Ravens of Eternity

111 Fish Cannoli

Miko pointed at an image of a fat, goofy-looking fish. It had a perfectly oval body, wide eyes, and hilariously stubby fins. The colorations on its scales were absolutely beautiful, however. They were a shimmering red with a purple streak along the body, and flecked with gold. Especially along the belly.

The Drogar cook grunted in approval at her choice, put away the pad, then went into the back of his food stand. When he came back, he had a short stack of fish fillets, all of which were perfectly round.

The cook rubbed some sort of oil on both sides of every fillet until they were coated, then set them under powerful heat lamps to cook slowly. As they did so, the smell of the fish cooking rose up and surrounded the air around them, and caused Eva and Miko’s mouths to water.

He then turned towards a number of other ingredients to prep the other parts of the dish. He grabbed a handful of soft green strips of some kind of tuber and threw them into a bowl with a bunch of lavender leaves, which had also been cut into thin strips.

With some deft hand-tosses, he mixed them in the bowl for a few seconds, just enough for them to bundle up a bit. Once he was happy with how well they were mixed, he scooped in a thick orange sauce flecked with tiny green orbs, then generously dusted it with a mess of spices.

The Drogar then eagerly dug into the bowl with his hands and mixed everything together until it was all perfectly blended.

With a quick tap of the controls, he switched the heat lamps off and swiveled them out of the way. He then laid down a bunch of the mixture in a line down the center of each fillet, and swiveled the heat lamps back in place, but didn’t turn it on.

It seemed their ambient heat was enough to soften up and slowly cook his mixture.

Then he turned towards a tub of semitransparent pickle-like things that floated around in a tank of bubbling, greenish water. He observed a number of the pickle-things for a few moments before he spotted a nice plump one and fished it out with some tongs.

.....

Eva thought she saw the pickle-thing wiggle when he grabbed it, which alarmed her slightly. The idea of food that moved wasn’t something that was high on her list of things to experience. It occurred to her that perhaps she had made the wrong choice in terms of food. But it was too late for second thoughts now.

I’m supposed to be more adventurous now, right?

When the cook cut into the pickle-thing, it burst open slightly, as though its skin barely contained whatever was inside. The Drogar quickly squeezed it out into a clear-walled steam fryer, where a cloud of clear frying oil swirled around at insanely high temperatures.

As the stringy transparent innards fell into the cloud of oil, they puffed up into something that looked light and airy and ridiculously crispy. He scooped them up with some tongs and set them aside.

When all of the innards were cooked, he crushed them up into flakes and crumbs, then layered them generously over the vegetable mixture.

Once every fillet had all the right ingredients, he rolled them up and coated them with a mix of some yellowish powder and crushed crispy pickle-thing guts. Once they were fully coated in the powder, he dunked them into the steam fryer one after the other.

Eva and Miko watched with rapt attention as the crust on the rolled fillets turned a light golden brown in the storm of oil. The Drogar cook pulled them all out after they spent no more than a dozen seconds inside.

He wrapped half of each of the rolled fillets in a large purple leaf, dusted them with a dark brown powder, then handed them over to the Justicars. For the two humans, he instead cut them in half before he wrapped, dusted, and handed them over.

The two of them thought the portion was too large for them. Plus, they didn’t really need to eat and all they wanted to do was taste it. So they had requested to share one instead, which the cook happily agreed to.

They moved off to the side and out of the way while they admired the cook’s handiwork. Though it was simple on the outside, it was incredibly complex on the inside. Neither of them could wait to taste it.

But first, they pulled their EyeCasts closer to them and made sure that they had great shots of the food itself. They both showed off the food at every angle. Miko even squeezed it a few times with very slight pressure, so the food would bulge out and sink back in.

Eva looked into her EyeCast with a twinkle in her eye.

“Here we go,” she said. “And before you ask – I can’t pronounce the name in Drogar, so I’m just gonna call it the Fish Cannoli.”

The two of them bit into the rolled fillets, which resulted in an absolutely satisfying CRUNCH. They struggled a bit to prevent the creamy veggie mix from spilling out, and had to take half-bites to keep it all contained.

Their eyes went wide as their mouths explored the Drogar food. They honestly weren’t sure what to expect. Worst-case scenario: the food was disgusting. Best-case scenario: they needed to eat even more.

“Holy shit,” said Miko.

Eva had to do a double-take on her – she wasn’t the type to curse. But she was right. Holy shit, indeed. She nudged her with an elbow.

“Tell the people at home,” said Eva.

“So this crispy outer part,” said Miko. “is half the fish. The other half is suuuuper soft. It is salty and a little briny, but because of the crust, not the fish. The fish is sweet and reminds me of taro. Or perhaps a similar sweet yam.”

When Miko took another bite, Eva took the moment to add her own thoughts.

“The creamy veggie mix inside is just crazy buttery,” she said. “The orange sauce, by the way, tastes nothing like oranges. It’s actually kinda neutral, almost like a light bean. Or like soy! Like a weird creamy soy with these pops of... I don’t even know. But it makes it all taste better for a second. One second umami.

“The green potato-like shred is kinda sour, but the purple leaves are sweet. All three are like this swirl of amazing, and whatever spices are in there accentuate that.”

Eva seemed impatient when she took another bite. Miko, of course, took that as her cue to fill in more of her observations.

“It is full of contradictions. The fish is crispy and melty. The filling is sweet and sour. It is hot outside and cold inside. Your tongue is supposed to dance around while eating it, I think. It is so good.”

“Yeah, you’re right. Even the crispy guts are a bit of a contradiction. I expected something like pork rinds or chitlins – but they’re not like that. I mean, they look like they’re crispy, but the moment they hit your tongue, they just melt away! It salts your tongue and kinda preps it for the rest of the bite.”

Miko turned towards the two Justicars who were also eating. They looked very pleased with their meals as well.

“Do they taste similarly for you two?” she asked.

“More or less,” replied Doreth. “There’s a hint of bitterness underneath all the ingredients, though. I don’t think either of you mentioned that at all.”

“The bitterness is rather light,” added Severas, “but most present in the Haveblot’s innards.”

“Haveblot?” asked Eva. “That’s the clear, worm-thing, right? With the stringy, uh, stuff?”

She paled a little when Severas nodded and confirmed they were indeed worm guts. Melt-in-your-mouth fried worm guts.

Eva shook her head and did her best not to imagine the cook squeezing the life out of the thing. Of its insides spilling out into the steam fryer. She even recalled that it had made a tiny squealing sound as it was squeezed.

It was tough. She did her very best not to turn green.

“It is rather strange that we cannot taste the bitter undertones,” said Miko.

She took another bite just to confirm, and rolled it around in her mouth a bit.

“In fairness,” said Doreth, “I don’t know what you mean by umami. So that makes us even.”

Eva rejoined the conversation, once she had recovered a bit from the worm guts revelation. She shook it off, like she would any blow to the face.

“Thanks by the way,” she said, “for buying the fish cannolis for us. I promise we’ll repay you, somehow. We just oughta figure out how to make money at some point. Can’t do anything without money.”

“And you want that knife,” added Miko.

“And you no doubt want some gadgets,” said Eva.

Miko’s eyes went wide, and nodded slowly. They both turned towards the two Justicars in search of answers.

“Well honestly,” said Severas. “No-one’s gonna hire a couple of humans, for any reason. Doesn’t really matter how good you are at what you do.”

“What, is that illegal or something?” asked Eva.

“Nothing like that. More like a lack of need combined with speciesism. There are plenty of perfectly fine Drogar out there, so why hire any humans? Much less any human prisoners.”

Eva sighed. Nothing was ever easy.

“Nothing at all? No circus acts or freak sideshows? Come see the crazy human-thing! Poke it with sticks! Only three Drogar coins per poke!”

“I don’t think you’d actually want to do that.”

“Depends on how well it pays, honestly.”

Severas looked off into the distance for a moment, then turned back when she recalled something.

“Well,” said Severas, “Alevos did mention having a friend in the Ferreshii Clan. Said he could find a use for you, given your, ah, aggressive skillset.”

“Ferreshii?” asked Doleth. “That’s the clan with ties to the Lady Imperator, right?”

“Sort of, yeah. They’re the Imperium’s foremost interspecies trade guild. So she values their input when it comes to matters of stellar trade. Especially when it regards humans.”

“Why, what’s their take?” asked Eva. “They pro-human or something?”

“Like all Drogar,” answered Severas, “they value profit. The Ferreshii have multiple lines of trade with some of the corporate members of the Hegemony. Those lines of trade are making everyone involved fat and happy.”

“Alright, so not so much pro-human, but pro-profit?”

“More or less. They’ve been making each other fat and happy for so long that you could say they were friends. Or, at the very least, they offer their human partners a great deal of respect.”

“You think they’ll offer the both of us the same?”

Both Justicars shook their heads.

“If you want them to respect you,” said Doreth, “then you’ll need to offer something truly great first.”

“I think,” replied Severas, “that no matter which Drogar you’re dealing with, you should automatically assume they want more from you than you realize. Mostly, the contents of your ledger. Just imagine them picking your pocket as you try to barter with them.”

“Should I count you two among those kinds of Drogar?” joked Eva.

“Of course not,” said Severas. “We’re bound by law not to exploit you.”