New York Carnival

Memory Transcription Subject: Rosi, Yotul Housewife

Date [standardized human time]: November 20, 2136

I spent the twenty minutes that remained before service seated at the bar, trying to familiarize myself with the menu. It was longer than I expected, given the scarcity of cooks in the kitchen, but I supposed that that was the advantage of pre-prepping ingredients. Still, the dishes all sounded surprisingly good. The wraps from the baseball game were still there, forming something of a baseline--no matter what, you could always order a nice chewy flatbread with stuff inside--but now they were joined by larger and smaller dishes, with prices to match. At the high end, there was some elaborate spread of roasted wild mushrooms and vegetables, spiced beans, and wilted greens over a variety of breads, and at the very low end, you could get a roasted 'sweet potato' with a drizzle of fragrant oil and spiced syrup for pocket change. A cup of soup wasn't a bad choice, either, for the worker on a budget. It even came with complimentary bread! Bread was a main course for my people, and humans were just giving it away? Even in Nikolo's home country, it was the other way around. You paid for bread, and got a little something warm to accompany it. But no, on Earth, even the salads came with free bread!

"Fattening us up before they eat us," I muttered. Chiri snorted, and continued getting her bottles and fruits where she wanted them. "No, I'm serious!" I continued, unabated. "What even is this? For a little extra, you can order soup in a bread bowl? What?"

Chiri smiled. Regardless of her predatory predilections, she was a Gojid, with a proper herbivore's flat teeth, so it bothered me less when she smiled than when humans flaunted their little fangs at me. With Chiri, it was like she was showing off that, underneath it all, she was still one of us. "Yeah, it's a big round loaf of bread, with the middle torn out and replaced with soup. It's nice. Fluffy in the middle, but they keep the crust dense and chewy so the soup doesn't leak."

"Oh, great, humans even disembowel their baked goods," I groused, and Chiri chuckled again. "Still, that's like… really decadent--straight-up aristocratic stuff!--and it's not even that expensive? How?!"

Chiri fussed awkwardly with a small knife and an orange, trying her best not to resort to her claws. "I dunno what to tell ya," she said without looking up. "David seems to think that you can't get to ten billion humans on meat alone. Sapient predators would eat through the entire ecosystem and then die off. So instead, they got really good at growing beans and high-protein grains instead." Chiri grimaced in annoyance and, in a fit of pique, crushed the fruit between her paws, squirting the juice into a glass. I flinched at the sudden show of strength from her. She just grinned excitedly. "The upside is, even their vegetarian cuisine's got a surprising surplus of aminos for muscle growth! I feel like I'm getting a soldier's workout, just eating David's cooking and hauling kegs up from the basement."

I grumbled. "Fattening us up and/or corrupting us," I amended. Still, between all the hearty soups, pleasantly un-grilled salads, and filling sandwiches, all beautifully described in detail for a foreign audience, I noticed one significant omission from the menu. "Where's the meat section?"

Chiri froze. "Oh! Um. That was a localization setting. We just omitted it from the non-human versions of the menu. David was going back and forth about sticking it in the back or something, but I told him it was better to just hide it." She shook her head. "Obviously, any of the Federation omnivores like myself would die from eating meat, thanks to that stupid allergy the Kolshians gave us, but uhh… David seems to think small amounts of well-cooked meat are perfectly safe for herbivores? But we're a long way away from any Yotuls being willing to try a bite."

I snorted. "Yeah, obviously no self-respecting Yotul would order a meat dish!" I scoffed. "But surely I, at least, need to know what dishes we serve here so I can bring them out to humans."

Chiri's eyes went wide. "Oh! Yeah, that's a really good point! Hang on, lemme…" She threw her mangled fruit carcass away, rinsed her hands off in the sink, and started fussing with her holopad.

"That's not a Federation model," I pointed out.

"This one's local. Uncensored." Chiri spoke in a monotone, not looking up. "Dropped my old one somewhere back on my homeworld while I was fleeing for my life."

I turned a bit green in embarrassment. "Right. Sorry."

"As they say in New York: it is what it is," she muttered. "Alright, there. Bumped your access credentials up a notch. Enjoy the horrors beyond Yotul comprehension. Lemme know if you need an explanation. Or a hug."

I snorted derisively. "I'll handle it just fine, thanks," I said, but I knew for a gods-damned fact I was probably bluffing…

…but somehow I wasn't? I thumbed through the forbidden dishes, practically searching for the horror stories, and I barely found anything! Grilled slice of ungulate shoulder, side of greens, side of starchy tubers. What? That was… that was two-thirds normal! A secret wrap with, again, grilled ungulate shoulder flesh chunks… in a spiced sauce, dressed with vegetables and pickles. Pickles! Another delectable bread wrap filled with grilled bird flesh… smothered in a mellow herbal sauce, a spicy vinegar sauce, and plenty of vegetables? A local style of bread roll with real cheese, bits of smoked fish flesh, and… capers, onions, and tomatoes? That was literally just the thing David was cooking in that weird fish oven! …That was literally just the thing David made for me last night using flipping bean spread and beets!

"Why are these all super normal, except for one or two monstrous ingredients?" I asked, baffled. "Where's the, like… live puppies or whatever?"

Chiri shrugged helplessly. "I don't know how many different ways we gotta tell you this, but humans are omnivores. A lot of their diet is just, like… grains and stuff. They can eat normal Federation food for a while with no downsides. Most of them seem to really like fruit, frankly?" She picked up another orange and waved it at me. "That's why they keep putting it in their booze, which, again, they are also quite fond of. Predators aren't supposed to be fans of any of those things." She slid the glass of juice over towards me. "Here. Orange juice. Try this, and imagine it with a couple ounces of 40% grain alcohol. They call it a screwdriver. Or, if you add a little drizzle of red syrup and some similarly-strong spirits of fermented cactus juice instead, it's called a tequila sunrise. It makes a pretty red to yellow gradient, you see, just like a Terran sunrise. It's beautiful. Just imagine it!"

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"Just imagining, this morning, are we?" I asked, eyeing up the fresh, pulpy fluid. I threw it back. Not too sour, not too sweet. It was refreshing!

Chiri snorted. "No drinking this early. You're on the clock today." There was a slight jingle behind me. I turned around, and noticed that a small group of construction workers, two humans and two Yotuls, had come through the front door. Sylvie, the head server, was heading straight towards them. "And the clock starts now. Good luck!" The Gojid beamed at me proudly. After years of Federation education, I had a hard time not feeling a little proud of that.

Still, I hopped down and scurried over to a spot just behind and off to the side of Sylvie.

"I hope this translates," the elderly woman said softly, "but please move from my five o'clock to my two or three. Humans lack your kind's peripheral vision."

I blushed slightly, embarrassed that I hadn't already thought of that. This was going to be tough, anticipating the needs of a species so different from my own. Though Chiri's sentiments kept throbbing in the back of my head, like an itch I couldn't quite scratch, telling me that humans weren't impossibly different. Just different.

I tried to make an effort to observe. The humans smiled at me like I was a well-groomed Hensa--patronizing and infantilizing--and the Yotuls looked relieved that they weren't alone anymore on a faraway planet. "Table for four?" one of the humans asked.

"Of course," said Sylvie. "Right this way."

She sat them at a table by one of the front windows, poured them glasses of water, and showed them how to access the digital menu. Then she left, and I followed, confused.

"We'll give them a few moments to read," said Sylvie. "And you look like you have questions."

I nodded slowly. "Alright, well, my parents would have been baffled by the lack of physical menus, but I'm a bit more acclimated to accommodating custo--guests across language barriers. Autotranslated digital menus just make sense. Why by the window, though? Do humans like the sight of rubble?"

Sylvie chuckled, and I felt a little proud of myself for eliciting a reaction from her. "No. We do not. But it's a nice way to make the restaurant seem more busy than it is. The neighborhood is a bit sparse right now, but if you're walking down the street, trying to pick a restaurant, what looks better? The place that's practically empty, or the place where everybody wants to be?"

I froze, contemplating, and let a wicked grin blossom on my face. "Shrewd, if slightly predatory."

Sylvie shrugged. "Business often is. But please avoid using the P word around guests. It can be seen as needlessly rude or argumentative."

I frowned. "Predator or Prey?"

"Either," said Sylvie, pursing her lips. "Try Person."

I grimaced, but allowed it for now. "So which drinks are complimentary on Earth?"

Sylvie rubbed her eyes. "Tap water is complimentary. Bottled or mineral water costs money, to say nothing of beer, wine, or cocktails. And that's often specific to America, and especially to New York City. Our municipal water is safe, clean, and plentiful. Other, more historically war-torn areas have developed a culture of not quite trusting tap water due to fears about damaged infrastructure. In those places, bottled water is preferred, and if you ask for tap water, you may as well be asking to drink from the toilet."

I nodded slowly. I was used to well water, so I was no stranger to water sources going bad. Still… "Didn't your infrastructure take a bad hit after the bombings?" I said, subtly gesturing out the window, towards the steadily-shrinking piles of rubble.

Sylvie nodded sagely, acknowledging my point. I felt a quick bubble of pride. "Though the city at large is currently struggling to rebuild its infrastructure, this establishment has circumvented those issues. This building abuts a small estuary, and we are equipped with a space age water purifier capable of removing salt and other environmental contaminants. Thus, we will continue this city's traditions of hospitality undeterred."

I nodded back. "Alright. I think I got it. What's next?"

Sylvie glanced back at the table and shook her head. "They're still deciding, by the look of things. Absent other customers, best not to bother them. Any other questions?"

I took a deep breath, steeling myself. "What's your deal?" I said, asking the obvious question.

Sylvie chuckled. "I am an old veteran of the service industry," she said. "I was Maître d'hôtel, Master of the House, at a far more prestigious restaurant than this one. David's mentor's mentor's establishment."

I looked around in a bout of flustered shock. "He can afford you?"

Sylvie chuckled, and shook her head. "No. He cannot. Favors were thrown about and called in. There was a preponderance of begging, and a great gnashing of frustrated teeth. But I mostly accepted because retirement bored me…" The older woman smiled at me fondly, and indulged herself in a chaste and dignified pat on my shoulder. "...and besides, what manner of being would refuse a request that involved limited hours, a modest paycheck, and the opportunity to spend time with real-life aliens?"

I laughed openly. "No, no, I get it. I get that. My people are new to this, too. First generation to grow up with it."

Sylvie nodded warmly. "My grandchildren will have a wonderful time of it, if we survive." The front door jingled again behind us. "Do you want to try to seat the next table yourself?"

I nodded eagerly. "Sure!" I scurried over to the next party. One human, alone. Female… I thought? I wasn't one-hundred percent sure. Older than me, but far younger than Sylvie. Maybe David's age? Ish? Her hair was dark and straight, but cut short like a soldier's or an Exterminator's. And based on what I'd seen of human diplomats and statesmen on the news, she was wearing something close to men's formalwear, albeit less flowy, more tightly cut. I didn't know what to make of that.

I trotted over towards her to seat her, but she'd already seated herself at a table for four by the wall with scratches on it. "Oh, sorry, I think you're supposed to wait to be seated?" I said, awkwardly.

"This is my table," said the woman. She ran a tanned fingertip over the grooves clawed into it, presumably by another species entirely. "It's marked."

Okay. Weird, but I could roll with it. I poured her some water, and tried to show her how to access the menu.

"No need," she said. "I'll have a tequila sunrise and the pancit palabok."

Okay, my memory was very good, thankfully, so I remembered Chiri mentioning a tequila sunrise earlier. But I'd seen the whole menu, even the forbidden parts… "I'm sorry," I said, pulling up my holopad awkwardly and thumbing through the menu. "I don't think we serve… sorry, what was it again?"

"Pancit Palabok," the human woman in a suit repeated. "It's an old regional noodle dish from my homeland. The chef promised me he could make it better than my grandmother. I'm here to catch up with him, and to call his bet."