Dungeons & Days Off (Kane)

[Ferris Macklin]

It was Ferris's day off, but he was at the school anyway. He didn't actually mind. Back during his line cook days he'd gone into work almost every day and the whole 'days off' thing left him feeling a little adrift sometimes. Two of the part timers had called in sick, so he'd gone in to help with the lunch rush, arriving at 10 for prep and staying for service. In honor of his filling-in status, he wore a t-shirt that said "If Anybody Asks, I'm Not Here" and didn't put on his chef's coat. And just for fun, he let himself be bossed around. His minions enjoyed that maybe a little too much, but he didn't care. Lunch that day was giant baked potatoes with toppings like vegetarian chilli or veggies and cheese, with a side dish of either fried tofu in sauce or mini meatballs. It was a new thing for the kids, meat as a side dish. But since there had been no attempts on his life (yet), Ferris decided they were also taking it pretty well.

While the others cleaned up lunch, he'd helped with some dinner prep, and had then taken his own belated meal into the staff room. He had a leftover baked potato with chilli and cheese, but he'd brought his own extra toppings in his duckie lunchbag. Namely, extra cheese and chunks of fried pork belly. And of course, sides like snow pea pods, carrot sticks, and sweet pickles. There might have been a small opaque container of illict Cheetos kept hidden in the lunch bag. There might not have been. It was hard to say. It was equally difficult to discern if the yellow metal water bottle had iced tea in it or flat Coke.

Sue him, it was his day off.

Ferris yawned without covering it. He had some stuff to get at the store before he went home. A handvac. Green onions. Jars, because canning season was coming up. Organic pectin, if there was any. Shoelaces, because whoever had written that the ones he had in his Cons now fit shoes of '10-12 eyelets' had totally been kidding. Oh, fresh ginger. And strawberries were coming in, he should check them.

But for now, he ought to concentrate on his potato, because the pork belly was making it awesome. Pork belly made everything awesome, really. The small amount of proto-bacon was inadvertently perfuming the staff lounge with the scent of fat. Ferris felt bad about that, but he'd handi-wipe the table afterward to make up for it.

He'd left nothing on the tables in the last three days. Would people get ramp pickles or not? Ponderances.

[Kane Woonren]

Kane had stepped down a bit in his roles in the cafeteria as of late, although until recently there really hadn't been anyone to pick up the slack, so he'd pulling double duty teaching cooking and helping to run the kitchen. With the new head in the kitchen, who more or less made Kane look like they'd pulled a homeless man off the street and gave him a spatula, he hadn't really needed his unofficial job title so much. He hadn't been the head of the kitchen, not really, but seeing as they hadn't had an actual head for a while, he'd and a couple of the others had been splitting the duties.

Today, he'd come in early and handled breakfast, which was the usual smattering of less-than difficult things, along with some of his own recipe for French Toast. After that, he'd had a class to teach. With this particular class, any day where the entire school didn't get burned down was a good day. If they didn't improve, instead of a final he might just hand out take out menus on the last day. It wasn't really that unusual though, most of his beginner courses were full of people that couldn't cook, but didn't want to do the "girly" things that came with a regular home-ec class.

After his classes, he had wandered the halls for a few minutes before finding his way to the staff room, a chicken sandwich wrapped in tinfoil in his hand. The giant of a man was wearing a white tee and tan pants, and had slipped into a pair of flip flops after class. He was rather uncomfortable as he was. He didn't like shoes a whole lot to begin with, never mind the fact that it was so expensive for him to get them in the first place, but he also had both his tail and his wings concealed inside his body. This was a rather uncomfortable feeling, and probably always would be. But, it was awkward to walk around the school with his tail out (seeing as they didn't exactly make pants that accommodated that, well, not ones that weren't onezies, anyway), and his wings spread or folded, both making it rather difficult for people to pass him in the hall.

He noticed the new head of the kitchen and swallowed a little bit, taking a seat on the couch on the far side of the room and unwrapping his sandwich. He felt awkward around people. New people, old people, people that had helped him so much in the past that he was now ashamed to let see him because he had undone most of their work.... He shook his head a little to get his thoughts out of the way before starting to munch on the cold sandwich.

[Ferris Macklin]

It was one thing to be told there was someone on staff who was over seven feet tall and another thing to constantly not see him. The other kitchen staff had been very complimentary about Mr. Kane Woonren, but Ferris had yet to meet him, or even see anyone who fit his description. Kane Woonren was quickly becoming his own version of the mythical yeti.

So when a giant of a man entered the staff lounge... it had to be him. Ferris kept eating, and noted that Mr. Woonren, if that was who he was, had chosen to sit as far as possible away. Possibly as well known as his stature was Mr. Woonren's bashfulness, for lack of a better word. Puzzling, considering his job, but as he well knew, liking to teach did not always mean liking people.

So, as he ate his potato, the question became thus: did he breach the other man's defenses and sally forth with a greeting and the thanks the man so greatly deserved, or did he respect the other's need for privacy?

Potato done, he packed up his containers and decided. Even shy people needed to be thanked. Maybe they could like, avoid eye contact and pretend it never happened. Standing and collecting his duckie bag, he stretched and yawned again, and felt a smile fall naturally onto his face.

Walking toward the couch, he stopped near it and turned his pleasant and hopefully unthreatening expression onto the man on the couch. "Hi, I'm Ferris. I work in the kitchens. I heard how much help you are and I just wanted to thank you."