Spaceships and Magic, What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

"Before the next rounds begin there will be a short intermission, so those of you in the stands feel free to grab some more snacks and use any of the facilities available!" Squadron Leader Belana announced. "We'll be back soon with the first match of the second round, which will be Vadton fighting off against Akash!" 

That was sure to be an exciting match. 

I remembered Vadton being the potbellied alien with the psychic abilities that were said to be able to overwhelm any opponent. If Akash had any countermeasures to deal with psychic powers then I hadn't seen them being employed so far. 

Equally, Vadton was supposedly fragile despite their colossal size and seemingly powerful build. If Akash was able to land a hit or two, he'd probably be able to close the fight out pretty quickly. It was just a matter of figuring out how to make those hits actually land. 

My stomach grumbling broke me out of my musing on how the fight between Akash and Vadton was going to go down, which in turn reminded me that there was actually a kitchen space in the Initiate rooms. 

"Hey Yr'Arl, I'm going to go make some food, do you want anything?" I asked, a smirk on my face. 

"Are you making more of that…" Yr'Arl shuddered, "Chilli?" 

I tried, and failed, to suppress a snort of laughter. On the one hand, I could totally go for some more chilli. The substitutes for Earth-based ingredients that I'd found worked a treat, and while it wasn't quite as good as something that I would have cooked up at home, it was a more than passable experience. 

On the other hand, I did still want to find something that both Yr'Arl and I could appreciate and share together, considering I had already discovered some of his cultural food that I liked. So, I was going to go down a pretty different route and pick out something that I knew cats back on Earth had a liking for. 

"No, not chilli, I promise you that I will never cook you something like that again," I said as I stood, heading over to the kitchen area. 

The setup was the exact same as the kitchen in the dorms, so I was fairly certain I could set it up to summon the ingredients that I needed. What ingredients were those? Some kind of fish substitute, and some kind of potato substitute. 

With BB's help I was able to find all of the ingredients that I needed, and while the fish looked like nothing I had ever seen on Earth, the meat was still white so I was pretty certain that it would still taste great after being dredged through some bread crumbs and cooked into fish fingers. Of course, what else do cats love the most other than fish?

Making the meal went just as smoothly as I had hoped, and before long Yr'Arl had come over with his nose twitching at the delicate scents that had begun to waft through the room. 

"What are you cooking this time, Jacob Lyre," He asked, taking a seat on a stool that he conjoured with his manna. 

"Back on Earth we would call these Fish Fingers," I replied, "Which is funny because fish don't actually have fingers, and if they did I doubt we would be eating them." 

I crouched down and looked into the oven, which in all honesty wasn't too different from ovens back on Earth. When it came to cooking things there was still nothing better than the simple application of heat from some kind of electrical element. The chunky chips I had made from the potatoes and the fish fingers themselves had all gone a nice golden brown colour, meaning they were probably done. 

I pushed BB down into our synchro mode so my corona shield would activate and then grabbed the metal dishes that the food had been cooking on with my bare hands. The heat didn't even tingle on my fingers. 

By this time we'd gathered the attention of the other aliens that were present, clearly, they had seen the viral holo-vid of Yr'Arl trying my chilli and was now ready and waiting to find out how the feline alien would respond to this element of human cooking. 

I piled half of the food onto Yr'Arl's plate and watched with bated breath as he took a bite out of the chicken. 

The alien chewed slowly at first, clearly expecting a wash of horrid spiciness, but before long he was enthusiastically taking huge bites out of the breaded fish. Clearly, this one had been much more of a success with Yr'Arl's palette. He looked like a cat, and it turned out he kind of ate the same food as a cat as well. 

"Looks like this meal has been a little bit more of a success than the last one, eh Yr'Arl?" I said, before biting into the crispy exterior of my own fish fingers. 

Yr'Arl nodded excitedly, "This meal is most fantastic, Jacob Lyre, and so I take back any negative things I said about your cooking in the past." 

To be honest, I couldn't remember if Yr'Arl had said anything negative about my cooking in the past, but it was still nice to hear the compliments. 

I picked up my plate and wandered back to the viewing area to sit down on the bean bags. The people who were out in the stands had already started to filter back into their viewing areas, so I was certain that Akash's next fight was soon to begin. 

"You want anything, Akash?" I asked, holding the plate out to him. 

"As tasty as your previous meal was, it would not do well to fight immediately on a full stomach," Akash replied. 

That made sense. He didn't want any food weighing him down while fighting against his next opponent. 

At the very least that meant he was taking his next enemy seriously. 

This next fight promised to be something special.