This choice: Actually, today’s the Dept. for Food Safety company cookout. • Go Back...Chapter #6But you're not going to the cookout. by: Unknown Your two halves are are carefully laid down in a tray full of ice. You feel the chill begin to seep into you. It makes you a little sleepy, but doesn't dull your amazingly boosted senses any.
Carl turns to the technicians. "You may go now."
The technicians nod their heads and leave through a door on the north side of the room. Carl pulls out a phone and speaks quietly into it.
"You can come in now." It's barely a whisper, but you can hear it loud and clear. A moment later, the south door of the room opens. Two women enter, dressed in business attire. The younger one is unfamiliar to you. You recognize the other woman, though.
She's the head of your department. "Thank you, Mr. Hazleton," she says, addressing Carl. "I trust your silence in this matter." Carl nods and turns to leave the room.
After the door clicks shut behind him, she addresses you.
"Inspector Anderson," she says, utterly unfazed by having to speak to a pair of inanimate salmon fillets. "I must apologize for the unusual treatment you've had to undergo today. But we happen to have an unusual mission for you."
"You see," she continues. "Today is the company cookout."
You feel panic rise up inside your fleshy pink body. COOKOUT? WHAT THE HELL? I'M AN INSPECTOR, NOT FOOD!
Well, actually...right now you ARE food. Oh, this is bad.
"No wait, I'm sorry," she says, her calm facade suddenly broken by a look of irritation. "I'm getting this the wrong way around....let me start again."
She pauses for a moment to collect her thoughts. You're not sure if it's her body language or just the ice, but you calm down.
"You see," she says. "I am Head of the Department of Food Safety. As such, I have the ability to have any kitchen in the city inspected. Even if it requires drastic means."
No kidding, you think. I just got friggin' filleted!
"But there's one kitchen no inspector has ever been able to infiltrate." Her face flushes slightly with...embarrassment? She falters briefly before continuing.
"It's ours. The Department of Food Safety Food Services kitchen."
Well, I'll be, you think, wryly, momentarily forgetting your current state.
"Jones, the head of Food Services, is an absolute tyrant when it comes to controlling what moves in and out of his kitchen. And he has an uncanny knack for rejecting our inspectors when we try to send one through one of his suppliers."
She pauses again, pursing her lips. "I suspect he possesses a TF detector."
That's not kosher, you think. They're illegal in private hands.
"So needless to say, we need to know what is going on in our kitchen. This department would not survive the revelation of an unsafe kitchen or illegal activity existing right under our noses. And this is where you come in. Watch." She holds up a small metal box with an antenna on it. "TF detector. Government issue."
She waves it over you. Nothing happens. Interesting.
"If we'd transformed you directly into salmon fillets, you would set off this alarm. But having been transformed into them indirectly, you are invisible to detection via the standard methods. Of course, it makes you more difficult to restore, but new restoration technology will let us restore you so long as we retrieve most of your body, regardless of what has happened to it, within the next 24 hours."
You don't find this nearly as comforting as it was apparently meant to be. The phrase "regardless of what happened to it" is problematic....
"Later this afternoon is the Department of Food Safety company cookout. Jones and all of the kitchen staff will be there. During that time, Agent Briggs here..." She gestures to the young woman next to her. "....will sneak you into the kitchen and substitute you for a pair of salmon fillets that we know are chilling there already."
"When you are removed for preparation, you will observe everything that you can. The salmon that you are replacing is destined for tomorrow's executive lunch, which I will be presiding over. When you are served, you will be gathered and restored so that you can make your report."
With that, she turns on her heels and left the room, leaving you to do the mental arithmetic. Twenty-four hours minus the time between now and the beginning of the executive lunch doesn't leave much room for error, especially if you're to be the main dish....
You are shaken out of your reverie by Agent Briggs. "Here, fishy fishy," she whispers, and picks you up. Her fingers are warm on your cold, inert flesh. You feel yourself being wrapped in paper and stuffed into some sort of container.
It seems that the cookout is about to start.
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