Recipe for the Apocalypse: I Cooked an S-Rank Monster

Chapter 3: You Cook or You Die

Morning came with no sleep, and Dash could still feel the ghost of warmth at his fingertips, even though he knew the buff had worn off three hours ago.

He knelt on the kitchen floor, scrubbing the Ashback Jackal's black blood off the tile with coarse salt and a wire brush. The monster's bones were already wrapped in burlap and hidden behind the waste bins at the back of The Rusty Skillet. The skillet was washed. The counter was wiped down. No trace left.

Except on his arm. The skin that had been blistering last night was smooth now. Too smooth. Like hot ash had never touched it. Dash pulled his sleeve down to his wrist and covered it.

He had just tossed the brush into the bucket when the kitchen door opened. Not a customer. Not Griggs.

Sergeant Voss walked in with two gray-uniformed officers behind him. Head of civilian sector security. Narrow face. Stiff jaw. His eyes swept the kitchen like he was inspecting a barracks.

"Dashiell Vreeland," Voss said. Not a question.

"Yes."

"You're CIV-7, Sector Twelve, The Rusty Skillet. Correct?"

"Correct."

Voss stepped deeper into the room. His boots squeaked on the freshly mopped tile. "Last night. Sector Seven breach. One Rank-C entity. Hunters secured the perimeter. But there's a report..." He stopped. Looked at Dash. "...that the entity was not found at the breach point. That it moved inside the structure."

Dash didn't blink. "I don't know anything about that."

"Griggs said there was blood in this kitchen."

"Rustmaw Rat," Dash said. "I filleted two last night for disposal. The blood's still in the waste bin. You can check."

Voss stared at him for a long moment. Then nodded at one of his officers, who walked over to the waste bin and peered inside. Came back. Shook his head slightly. Nothing in there but rat blood.

"And Griggs said you ate monster meat," Voss continued. His voice was flat. Not accusing. Testing.

Dash set down the brush. Straightened his back. "I didn't eat anything. I killed it because it charged me in my own kitchen. I was cornered. I had no other weapon." He raised his left hand, the old one, the one with the burn scar gleaming under the neon. "I'm CIV-7. I don't have access to weapons. All I had was the cleaver on the cutting board."

"And the meat?"

"I was going to dispose of it. Standard protocol. Burn it or toss it. I hadn't gotten to it yet because you showed up."

Voss stared at him. Five seconds. Ten. Then he exhaled through his nose.

"I have no proof you ate it," Voss said. "And I have no reason to detain a CIV-7 who defended himself in his own kitchen." He paused. "But." He held out his hand. "The cleaver. Evidence. I'm confiscating it until the investigation is closed."

Dash froze. "That's..."

"Evidence, Vreeland. You want to file a complaint, take it up with the Commander. But you're CIV-7. You know what that means."

Dash knew. It meant he had no rights. No voice. No reason he could give that would change a single thing. The cleaver belonged to his father. The last object left from the world before the sky tore open. But he couldn't say that. It wouldn't matter.

He walked to the rack. Took down the cleaver. Placed it in Voss's open palm.

"Next time," Voss said, sliding the cleaver into a pouch at his hip, "if there's a breach, you go to the underground shelter. You don't stand in your kitchen waiting for a monster. Don't play hero. You're not a Hunter."

"No," Dash said. "I'm a cook."

Voss snorted. Turned. Walked out. His two officers followed. The door clanged shut.

Dash stared at the empty rack where the cleaver used to hang. Ten years. Ten years that cleaver had been in his hands. In his father's hands before that. Now gone. Confiscated by a sergeant who probably didn't even know how to dice an onion.

He breathed in. Breathed out. Didn't cry. Couldn't.

Afternoon. The Rusty Skillet was closed. No customers after last night's alarm. Dash was drying dishes when the front door opened and Kael Mireaux walked in.

She didn't sit at a table. She sat at the counter, on the tall stool usually meant for solo diners, and watched Dash through loose strands of her short hair.

"I saw you last night," Kael said. No preamble. No small talk.

Dash kept drying dishes. "Saw what?"

"Through the window. During the breach. I hadn't reached formation yet." She leaned forward. "You cut that Jackal at the C3-C4 joint. Right between the vertebrae. Not a panic hack. Not a blind swing. That was a cut made by someone who has broken down ten thousand carcasses."

Dash set the dish down. Picked up another. "I'm a cook. Cutting meat is my job."

"That's not what I want to talk about." Kael lowered her voice. "Griggs has been talking. In the barracks. He said you ate the meat. And you're still alive. And your burn, the one that was blistering so badly last night I could smell it through the window, was gone this morning. Just gone."

Dash didn't answer. He kept drying a dish that was already dry.

"I want to know how," Kael said.

"There is no how." Dash put the dish on the rack. "I must have missed the venom gland. Maybe the Jackal was too young, its toxins hadn't fully developed. Maybe it was luck."

"Luck."

"Yeah."

Kael stared at him. For a long time. Then she shook her head slowly. "I don't believe you. But I won't push." She reached into her jacket pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper. Set it on the counter. "That's the Hunter patrol schedule for the next three days. Routes, times, sectors."

Dash looked at the paper. "What's this for?"

"If you want to find out whether it was luck," Kael said, "we need a second monster. A fresher one. One you cut yourself, cook yourself, and eat yourself." She stood up. "I can bring you one. But you have to cook in front of me. No more sneaking around the kitchen at two in the morning."

"I don't..."

"Think about it." Kael was already walking toward the door. She stopped at the threshold and turned back. "You're not a Hunter, Dash. I know that. But you have something no Hunter in Ironway has. And if you keep hiding it, someone will force it out of you. Griggs already talked. Today it was Voss. Tomorrow it might be Aldric. The day after that, someone worse." The door opened. "Think. Before someone else starts thinking for you."

The door closed. Dash was alone.

He stared at the paper on the counter. Didn't touch it. Didn't throw it away. Just stared.

Night. The kitchen was dark. Only the small blue glow of the stove's pilot light. Dash sat on the floor, his back against the cold oven. Kael's paper was folded in his chest pocket.

He stared at his left hand. The burn scar. The old one. Not from the Jackal. Not from last night. The one that had been there since before the Convergence. Since before his father died in a hospital bed in Tucson, the air thick with antiseptic, the heart monitor slowing down, slowing down, until it didn't.

Dash. His father's voice, three years ago. Hoarse. Weak. Food isn't about recipes, kid. It's about respecting the ingredient. You respect the ingredient, the ingredient respects you back.

Dash clenched his jaw. He pulled out Kael's paper and unfolded it. Patrol routes. Sectors. Times. In the corner, in Kael's handwriting: Tomorrow, 0600, south gate. Don't be late.

He folded the paper again. Slid it back into his pocket.

Then he stood. Grabbed the last trash bag. Carried it to the back door.

The alley behind The Rusty Skillet was narrow and dark. Smelled like rust and dust. Dash tossed the bag into the dumpster and turned to head back inside.

And stopped.

On an empty ammo crate at the far end of the alley sat an old man. Worn brown coat. A thermos in his hand. Coffee. Dash could smell it. The man was watching him. Calm. Like he had been waiting a long time.

"You the one who killed the Ashback Jackal last night?"

Dash froze. His hand was still on the door handle.

The man sipped his coffee. Swallowed. Smiled. A small, tired smile, but alive. "My name is Theo Brandt. Used to be a toxicology professor at the University of Arizona. Now..." He shrugged. "...now there's no university. No Arizona. Just this." He lifted the thermos. "And I've spent two years looking for someone stupid enough, or hungry enough, to cook a monster."

Dash didn't move. Didn't breathe.

Theo stood up. The ammo crate creaked under him. He opened his coat. Underneath, strapped to his chest like a vest, was a thick notebook. The cover was scuffed, the pages swollen with scribbles. Molecular diagrams. Organ sketches. Temperature charts. And on the first visible page, one sentence written large in red ink: VSP - VENOM-STRUCTURED PROTEIN.

"I have a theory," Theo said. His voice changed. No longer an old man drinking coffee in an alley. This was the voice of someone who had been talking to himself for two years with no one listening. "Monster toxins aren't ordinary chemical poisons. Not cyanide. Not arsenic. They're protein. Structured protein. And protein can be denatured." He stepped closer. "Heat. Time. Mechanical technique. Cutting, salting, rendering. That's not cooking, kid. That's taming. And somehow, you did it without knowing any of the theory."

Dash swallowed. "You know about last night?"

"I know about last night and the last three years. I know how many people died eating raw monster meat. I know how many died boiling it too fast. I know why they died." Theo looked straight at him. "And now I know why you didn't."

In the distance, Ironway's alarm sounded.

Not three bursts like last night. Not a small breach.

Five. Back to back. Long.

And beneath the siren, Commander Aldric's voice came over the speakers. For the first time, not flat.

"All units, this is not a drill. All Hunters, report to the southern perimeter. All of them."

Theo looked toward the sound of the alarm. Then back at Dash.

"My question," he said, "is whether you're ready to prove that theory. Or are you going to pretend last night never happened and let four thousand people in this fort slowly starve to death because no one dares to cook?"

Dash stared at the notebook strapped to Theo's chest. Stared at the alarm still wailing. Stared at his own hands. The left one, with the burn scar that would never fully fade.

He hadn't answered yet.

And at the southern perimeter, something much bigger than an Ashback Jackal was dragging itself along the wall.