How or when they receive order of what meal the patron wants, the person who hired them all likes to play a fun mystery game of slipping notes into each of their lockers or giving them a cryptic email with idioms and metaphors, to describe the recipe to them. That, or she'll give a title of the dish and the chefs have to guess what she wants as she giggles in the shadows, it makes a lot of them react with simply a groan as they read her letters or emails.

"A liver, and a heart. It was probably on purpose."

"I'll cook those with same fava beans later, let me get a tray." The lady replied.

She put the two organs in a separate tray after cutting the red strings connecting the lumpier red organ from the torso, and then went to look for a knife. The tall man took a really big looking saw and started to cut the torso vertically down the middle through the chest. this is where it was quickly realized that not all of the blood was drained from the body.

Noemie didn't say anything even when looking surprised at the scene, she came back with a smaller, curved and thin knife, and waited for him to cut it right down the middle with his strength before taking one half. He sighed in annoyance.

"Well, I guess, they might like it juicy." She said, like she was trying to comfort him.

Her coworker just let out this odd sounding, forced or unsure laugh.

"They'll like anything as long as they know it was human." He said in this hushed-like tone; it was hard to tell. They all spoke quietly and gently, or not at all, like they were afraid of what could be heard outside the kitchen walls. Their boss was, how do you say, unpredictable.

It was hard to tell what they were doing, cutting up the parts in ways for which I didn't know the why for, putting some strange looking but good smelling stuff on them that was hard to keep up with since they didn't explain it. If it weren't for the ribs they cut up, I'd have forgotten what they were making, but the sun-kissed man over at his station, it was easy to tell what he was making, his station always managed to overpower the smell of iron with something sweet. Like honeysuckles that are rare to find.

There was a bowl with what looked like the usual flour and other powders for baking bread, but then he adds other things like butter, and then a bottle of something that smelled like vanilla, then sugar, which was the easiest powder to name. He mixed them all up using this loud machine that spun this skeleton hand looking thing inside the bowl, he stopped to then add some eggs, milk, and then the blood. It honestly looked far cleaner than whatever was happening at the meat station. Though everything did smell gross at first, like a raw goat's eye or water mixed with expired milk, but then everything started to smell good again after a bit. When the chefs finished, Noemie called for Alonzo, it seemed like it was safe and clean enough for him to come back in again.

Now it was his turn. Noemie and Charles pulled their trays of what was once a human's chest, to a tray of ribs, the skin was cooked, and smoke was coming off of it, but even with how delicious they looked, Noemie was waving her hand in front of her face with a disturbed look. The heart and liver were now singed and lost their red and pink, and the man who was taking care of the blood was still only paying attention to his own craft.

The soft looking boy took some plates, again, this time much larger than the ones he took out earlier, and started to take the ribs and set them up into something more fancy looking then when they were on the tray. Whoever's body that torso belonged to, it has been turned from ugly pieces of a corpse to a delicious platter of ribs, the liver was cooked with fava beans and served on a separate plate, the heart was turned from red to a shiny brown with lines of black and shredded into pieces then mixed with other shredded pieces of some lettuce or cabbage, looking like some sort of salad with meat. It looked like some sort of small feast for a family.

The man who was mixing the blood into his bowl of sweet-smelling stuff finally finished, taking the round pan out of the oven, he carefully flipped it out onto a plate to reveal a pretty normal looking cake, no sign of any human fluids used in it whatsoever. It was a dessert that was clearly going to be served last, as Alonzo and Charles worked together to move the big platter of human ribs onto a tray, and then onto a cart. The salad bowl with the chopped-up heart and the plate with the liver were put on a different tray.

The door that Alonzo went through, this door with a very nice design, not like the one that led to the locker room, a new face came through it, dressed in a corset vest and bow tie, black outfit with a tint of red. It wasn't a very memorable face, and they didn't say much either, they were silent and stone-faced, didn't say anything to the chefs, just took the liver and the heart salad and left through the doors. Two more people that looked just like them came in, one had a bandage on their face and looked kind of scared, that'll be explained later. The two other waiters took the cart with the human rib platter and pushed it through the fancy door.

After a few minutes, the three waiters rushed back into the kitchen, sweats of fear on their faces as they either collapsed to the floor or leaned on the table, panting and heaving heavily like they saw ghosts.

Chapter 2: Poor Customer Service Workers

Pale, sweaty, and with the looks saying that they definitely didn't want to go back out again.

These types of faces didn't happen every night, they knew they had to go back out again and were numb to it, but I suppose sometimes the patrons each night can be a bit aggressive, or impatient. From simply observing them, it seemed like the waiters were pretty strong looking people, save for the one with a bandage on their face, looking half swollen or strained, they're used to this.

Looking through the window of the fancy door when no one else was, the one customer that night looked like an average man, he sat at the table and laughed at the amount of delicious food in front of him like he was a king. Too many different people came by to bother with recognizing them, just a pretty normal reaction that was common among the patrons of this secret restaurant, laughing like royalty at the food made from human flesh. However, one feature I will point out, he looked out of it his eyes sunken in and the smile just a little too curved up. Insane?

The man grabbed one of the ribs from the platter and easily ripped the meat off the bone, the cooked skin that was left on could be heard crunching between his teeth, or perhaps that was just imagination from watching him eat. There were two waiters by the walls, unmoving and avoiding looking at the man who was ripping the meat off the rib bones easily, they looked scared. Sometimes the patrons can attack the waiters, there have been rare cases of naughty ones trying to break into the kitchen for more, something about the food affected them like a drug in a way. 

Professionally prepared human meat was rare. those films where they use human meat as ingredients, it's just that, using human meat as they would any other kind of meat. But here at this establishment, the owner wanted to make it obvious that the food was made from humans, that everything used, used to be alive, that the patrons were indeed eating their own kind. The owner found it beautiful in a sense, the dishes aren't as professional or as elegant as how an actual chef would cook meat, but the only thing that mattered to the patrons and the owner was the fantasy come to life.

The lady walked over to the waiter who was still shaking on the floor, an apologetic look on her face. 

"You can't hide here forever; they're going to need you eventually." She softly told them, hesitantly wondering whether to help ground them by putting a hand on their shoulder.

"I know!" The waiter whisper yelled to her.

"I know just- just give me a moment!"

They breathed slowly as they rose to their feet, shuddering. 

The others in the room didn't move, Charles had to help move both of them towards the door, he was firmer in getting them to move.

"Go before another one gets bitten."

The one with the bandage on their face gritted their teeth and made a clicking noise from their mouth. 

"Oh, like numbers of people will stop them from biting." Said the man who stood up from the floor.

He waved his hands around his face, before releasing a quiet cackle of laughter from deep within his throat. It looked like he was miming a laughter as he soon stopped making any sound, yet his mouth hung open in a tooth revealing grin, hands on his knees as he slumped his shoulders.

"I can't wait until this shift is over!" He screeched as he walked over to the door all glum, after his sudden crack of anger. 

He left through the door with a slouch, and the others followed with better postures, hiding their fear and discomfort. Alonzo handed one of them a pitcher of water before they all left, to serve to the man who was consuming faster than swallowing. Just a glimpse of him through the door and he gave off the impression of a starving madman even though he seemed to have plenty of meat on his arms. Gluttony was possessing him. What exactly was being put into the food I wonder, all the chefs wore gloves and made sure to touch it.

"They must be a new batch of workers." Noemie said pitifully, folding her hands in front of her. 

"They won't last." Charles said, wrapping an arm around her shoulder to pull her away from the door.

The man who was working on the cake didn't pay attention to any of this, his back turned the entire time. He was on the third bag of blood, whipping some more cream like stuff in a bowl, kind of like the stuff from before but thinner, pouring the blood in began to make it thicker, thanks to how gelatinous it became in the freezer. Unlike the cake liquid, this stuff didn't smell good at all, and the baker knew this, not bothering to do anything to hide the smell because he couldn't. He's tried several times before but there are no recipes with blood in frosting, all he could do was make sure it would hold its shape. 

He was a good baker during the daytime, mind you, he was very gifted in creating patisseries that the manager thought it would be funny to make it gorier. 

Noemie looked to the camera in the upper corner of the kitchen that would rotate every so often around the room, and looked down at the floor, leaving Charles' arm. She took off her cap and gently tossed onto the counter that she leaned against. Throwing her head back, she daydreamed at the ceiling as she crossed her arms.

"They should be alright this time." The soft looking man said, breaking the silence. 

The baker stopped whisking his mixture, not turning around but it was easy to tell that he was waiting for what funny reason the man must've had for his statement. 

Alonzo, the one who broke the silence, fiddled with his sauce and spice covered gloves, pulling at the tips of his fingers as he tried to make eye-contact with everyone, save for the baker.

"It's only one person tonight, and he's busy with a plate of ribs, a bowl of heart salad, and a liver dish." He shrugged his shoulders.

"He shouldn't be hungry anymore after that, and if he is, Roman is almost done with the dessert. No one will get hurt tonight." He was mostly telling himself this, searching for some ray of hope.

No one agreed with him or said anything really. It was a stuffy room. Charles walked around the kitchen island and threw his gloves in the trash can, pushing up his glasses and gave Alonzo a pitiful look, and so did Noemie. Although the lady was the newest recruit to the team of chefs, she wasn't as naive as Alonzo, having endless hope and faith that things will just be alright. Noemie has seen cruel things.

"Maybe, but even if no one is attacked tonight, the two dishwashers who didn't show up at all will never be seen again." Noemie said with remorse in her tone. 

"Not true." Charles retorted. 

She gave him a pained look before he smirked with a little evil glint, looking at her and nodding his head over to the freezer.

"We'll see their faces again tomorrow, in there!" He said, and then laughed lowly to himself. 

"Gavin!" A low voice but strong voice yelled. It was still quiet, but it held a lot of power, more strength than any of the other chefs' voices. 

The baker whose name was Roman apparently, had slammed his hands on his counter station after hearing Charles -or- Gavin's laughter at his own joke, letting the table shake beneath his strength and the noise ring out from the shaking, overpowering everything else. He turned around to sneer at the man with glasses, then his gaze shifted over to the lady who was clearly upset by his joke. 

"Learn to keep your mouth shut like the rest of us." He said, before going back to stirring and ignoring everything, beginning to put the stiff bloody cream he made into one of those triangular or upside-down cone bags, the ones with the metal tip.

"Elias." The lady said while looking at the Alonzo guy. She then hesitated with what she was going to say next, not making eye contact with him and pulling at the tips of her bloody and spice covered gloves. 

"Since there is only one customer tonight as you say, then maybe it's safe for you to go home now." 

Gavin whose surname must've been Charles, gave her this surprised and wide-eyed look, like she said something unordinary.

Noemie made a swallowing expression and continued. She turned to Charles. 

"His job is just to make the food presentable, so he's safe. If the patron wants more, which isn't likely since we would have known, he likely won't care about how the food looks and will just be desperate to eat." 

"You're just trying to spare him from what might happen to the waiters outside the door." Charles said to her, lightly shaking his head.

He stood up from his leaning position and gave a strong yet tired look to Alonzo. 

"It's not like he'll see it, it'll just be noise. You can't keep him naive forever." 

"But I can try to help him keep his sanity." Noemie quietly argued back. 

"It's a cruel world out there, he's gonna have to get used to this eventually, unless you have a way of helping him quit without dying?" 

The lady was then quiet after that, almost opening her mouth to speak but then closing it and looking away, regretful and filled with sorrow. Gavin just sighed and patted her shoulder, also looking away, remorseful.