Halloween Bonus: Bloody Mary Family Dining
My name is Bilgob, I am a goblin of 13 years of age. I'm non-binary, never got that whole gender stuff. Both my parents were gourmet chefs so I ate well at home. They ran a restaurant called the "Gobble Stay" that only served goblins, rarely inviting outsiders. Eating good food was a necessity for my kind. As my father would always say, "quality can satiate the endless hunger better than quantity any day."
I satiated my hunger through comic books, videos on the internet, and other stuff. Turns out you can stretch the definition of "consumption" when it fits my subspecies' curse.
Normally I would go eat at my parent's restaurant, but I was with friends today, a very important get-together. I met my friends just down the street from the place we were going to eat at.
One of my friends was Tobias, a kobold with a penchant for building things and often breaking them. He certainly had a future in demolition.
My other friend was a bugbear girl named Bria who dreamed of becoming a writer. She had a penchant for singing soft melodies with birds and wearing fancy dresses.
"You sure we shouldn't be finding a way to get Bria to stay? Maybe if I sell him one of my designs..." Tobias started.
"I doubt he wants to be the subject of Sanctuary's first lawsuits, Toby." I said sarcastically. Even Bria's father, coward as he was, would know that Tobias' inventions were bad news.
However, our comments only gave Bria distres. "Guys, please don't go out of your way for me. My dad made a decision, and he never goes back on one of his decisions..."
Ever the social butterfly, she was never the shy type. No, she was down because her father was moving her to Annesville. Word from the Princess is that they found a portal above the town. I don't fully understand it, but the dragons might attack because of that. That's got Bria's dad running scared, and with her mom recently out of the picture, his say kind of goes.
"Damn, dragons! I'm not scared of them!" Toby pounded his chest confidently.
"They got all those big teeth, ya know, and fire breath." I told him.
"True, but the Princess can handle them! I've seen her kick a matriarch's butt a while back! Knocked her out! Do that to a dragon and they wouldn't stand a chance!"
"Yeah, Princess Anne could protect us..." Bria put her hand over her heart, an odd smile on her face. I knew how much the Princess meant to her. I still remember when her eyes lit up when she heard the Princess' story about finding her identity. It was enough to inspire her to live as her true self full time. Something we both support!
"Yeah! She'll show those dragons what's what!"
I didn't know if Anne could really protect us, but after seeing Bria smile at Toby's words, I started to believe in her, too! "Yeah!"
We approached a run down building that wasn't there a month ago. The sign was so worn down that you couldn't even read it. We've been calling it "Bloody Mary Family Dining." They say they had a location out in the great redwoods, but it mysteriously disappeared one day. Some say, if you stand in the place where the shop used to stand, you can still hear a one sided argument from the landlord about rent being raised and eviction notices being posted.
No one knows for sure where it had gone, but some people claim to see a run down food truck without any wheels suddenly appearing at the stroke of midnight in various locations around the planet.
Then, suddenly this building appeared in Sanctuary overnight. If Duchess Raina hadn't recognized it, we probably would have never gone in. This feels like something that would deliver you to an alternate dimension or something.
We parted the musky curtains to find tables strewn about. One of the tables cleared itself for us. We figured we were meant to sit at that one.
Taking our seats, some menus fell down from a holder in the ceiling, landing perfectly in front of each of us as if it were calculated. Some glasses spirited in front of us and started to mysteriously fill with water. I took a sip from it. It didn't have ice but it was still frigid cold.
We looked through our menus. "I'm tempted to get the omurice, but I've had it so many times already." I heard that eating the omurice too often will curse your body so your blood would be replaced with ketchup.
"I heard," began Tobias, "that the ketchup gets replaced with demon blood if you order it too much."
"Don't be silly." Bria stated. "They'd never get customers if that's true."
"How do you know we aren't being mystically drawn here?"
"That um..." She was frozen in thought. "Uh, well, we planned to be here so..."
"What if we were drawn to make those plans?"
Bria was starting to look really nervous so I stepped in. "Stop it, you're scaring her!"
"We're in a haunted restaurant, what were you expecting?"
"Well, you don't have to make it worse!" I turned to Bria. “Let’s order our food.”
To make your order in this restaurant, you need to dip the tip of a rubber knife in raspberry jam, "prick" your finger with it and touch the item on the menu you want. Basically, you're using the jam as a substitute for your own blood in this case. I heard they originally had you actually prick your finger, but Dr. Nial, concerned for patients with hemophilia, negotiated it down to this compromise. As soon as you do, you hear a disembodied voice saying "the contract has been sealed" and the menus burned up in green fire right in front of you.
I ordered the Bloody Double Cheeseburger (a burger with extra ketchup,) Bria got the Dismembered Finger Salad (salad with fish fingers on top,) and Tobias got the Random Gore Trapped in Intestines (hotdogs.) I shouted out "hold the tomatoes" when I made my order.
While we waited for our orders, we looked around at the other patrons. A bunch of ghosts had called up a bunch of food just to phase through it a bunch of times. One customer was making a custom order on a Ouija board. In the next room, a bunch of people were participating in the "light as a feather, stiff as a board" weight loss program.
"For a decrepit building, this place sure was getting a lot of visitors." Tobias said.
"I've thought about doing the weight loss program, to be honest..." Bria said.
"Why?" I asked. "I think you look perfect!"
Bria smiled at me, which made my heart flutter. Tobias mouthed the words "simp" in my general direction. I couldn't really deny it.
Eventually, a bunch of mirrors appeared in front of us, one for each of us. We said the word "Bloody Mary" three times with our eyes closed and when we opened them again, our food appeared in front of us. I sighed heavily. They forgot to take off the tomatoes.
After removing the tomato from my burger (which Bria promptly added to her salad,) we all dug in. I swear, they must make everything fresh here, because it tasted so goddamn good. But, the fact it was so good made me kind of nervous. "Where are the ingredients coming from?"
"What do you mean?" Asked Bria.
"These taste like they were made from fresh ingredients, not conjurated ones, but where would they be getting the meat?"
"They probably just found a way to conjurate it better..." Bria reasoned.
Tobias started to speak in a spooky voice while wagging his fingers in the air. "What if they are getting the ingredients from the locals?"
She looked uncomfortable. "What do you mean?"
"Have you heard of Circe?"
"She's an infamous serial killer and cannibal that goes around killing anthros for their meat. What if we are eating her handiwork right now?" He took a large bite from his hotdog and smiled deviously as he chewed.
She shook nervously. "...the town wouldn't allow something like that."
"Yeah, Tobias, stop being a dick!"
"Maybe the town leadership is behind it?" Tobias suggested. "We don't know exactly what the Princess eats.
Bria, who was so nervous until a second suddenly shouted, "You don't talk about Princess Anne that way!" Her voice rose so high that the entire restaurant turned to stare at her.
"Woah, I was only kidding!"
"The Princess is kind, and caring! We owe her so much! Don't spread lies about her!"
Bria sighed heavily, but just as she was finally going to let her guard down, someone approached a table.
We turned at the sound of the voice to be greeted by a bugbear ghost about double our age in appearance who was hovering her way over to us. Wait, a bugbear ghost?
Bria’s eyes winden. "Mom?!?"
"Oh my god, I had no idea you were in Sanctuary!"
"I had no idea you were a ghost!"
"I never thought I'd see you again!"
The two would have a tearful reunion right in front of us. It was a beautiful sight to see.
We wouldn't get to see it, but Bria brought her mother home and the family had reunited after a long time. I heard her father broke down crying at the sight of her. Her mother was loyal to the princess (because she let the ghosts live in Sanctuary) and talked her husband out of going forward with the move.
When I saw Bria again, she was back to her rosy self. I was so glad to see it!
The fact a girl reunited with the ghost of her mother at the restaurant only added to the establishment's mystique, and became another one of the place's legends. They say going there changes you forever, and for once, I see what they mean!
