetal replicas, others made from less intelligent materials. Look – an ancient heating device off the spacecraft Nakshatran One,” she said, holding it up. “Original seed trays from the early settler tents – with freshly planted saplings, of course,” she proclaimed, pulling six of them out and adding clumps of dirt to the otherwise smooth ground. She proceeded to produce one fascinating piece of Primian history after another, arranging them on the floor haphazardly, like she was setting up shop as an interplanetary trader.
“Oh, and you’ll love this!” she announced. “May I interest you in a bejewelled goblet? This is supposed to be pre-Interstellar Era. Do you recognise it? Wait for it… it’s from Earth!”
She held the goblet up, and it smacked of all the wastefulness and opulence of my ancestors, the unbroken history of my home-world symbolised in its gilded, ruby-studded chalice. I blanched and took an involuntary step back.
“No, no! I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you.” Curiosity Nenna rose to her feet and clapped her hands over her mouth.
“Smooth,” Serenity Ko said callously, though she swung her legs back to the ground and leaned forward. I suppose she was concerned.
“Are you okay?” Courage Praia asked.
“I – I forgot you’re a refugee…” Curiosity Nenna’s voice came out as a squeak.
The need to perform the lie I’d been living since I got to Primus snapped me out of my sulk. “Oh! That’s okay, it’s just that I’ve had my Earth-origins probed into all day by the stream-media. Good Cheer Chaangte’s on a rampage, everyone hates me…”
Serenity Ko rolled her eyes. “We’ve heard it all, haven’t we?” She turned to Kili, who now hovered beside her.
“I’m the most hated chef in all of chef-dom—” Kili said, aping me.
‘“They called me ‘a disgrace to the culinary arts’ today,”’ Serenity Ko continued.
“Chaangte said I’m ‘an opportunistic social climber from a Fringe planet.’”
“Have you guys been rehearsing?” I asked drily.
“No, and also fuck Chaangte,” Serenity Ko said earnestly. “Our pop-up debut is with the stream-media. They’ll set public perception straight.”
“No pressure,” I sulked.
“They’ll shut all of Chaangte’s diatribes down – don’t forget, she lost to you on the Millennium Feast Special. Everything she’s done since has come across like sour grapes.”
True, Kili said.
“Fuck ’em, the star-fucked bastards,” Serenity Ko said cheerily. “I’m around now, so if anyone so much as breathes about your origins…”
I flushed, and my breath came up short. I busied myself with prep, trying to ignore the flutterwings tumbling through my stomach at her words, and doing my best to push Serenity Ko out of my thoughts altogether.
Every once in a while, one of us would forget ourselves, and we’d have a really good time shooting the breeze. Until we gave into the electric current that filled the empty air between us, our hands brushing or our shoulders just a little too close for comfort… until our lips found each other’s. And then I’d pull away, prompting a string of apologies from Serenity Ko and myself, awkwardly followed by a rapid change of subject to more work-related things. And the burgeoning electric field we somehow found ourselves trapped in would supercharge all over again…
Never mind that there was the ever-present risk that I’d unwittingly drop my secret history like a ray-bomb, revealing the fact that I was a Godavari runaway and not a Kaveri refugee, like I’d almost done last night. I was still kicking myself over that momentary lapse.
It was safest to shove Serenity Ko into the darkest back alleys of my mind and not go looking for her.
I neatly organised the chillers in the order in which we’d be serving the Feast cubes within, which was the least prep I’d ever done in a professional kitchen.
We were debuting a set menu with five courses, each paired with a beverage – with alcoholic and zero-proof options available. I’d handpicked the pairings, and the stringent quality bar to which I held the rest of the team had applied twice as severely to my own work.
Beside me, Boundless Ano was arranging his mise en place at the bar. He was incredibly easy to work with; he had a cheerful demeanour, but stayed focused upon his prep. And when our servers arrived, it only took a brief conversation to outline my plans for the evening with them.
One of the big benefits of Feast was the minimal kitchen equipment required to make and serve it. The XP Inc. publicity team had zeroed in on this, and chosen to have us host pop-up restaurants for their user-testing and pre-marketing initiatives. All they needed was a large tent, a couple of industrial chillers for the Feast cubes, fancy-looking plates and glasses, and a competent mixologist for the drinks.
And me.
Our diners for every pop-up were sent a complimentary nanopill packet with the internally tested, brand-new Feast subscription. It was entirely portable, all plug and play. Our weatherproof, climate-controlled tent had been set up at the Uru and Beyond Marketplace for this, our very first pop-up. At the very heart of its warrens and alleyways, with the scents and sounds of exotic foods and ingredients surrounding us, stalls pushing up against us on all sides, it was an entirely unremarkable structure, and intentionally so. The publicity folks at XP Inc. had opted for an understated introduction to Feast… all the way until our guests tried it for the first time, and it blew their minds.
Word had got round, though, and through the tent’s transparent walls, I spotted several passersby peering curiously inside, and even stopping to ask what we were all about. Optimism Tina guarded the door possessively, unwilling to let anyone inside. A group of older women trilled excitedly when she patiently explained what we were doing, and left beaming. A happy family paused at the door, and then walked away looking distinctly less enthusiastic than when they’d arrived.
The tent’s transparent walls and ceiling lent the illusion of being open to the elements, which, though ominous, were atmospheric in their drama. Minimalist decor, with tasteful flowmetal tables and chairs upon the bare ground, so as not to detract from the star attraction of the evening – the audiovisual and flavour experiences delivered by Feast. Artefacts paying tribute to Nakshatran and Primian history nestled unobtrusively along makeshift wall shelves. Serenity Ko and the gang had done a solid job adding decor to the inside of the tent while generally staying out of the kitchen. The space was everything I’d envisioned.
Excerpted with permission from Intergalactic Feast: Flavour Hacker Book 2, Lavanya Lakshminarayan, HarperCollins India.
