Memory Transcription Subject: David, Human Restaurateur

Date [standardized human time]: November 10, 2136

The U.N. Peacekeepers drifted back into the park slowly, with a practiced casualness. It wasn’t hard to deduce that whatever those gunshots were had been dealt with, but nobody was saying anything yet, which left a baseline aura of anxiety over those of us who’d been close enough to the entrance to hear them. For those already seated, the sound of gunfire wasn’t too dissimilar from the sound of a baseball hitting a bat.

Contrary to the persistent media rumors, New York was one of the safest cities in America, from the turn of the millennium, straight up until… well, honestly, given how many people had been rendered destitute by the Extermination Fleet bombings, I couldn’t rule out a new resurgence in desperate looters. The U.N. had been rendering aid in the form of food and shelter, but that's not going to help you rebuild your whole life after your renter’s or homeowner's insurance provider decided that “blown up by space aliens” isn't a category of damage they're willing to cover. And insurance payouts don’t un-incinerate priceless mementos. Or loved ones who lived too close to the center of town…

I shook my head. It wasn't a topic I liked to think about.

I caught the eye of a Peacekeeper and waved them over. “Hey, we all good out there, or…?” he said, pointing towards the entrance.

The Peacekeeper’s helmet turned back towards the entrance as well for a moment. “Yeah, we’re good.” He glanced at the Yotul couple for a moment. Nikolo looked uneasy, and Rosi was fully cowering behind him. “Couple of teenagers got excited and set off some firecrackers,” the Peacekeeper lied.

“Sir, I know what gunfire sounds like,” said Nikolo, a mile less casually than he’d been speaking moments earlier. “Please don’t patronize me.” I blinked in surprise. Did… did that Yotul just code-switch when talking to the cops?

“I still hear gunfire every night in my nightmares,” Chiri said, looking as sad as she could muster. She wasn’t entirely lying about sporadic night terrors--she had her heels dug in about seeing a therapist for some reason, but hopefully I’d talk her into it eventually--but she was definitely laying it on thick to sway the Peacekeeper. “Please tell me this place is safe. I can’t lose another home…”

The Peacekeeper looked to me for some reason, and I shrugged sheepishly. “I’ve literally never heard gunfire before in my life. I only know what it sounds like from a video essay on unrealistic movie sound effects.” I glanced at the three aliens. “You should probably put their minds at ease, though. The truth is less likely to cause a panic than some obvious lie about fireworks.”

The Peacekeeper sighed and gave in. “Some guy tried to make it past security with a machine pistol, and he wasn’t happy that we found it. Nobody was hurt, and he’s in custody now.”

“Why?” said Chiri, crinkling her snout in confusion.

The Peacekeeper waved her question away. “I didn’t ask, and I shouldn’t speculate. I'm sure it’ll be on the news tonight. Now, if you’ll excuse me?”

We all watched the Peacekeeper leave before turning back to each other. “Okay, but seriously, why would someone try to smuggle a machine pistol into a baseball game?” asked Chiri, directed at me this time.

I resisted the urge to rub my eyes. No touching my face while cooking; for health reasons, and also because I'd been handling spicy food. “Charitably, maybe the guy just didn't feel safe anymore going outside unarmed. Not much a pistol is going to do against a spacecraft, but it's mostly just there for peace of mind.” I purposefully omitted the possibility of land-bound threats like human criminals or alien exterminators who’d ejected and gone to ground for the past month. Hadn't been any word of that on the news, but who really knew what was still being censored?

“And uncharitably?” asked Nikolo. Chiri had been copying my body language lately--Gojids had shorter ears and tails, so human gestures were easier for them anyway--but the Yotul was still using Federation mannerisms, which I barely understood. He was doing something weird with his ear that reminded me vaguely of a raised eyebrow.

I made a bemused expression. Every step forward came with a billion voices demanding a step back. Action begat Reaction. You could set your clock to it. And the days since first contact, back in July, had seen centuries’ worth of shocking and painful change all at once. It was already difficult, on most days, to get humans to tolerate foreign cultures from just a few countries over. A few star systems over, to say nothing of the Federation’s hostile ideology against meat-eaters, was going to be the mother of all uphill battles. And there were probably a few billion humans, at minimum, who didn’t think it was worth the effort in the first place, let alone after the destructive mess that was the Battle of Earth.

“Uncharitably,” I said simply, “there are more than a few humans who've had a bad enough experience during the past few months that they've written off aliens entirely.”

“Not all of them,” some human passerby sneered. “The Arxur don't seem half-bad.”

Eyes wide, my heart pounding, ready for a fight, I had a steadying hand on Chiri’s shoulder immediately. “Don't,” I said, in a cautious whisper, my blood flow echoing in my ears. I had my eyes locked on the other human, but I could see Chiri bristling with rage in the corner of my eye. Her hearing was weirdly good, so I continued softly. “He's just looking for a reaction.”

“Another human with knives on the tongue,” she growled back, a ball of knives herself, murmuring at the edge of hearing.

I stared at the man with a neutral, bordering on bored, expression carefully practiced from years in the service industry. Any statements from a customer not phrased in the form of an order--or, at minimum, a question about the food--were meaningless.

Nikolo, sadly, took the bait. “Yeah, they don't seem half-bad because the Arxur are all-bad.” He all but grinned, his eyes closed to slits, holding his paws together in a mockingly servile way. “I get it, fractions can be tricky for new species like ourselves. Do you need help with the difference between a half and a whole?”

The human sneered, and fake-lunged at Nikolo. For all his bravado, the Yotul flinched back in panic, and the human smirked with satisfaction. “These are our allies?” the human asked, rhetorically. “They're terrified to even be around us. I'm sick of walking on eggshells around them,” he said, visibly pleased with how his word choice was affecting the Yotuls. “Or mincing words.”

“How about I strip the bark off of you?” Chiri growled, waving her claws, and trying to restrain her fury to something actionable.

The human threw his hands up in the air. “See the violence the Federation holds towards us?”

I snorted. “Do you want to see backbone out of them or not?”

The human recoiled, but saw the contradiction, and so he pivoted like a coward. Reactionaries always did. “The Arxur bailed us out. Where were the Yotul?”

Nikolo bristled. “We sent our whole fleet to help,” he said. “All zero ships of it. I basically had to hitchhike here.” I'd taken a horseback riding class once, briefly, in a summer between my middle school years, and I had no other framework for Nikolo’s casual head-toss than a beast of burden who was fully sick of being micromanaged by the idiot who was riding his ass.

The human scoffed, regardless. “Why bother allying ourselves with people too frail and cowardly to protect us?” He spat. “The Arxur are strong, and you're weak.”

I kept my expression neutral as I reframed the argument. “The United States doesn’t make a habit of seeking out strong allies. We aspire to be the strength that our allies look to.” My lip curled in disgust, against my best wishes. “You want the Arxur to protect us? Tying ourselves to any alien power for protection is madness.”

Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

“Then what are they for?” the guy said, glancing at the Yotuls. “At least with the Arxur, we don’t have to hide ourselves. The Arxur don’t judge us. I shouldn’t have to be ashamed of who and what I am. I shouldn’t have to be ashamed of my own culture.”

“Shame sounds like a you problem.” I looked towards Chiri and smiled fondly. “I hide nothing,” I said, placing a supportive hand on her shoulder.

The other human looked at Chiri with disgust. “Oh please. She’ll turn on you the moment you eat a cheeseburger in front of her.”

Chiri cackled like a stoned hyena.

“Hey, Chiri, there’s a major holiday coming up,” I said, trying not to grin too obviously. “Thanksgiving. It’s a big feast day. Plenty of dishes you can eat, but the centerpiece is typically the biggest roasted bird you can find. Does that sound like a fun experience for you, or…?”

Chiri grinned. “That sounds awesome! We doing it at the restaurant, or at your cousin’s place?”

The human stared at us, baffled, which, thankfully, kept him from noticing how the Yotuls were recoiling in sickened disgust. Unideal, but it kept the momentum on my side.

“Cousin’s place,” I said to Chiri, and I turned back to the angry fellow, locking my eyes with his. I smiled politely. “Skill issue,” I said.

“Ugh, whatever,” he said. He rolled his eyes and left, searching for easier prey.

Nikolo watched him leave. “The fuck was that guy’s deal?” he asked, dropping back to his more casual tone.

I shrugged. “Again, uncharitably, humans have had a really rough time of first contact.” I tousled Chiri’s fur and smiled, as did she. “I’m happy, on the whole, but not every human shares my enthusiasm. It’s gonna be rocky, settling in here, but it’ll be worth the effort in the long run, if you can tough it out.”

Nikolo nodded, slowly, mimicking my body language. “I might just,” he said. “It’s an interesting little frontier world you’ve got here. Just gotta get used to the weirdos.”

Another human saw my sign, sank to his knees, and wept. “The West has fallen,” he wailed.

“I’m still here, you goober,” I said, squinting. He looked slightly familiar… “Did you need something, or…?”

The man practically lunged for my hand, grasped it, and pleaded like his life was on the line. “I spent a month and a half on Venlil Prime! It was horrible! No meat, masks on at all times, and everyone judging us! The only thing that kept me going was the hope that, one day, God willing, I’d get to come home again and try some of the wild and innovative dishes at the Cropsey Carnival!” His eyes flicked over to the sign. “But the cultural infection’s spread here, too. It’s all gone! It’s all vegan, now! You had this impeccable dish of turbot in lamb tallow, with just the right amount of garlic…”

I recoiled, slightly. I was mostly sure I recognized this guy. He was a regular, which was a polite way of saying he was a rich asshole. More to the point, though, as Chef-Owner, I rarely left the kitchen, so for me to find him even a little familiar was unusual. I think he was in real estate? Did he know my dad, maybe? My brain wanted to say his name was Colin… “Buddy, I’m at a baseball game. I had to 86 a falafel dish because I couldn’t figure out how to keep them crispy in a chafing dish,” I said, pointing at the array of metal dishes perpetually steaming their stew-ish contents. “I’m not sauteing fish over a dinky little ethanol flame.” I gestured towards the two Yotuls, who’d been roped into multiple conversations with oddballs at this point. “Also, yeah, I’m just trying to be polite to our new guests. Little taste of Earth cuisine? All vegetables? It’s a fun creative restriction for me, like coloring inside the lines, or writing fanfic in someone else’s canon. If I start serving grilled flesh, they’re not gonna buy anything, even if I keep it off to the side.” I glanced over behind the fellow human. “Look, if you’re gonna die without a hot dog, the fuckin’ Nathan’s stand is like right there.”

“I don’t want Nathan’s meat, I want your meat,” the human moaned.

“Phrasing,” I said, trying not to laugh. “But yeah, the restaurant’s still standing. We’re opening again shortly. Come by sometime. But today, here and now, I’m trying to cook foods that our new friends and allies from the stars would enjoy. That’s what today’s all about, right?” I said, looking towards the baseball field. “Little showcase of our culture. The rest of it’s still there, we’re just showing our new friends the parts that they’ll like the most.”

The real estate investor whimpered like a kicked puppy. “Fine. What do you recommend? For a guy who hasn’t eaten meat in weeks?”

Rosi ducked even further behind her husband, eyeing Colin up like he was a cobra preparing to strike at her. I tried not to roll my eyes. “If you need meat, specifically, again, Nathan’s Hot Dogs are a timeless New York tradition.” The real estate guy snorted like an unhappy pig. “If you want something I’ve made, then I’ve got a mushroom wrap that I was going to slather in cheese, but I wasn’t sure if our new friends would be down for it, so--”

“I’ll try it,” said Rosi, staring me down, and I almost choked on my own spit. So did Nikolo, frankly. He did some kind of silent gesture with his tail that I couldn’t understand. Contextual guess: ‘Sweetie, are you fuckin’ okay, or…?’

My eyes widened, and I continued. “...so I made a plant-based sauce reminiscent of a fondue dip, is how I was going to finish that sentence. It’s not real cheese.”

“Even better,” Rosi said, daring me to deny her. I was perfectly happy to indulge her, but I had no idea what she was thinking.

“I applaud your boldness!” said Chiri, practically bouncing with excitement. “I think you may very well be the second alien, ever, to try such an earthling dish. I hope you’ll enjoy--”

“Shut up,” said Rosi. “I don’t want your commentary, Gojid. I want to see what this ‘not-meat’ earthling dish is like.” Aliens didn’t tend to have strong facial expressions, but Rosi’s tone, at least, was legible to me. Racism and suspicion, hatred and fear. Not too far from that earlier human, really.

I glanced at Chiri, but she mostly just looked hurt. I put a supportive hand on her shoulder, but short of chewing out our second or third customer of the day, there was nothing actionable in her countenance.

“One tropical curry wrap,” I said, looking to Nikolo, “and two alpine wraps?”

“Alpine?” asked Colin, I was pretty sure.

I shrugged. “It’s mushrooms, onions, and the closest I could get to the taste of emmental cheese with a splash of flamed-off cherry liqueur,” I said. I couldn’t get the texture perfect in time--real melted cheese was a bafflingly complex emulsion of fats and proteins that was far harder to replicate than a smooth cheese sauce--but the flavor was on point, at least. “Practically a toast to the late Secretary-General of the U.N. That old Swiss bastard got us all into this mess, so his ghost’s cuisine can get us out of it, God willing.”

Rosi’s head dipped slightly in taciturn acknowledgment. If the dish was good enough for the former leader of mankind, then surely it was good enough for… whatever her agenda seemed to be. Probably some variation on proving how terrible and predatory humans were. We’d only ruled out the human thirst for raw blood, after all. There were plenty more dishes we might all be secretly craving to turn her into.

I tried to fight off the urge to reminisce about different kangaroo meat dishes I’d been meaning to experiment with as I served the Yotuls. Two white sauces, funnily enough: my tropical wrap was thickened coconut cream dotted with flecks of spices, bits of bright yellow pineapple and mango, and a few bright green leaves of cilantro. The alpine wrap was dark brown mushrooms and caramelized onions, with a pale vegan cheese sauce, and just a touch of black pepper. I loaded them onto the thick warm flatbread, chewy like pizza dough or naan, with just a few spots of char left from the oven. Into foil, into a pair of cardboard trays, one for the human, and one for the Yotul couple.

“Let me know what you think,” I said, my face back to neutral.

Colin tore into his immediately and greedily, which gave the Yotuls pause as they watched him enjoy it. He was practically brought to tears. “Oh my God,” he moaned, his mouth still half-full. “I needed this. God. You’re sure this isn’t like beef broth or…”

“Mushrooms and onions,” I repeated. “Totally vegan today. You want meat, come by the restaurant once we’re open. Maybe I’ll do alternating days or something, I dunno yet. I need to staff back up first in any event.” I turned to Rosi and smiled. “You wouldn’t happen to know anyone looking for a job as a cook or a server, would you?”

Rosi wrinkled her nose at me in disgust, and took a bite of her wrap while maintaining aggressive eye contact. The way her eyes widened, and she stared at her food in shock… I savored a small amount of smug satisfaction. “Wait, why is this good?” she asked.

Why wouldn’t it be? “I mean, from a top-down perspective, it’s salty, fatty, just a touch tangy and sweet, and showcases a number of Earth’s aromatic vegetables…” I said.

Rosi glared at me. “I’m not stupid! If it’s supposed to be meat-like, or cheese-like, why doesn’t it taste disgusting? Like rotting hot carrion? Is this a trick?”

“Sweetie, you’re being a little rude right now…” Nikolo said, softly.

“No tricks today,” I said, shrugging. “Humans are omnivores. Most of us like eating plants. Besides, I had a great taste-tester.” I smiled at Chiri again. I hoped this wasn’t going to sour her mood for the day…

Rosi kept staring at me, suspiciously, but kept eating. Nikolo snuck in a bite of hers to try it, but aside from that, she finished the whole thing before she even left. As for Nikolo himself… “Whew! Love that kick,” he said, tearing into his tropical curry wrap. “Sweet and spicy. Didn’t realize you humans could cook like this!”

I bowed, politely. “Tell your friends.”

And tell them, he did. By the time the sun was high in the sky, the line stretched from home plate to first base, and by the time the game had finished, we were sold out of everything. Every scrap of bread, every spoonful of stew, and, best of all, every little business card I’d set out in English and in Yotulese to remind them to come back soon. Even our social media page was starting to do numbers. All part of our dastardly plan to get the word out once we reopened…