etrayamemes | TDM 005

⏵ arrival ⏴
Arrival goes as anticipated. Characters awaken in a sterile hospital bed in a clean, white room to the hum of machines under the unnatural lighting common to well-kept institutions. Every bit was designed to be comforting and calming, even with the jarring undercurrent of this situation.

The first face they see is Aurora's: her smile appears to be warm, but it doesn't quite reach her eyes. She might offer a quick explanation, or leave characters to figure it out for themselves depending on their approach.

The door to the room swings open, revealing a hallway that stretches out ahead of them. There’s noise from outside and strong pumpkin spice scents coming from the lobby. Ah, muffins and tea. Grab one and head into the crisp, sunny fall morning ahead.

⏵ potluck ⏴
Cutthroat Iron Etrayan Bake-Off

As you step out of the arrival holding area into the main thoroughfare, the entire street has been turned into tents and chef stations to accommodate the activities of thirty people at once. There’s seats, trailers, and robots bustling about to make sure everyone is ready.

A couple of cheerful robots in aprons and colorful sweaters approach and redirect you as you step towards the cooking area. There’s gas ranges, ovens, grills, blast chillers, mixers, and set walk-ins and pantries with just about every ingredient you can imagine. There are cameramen (also robots) patrolling the area to capture all your best moments and to broadcast them directly to your fellow citizens’ devices.

Your instruction? “Make your signature dish. You have one hour, chef.”

It can’t just be straightforward, can it? The land itself is held together with pure chaotic energy. If you’re lucky, all goes as planned. If you aren’t… well…

Roll a Die

1	Your leg is now tied to another chef’s	2	Your meal is continually un-cooking itself.
3	All of your ingredients are pickled now	4	The longer you touch an ingredient, the bigger it gets.
5	Every time you lift your pot lid, a component changes.	6	The aromatics are glowing and flashing like LED lights.
7	Your knife has been replaced with a cheese grater.	8	The ingredients are now magnetically stuck together.
9	Your meal is becoming deep fried.	10	Kittens are multiplying out of the cupboard. *
11	All of your ingredients have become incredibly heavy.	12	Your cook pot moves burners whenever you turn around.
13	Eggs scream when you crack them	14	The kitchen has become incredibly slippery.
15	It’s soup now.	16	All utensils have been replaced with crustaceans. **
17	Your knife has a mind of its own. Watch out!	18	Your fridge catches fire.
19	Your pasta is trying to escape. Go get it.	20	Any ingredient not in the pot starts to float away.

* All kittens disappear at the end.
** These however, stay.

⏵ share a meal ⏴
As all the cooking concludes, you will be invited to plate your meal into one of many casserole dishes, regardless of what was made. A ladle will be tucked into the corner and placed on the table with a folded bit of cardstock declaring the chef’s name and the name of the dish. A helper camerabot will come around to each participant and ask for their thinking and their process.

Even if you got away without having to cook, even looking towards the table of dishes will spur a helper bot to start making you a plate with one of everything. The helperbot will insist that it is rude to not at least try what their peers have made.

In fact, if you are to fill out the score card for each person, you really must taste everything! The robots can’t try the food, so it’s up to you.

The cards look like so. The grading system is opaque. Is it meant to be numbers? Stars? Letter grades? Well, you’re the judge. You figure it out.

Chef: ___________ Dish:_____________ Judge:___________ Overall Rating:_______

Flavor
Presentation
Stackability
Wet
Originality
Rizz

⏵ tummy ache survivor ⏴
No matter how well your compatriots cooked or baked their dishes, there are… factors. You see that carrot? It’s really just condensed chaos in the shape of a carrot. No matter how powerful you are, these particular ingredients may not mesh with your being.

…And even if it is truly a carrot, do all the chefs know the proper cooking temperature of chicken? Even chickens are aliens to many.

(Optional) Roll a Die

1	Tummy Ache. Go lay in bed. Complaining alleviates symptoms.
2	That plate of food has energized you. You feel compelled to race or spar.
3	The food has reminded you of home. You must tell someone a detail of your childhood.
4	That food was so horrible that it simply must be washed out somehow. Spicy peppers? Booze? Gravel??? You’re going to over do it.
5	You have now discovered your new favorite dish. Make them teach it to you or you’ll lose sleep over it. This is all you want to eat for the next week.
6	The oddity of the ingredients has transferred to you. You start floating away.
7	The range of food and textures have inspired you. Acquire an annoying new hobby or habit.
8	You are now haunted by the digital souls of chickens.

⏵ NOTES ⏴

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⏵FULL NAVIGATION⏴

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ Even counting Merdian's bounty - won in blood, earned under Pope's banner and God's love the way anything worth having is earned - it's been a lifetime since Carver's seen this much food on display. He stares at the plate in front of him, suspicious and ravenous in equal measure. Maybe the world before the fires could have thrown such pageantry into the equation, but not after.

Here, no one guards their food. No one seems bothered by the prospect of waste. He scoffs at the scorecard, unwilling to entertain that charade unless forced, and torn between throwing his plate away entirely and - perhaps contradictorily - stabbing anyone who tries to take it from him.

Life's funny like that.

He considers the knives he stole from the kitchen, in the meantime. ]

You're staring, [ he observes, rather blandly. He noticed; he's been doing the same. Watching everything, and everyone. ]

[that he has, and armand's lips quirk faintly in a pleasant smile, as if that is the right response to being caught out.

his tablemate seems distrustful of this odd ceremony in a way armand has not yet seen from anyone else around. he's half tempted to brush into the man's mind, wonders if he'd encounter all the sharp edges of shrapnel or calm.] My apologies, I just could not help but notice you do not seen as keen for this feast as the others.

[ Carver’s jaw works. Two contradictory ideas war inside him: that he ought to eat his fill to save his strength for when things turn, or that the food’s been poisoned and he ought to throw it aside. Meridian had them on full rations for the first time in a long time, but they earned that right. They fought for it.

No one fought for this. It’s only pageantry and it nags at Carver’s soul that he can’t see the endgame. He gives the other man a narrow-eyed once-over, assessing. Calm and centered, at least on the outside. And he holds himself with a certain expectation, almost, unlike Carver’s brittle edged paranoia.

Interesting. Maybe. ]

It’s a trick, [ he says after a moment, when he remembers he ought to. ] Only question is what kind.

TDM 005

Share a meal (cw: cult shit, starvation)

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