Uncle Spikes Wants You (for barge chef)

[myironeyes]

[Public Video]

[For those who have not seen Marsh before - and he does keep to himself, sometimes - the sight of him and the steel spikes pounded bloodlessly through his eye sockets may be a bit of a shock.]

Esther Coleman has departed from the barge. Her cabin has reverted to standard.

She was not a kind young woman, but the world was not kind with her, and she - she had very little hope in her life. But she carried on.

[Brief though it is, it is a very sincere eulogy, one he feels a great deal of kinship for. He hopes the kitchen was a small solace to her, while she worked their - a place she could be respected purely for her performance, a place where she need not hide or pretend or be interrogated. But now he'll never know.]

We are now short six kitchen staff inmates, and although we appreciate our volunteer on-call wardens greatly, this cannot continue.

Wardens, if your inmates' files contain no poisoning or cannibalism, they are now candidates for kitchen work. Inmates, if you're getting bored of our current staples -

[Barge food isn't bad, but neither Marsh nor Ben are especially creative.]

- the position comes with considerable menu control.

If we don't get at least four new inmate staff, I will start drafting people.

Comments

[surfaceshine]

Your sales pitch needs work.

[myironeyes]

If enough of the kitchen crew gets knocked out by floods or comas, hot meals don't happen. We've had too many close calls lately as it is.

You eat, you should help cook.

[surfaceshine]

So what you're saying is if I don't eat, I don't have to cook?

[myironeyes]

Most of our non-eating population is undead. That would be unsanitary.

[surfaceshine]

[Well, Dean can't exactly argue with that logic.

Obligatory:]

Aren't there knives in kitchens? Among other things?

[myironeyes]

Yes.

[what is your objection to knives, dean, you seem like a guy who likes knives]

[surfaceshine]

[Dean loves knives, he thinks they're great.]

You realize I've already stabbed someone and set someone else on fire, and that was without approved access to anything actually weaponlike, right?

[myironeyes]

You don't get to keep them.

And I would advise against causing trouble in the kitchens.

[surfaceshine]

Why?

[myironeyes]

You wouldn't manage to accomplish anything. All three supervisors could stop you before you saw us move.

[He's not bragging. But he's not as uncomfortable with it as he used to be, either. Just - don't do it. Okay.]

[surfaceshine]

[The question wasn't argumentative - at least, not any more than Dean's present baseline - so much as investigative. Every now and again he remembers not to assume.

Which brings him to the dregs of his resistance, shaking his head.]

I can't cook for shit. [Anymore.]

[myironeyes]

Then we'll teach you.

[Lots of people can't, and they've all learned more since they started; it isn't as though they do fancy gourmet things. Except Riddick, sometimes, when he gets in the mood for it.]

[surfaceshine]

Until I go mad with power with both menu control and newly learned skills?

[myironeyes]

Sure.

[surfaceshine]

Oh, well in that case.

[This is not an agreement. This is rawboned sarcasm.]

[myironeyes]

You'd make a perfectly adequate culinary dictator.

[Also sarcasm. Not that you could ever, ever tell from his tone.]

[surfaceshine]

I doubt that.

[This is not sarcasm. He's pretty sure the only adequate thing he is, is a douchebag.

However, more than anything because so much of Dean is still that man that had been trying to run a camp with too few hands and too few supplies and too little sleep:] Fine. When?

[myironeyes]

Dinner shift starts at four.

[And it's now the one with zero staff, so.]

[surfaceshine]

Great, I have time for a nap.

Should be a blast.

[myironeyes]

Sleep well.