Nooni Yaki is a product of the Olarian people’s great migration. After their homeworld was rendered uninhabitable by an asteroid, these mysterious aliens built star ships and traveled to a neighboring planet which their god prepared for their arrival, bringing plants, animals, and all manner of objects along as divinely advised.

Now I, dear reader, am a skeptic and an atheist, but it’s impossible not to feel a certain awe considering everything their god told them came true.

Nooni yaki became a staple during this harrowing time. Meaning literally ‘water and whatever’, anything edible can be used in this hodgepodge stew. Two ingredients must be included to qualify as the traditional dish: Olarian metta, a full-flavored herb with remarkable anti-bacterial properties, and a few cups of milk from the goatlike herbivores native to the new planet.

Nooni Yaki remains a sacred dish on Olarian Beta today, and among the hardy few who break away from their isolationist world to travel the universe, remains a connection to their people, culture, and faith.

- the Interstellar Love of Cooking, Volume One

* * *

The pressure of many eyes was on me as I stood next to the door, my back against the wall as I fidgeted with the stunner Dove had made me carry and fought the urge to flee. I watched as people laughed, carrying bowls of stew and cups of steaming tea to sit in companionable clusters as they ate their one good meal of the week.

The depth of my fall from grace could be measured in the number of sideways glances I gathered, in the furtive warding gestures that followed when some met my eyes. Where before we’d been something like probationary community members, now it felt like I’d stumbled into a crowded small town bar and realized I was the only woman in the place, the target on my back clear for all to see.

No matter what Steve said, I’d sided with aliens against my own people and refused the help they’d been so eager to give. I’d made myself their enemy, and I wasn’t looking forward to lights out.

Dove wove her way through the crowd, her familiar form the most beautiful thing imaginable as she rejoined me with a tall mug of tea in one hand. I’d refused food or drink, saying that I’d rather survive on ration bars than eat anything made by people who worshipped my grandmother, but she needed the caffeine to stay up and keep watch.

“Let’s go,” she told me, and led the way out of the cafeteria and through empty ranks of beds. We walked toward the lone figure who stood next to our bunks, his arms wrapped around his slim body as he waited. It was the hollow-looking man, and as we drew closer I saw he was standing guard over our packs.

“I haven’t taken anything,” he said quickly. He ran a hand through his silver-streaked hair and gave me an apologetic smile. “I’m sorry for invading your privacy. His gang wanted to know what you were carrying, and making me do things is one of their punishments.”

He said it in a matter-of-fact way, like there was a whole list of punishments he knew so well he could rattle them off at a moment’s notice. The anger fizzled out of me, and all I felt was sadness as I examined the dark circles under his deep-set eyes and the sickly pallor that hung over his golden skin. He might not be much older than Dove, I realized as I took him in, though his hair and gauntness aged him.

I gazed at him, wondering. “Why do they punish you?”

He answered my question with one of his own. “You’re really Evelyn Rossi’s granddaughter? The false prophet?”

I nodded ruefully. “Met her for the first time a few weeks ago. Didn’t know about the prophet thing till we got here.” I repeated my question. “Why do they punish you?”

He swallowed, his adam’s apple bobbing in his thin throat, and gave me a wry smile. “They need to punish someone,” he told me. “And who better than a Repentant and a debtor?”

I frowned and tried to remember where I’d heard the term before. It sounded religious, maybe Catholic? I might just be thinking of Protestants. “It’s because you don’t follow One Family?” I guessed, and the stranger shrugged.

“Sort of,” he agreed. “Most of the crew follows the false prophet, but not all – there’s a Jewish couple and quite a few Christians and atheists who think she’s trouble. But calling the names has a way of getting attention, and since our last Muslim debtor escaped I’m the easiest one to go for. Plus I’ve got friends among the aliens, and they don’t like that.”

Repentant, calling the names, I repeated internally, determined to remember so I could ask Dove about it later. I grabbed my bags as I introduced myself. “You have nothing to apologize for,” I told him. “What’s your name?

“I have many names, but you can call me Amur today,” he answered evasively. “I’d better go, Steve’s people will be looking for me.”

“Those people said they’d save us, Amur, but you’re the one who did,” I told him. “Would you be willing to introduce me to your alien friends?”

He stepped closer to me, near enough that Dove – who’d been in the middle of checking her belongings – dropped what she’d been doing and stood with her chest puffed out at my side, hand at her weapon belt. I didn’t feel threatened, though, and I gave her a quelling look and took a step forward to show I wasn’t afraid.

The corner of Amur’s wide mouth lifted and he examined me quietly for a long moment, then exhaled deeply and nodded.

“Come,” he said simply, and then he was off, hurrying down the corridor without a glance behind.

Dove threw on her pack and followed me, her tea jouncing as we all but ran down the corridor. The non-humans lived at the far end, away from anything the humans might need like the cafeteria, showers, or rec room. I’d never gone this far into their area before, and I looked around curiously as we walked toward a group clustered around a large pot.

Aliens lined the lower bunks, some playing what looked like card games and others chatting or grooming each other. In the group that sat around the pot, there were two that looked like a cross between a stag beetle and a giant tortoise, one no taller than Alum but with four arms and a face like a chipmunk, and a broad, deep purple bipedal who almost looked human except for the golden mask he wore. The eyeholes were lower than they would be on a human and there were three of them, so I guessed the face underneath must be pretty different. They’d been sorting through piles of something laid out on a blanket, but they watched warily as we neared.

“Peace,” Amur murmured. “These ones wish to meet you, and I believe they intend no harm.” He didn’t bother with his combox, so I guessed most of the aliens must speak or at least understand English, which seemed to be the lingua franca of this part of Free Space.

The large purple alien looked at Dove and I. That impenetrable three-eyed gaze, coming as it did from behind a featureless mask, gave me a shivery thrill but I tried to meet it evenly.

“Hello, little brother,” he told Amur. “We heard these two were joining the angry ones?”

Amur shrugged. “Seemed like it, but now I don’t know. What does God say?”

“Not to bother him every time I have a question. I’m Seelah,” the alien said as he turned his unearthly stare on Dove and I. “Why do you wish to speak with us?”

I bowed my head. “We ask for shelter, unless it will put you in danger. We’ve got two days left till we arrive at Octavia’s Point, and I think we made some enemies. We have food to trade, in payment.”

Seelah gazed at me, all three of his bright lilac eyes fixated in a way that left me feeling pinned in place.

A deep, low vibration moved through me, the feeling of a passing car with the bass blaring or the rumble of a massive train, and then the sensation became audible as a droning hum burst out of his throat. The other aliens turned as one to watch as Seelah raised his arms high and began a slow, intricate dance that highlighted his inhuman physique. He was a crane stepping through the water, a cat leaping, a tentacled thing writhing as his fourteen fingers reached for the sky.

I watched, open-mouthed and tingling, so fascinated I lost all sense of time. He dropped to the floor at the end, looking up from a tangle of arms and legs. Everyone watched quietly till he took a shuddering gasp and untangled his limbs, then climbed to his feet.

“We’ll protect you. No need to pay, but you may contribute to our meal,” he answered solemnly. He nodded at a hulking gray alien who’d been watching Dove suspiciously ever since we showed up, his thick unibrow furrowed as he glared in her direction. “The angry ones don’t like us, but they’re too afraid of him to come near our bunks. We only run into trouble when we go out alone, but even Grue can’t be everywhere.”

“Thank you,” I said feelingly, the words too small to encompass the relief I felt. “I’m sorry for interrupting whatever you were working on,” I added.

Seelah gestured to the pot. “Dinner. We make our own once a week, just like the humans. We’ve got a hot pot so we don’t have to share the kitchen. Put your things down and sit. Sitting is comfortable for humans, yes?”

I smiled and agreed that yes, sitting would be nice. Dove and I set our packs aside and I turned to Amur, who’d watched our exchange with something that looked oddly like envy.

“Can you stay?” I asked, feeling that I owed it to him even though there was something about the man that made me uncomfortable, an unwarranted familiarity that I couldn’t quite put my finger on.

He wrinkled up his face and shrugged. “I’m doomed no matter what,” he answered. “I might as well have dinner first.”

The aliens had been sorting through a mishmash of roots and odds and ends of dried goods. I recognized a knob of tuba root, a handful of dry beans, and a curling brown stick that looked like cinnamon but who knew, so far from home? Dove and I sprawled next to our packs to dig out our supplies, and we soon had a substantial pile on the ground before us.

“What do you need? We have spices, salt, all sorts of dry goods… and ration bars,” I offered, laughing at the last. Mom had insisted I pack as many of the meal replacement bars as I could cram into my pack, but after Dove and I split one during the first transport we’d stuck to the vending machines rather than endure their strange nameless flavor and texture. We kept carrying them though, knowing they’d be welcome if we got desperate enough.

“They taste like dirt,” Dove warned when Amur picked up one of the bars. He dropped it in a hurry, but the multi-armed chipmunk looked interested and grabbed one to examine the package.

“Will the others understand me?” I asked, wondering if I needed to turn on my combox.

Seelah waved his head back and forth fluidly. “We know enough. Some can’t speak it, but they prefer not to bother with comboxes. We help each other. Tell me about these,” and he gestured at the packets of beans and seeds.

“These are the dried seeds and fruits of Earthen plants that are good for eating.” I spread them out and began to point. “Pinto, black, anasazi, navy. French lentils, mung dal, black lentils.”

I thought bitterly of the red lentils I’d contributed to the human meal. And worse, my cumin! What a waste. I sighed and kept going. “They’re high in protein, but the beans need to soak before cooking or it will take all night. The lentils cook fast though,” and I pulled those to one side. “These are grains. Rice, quinoa, millet, oats. They make a complete protein when paired with the beans.”

The chipmunk-like alien bobbed up and I realized they were halfway through a ration bar, their cheeks puffed out and face – if I read it correctly – blissful?

“This is amazing,” they said in a surprisingly deep voice around the mouthful of pasty bar. The syllables were chopped and rounded, but they were still understandable. “Tastes like Kithareen olo. Would you trade me some?”

Dove elbowed me and I jounced her back, both of us grinning. “Yes, you can have some.” I’d make a gift of the dreadful things happily enough, but I wouldn’t pass up the chance to see what kind of treasures the alien carried around. “What do you have to trade?”

“I’ll be right back!” they promised, and ran off with the half-eaten bar clutched in one of their many hands.

I turned to Seelah and the beetles, who were poking through the spices with apparent interest. Seelah held up a pouch he’d just been sniffing. “Jaya and Mina – these Lethis – want to know what this is and if they can trade for some. Apparently it smells like home.”

Dove peered at the package. “Cardamom,” she read, and rolled her eyes skyward, then gazed at me with an unreadable expression. “Rose, you’re the only person I’ve met who’d pack a spice cabinet for space.”

I ignored her, feeling that my kitchen cabinet diplomacy was proving its worth. “It’s a lovely spice,” I answered Seelah. “You break open the pods and grind the seeds. Incredible in rice pudding. Your home smells like this?” I asked the beetles, fascinated by the idea of a verdant beetle paradise that smelled like cardamom.

They clicked at Seelah, and though I listened carefully it was hard to imagine any sort of meaning behind the raspy sounds. “There is a grass that grows in the marshes,” Seelah translated. “It smells like this when it rains, which is often.”

I took the bag and poured half the pods into my pocket to keep, then set the rest in front of Jaya and Mina. “For you. I’d love to hear about your world, if Seelah will translate.”

“Of course,” Seelah answered before taking a moment to look around. I realized the other aliens had gathered closer around us. “For now, though, we’d better start cooking.” He reached into a pocket and dug out a baggie filled with a pinkish dried substance. “Tonight we make stew flavored with Olarian metta. Which of your foods would taste good with it?”

I took the baggie, cracked it open, and sniffed. Hesitantly at first, then deeply as I marveled at the strange rich odor.

It smelled like no food on Earth, and each time I breathed in different scents clamored for attention. It was almost like damp clay, or perhaps coffee, or was it mint and thyme? I passed it to Dove, who sniffed warily, then made a pleased sound and said it smelled like pizza. It definitely didn’t smell like pizza, but it did smell good and that was all that mattered.

I selected the bag of French lentils and some jasmine rice, then with a feeling of uncertainty also grabbed dried apricots and allspice. I pushed the packages toward Seelah, then reconsidered and pulled back the apricots to open the package and pull several out.

“These might be good if you chop them up small. They’re a dried fruit, sweet and sticky. Anyone?” I held out a handful, and Seelah and the beetles each took one as well as Amur and a few other bystanders who’d inched their way closer. The chipmunk suddenly rejoined the group as well, a bag over their shoulder.

“That will taste wonderful,” Seelah said in their rumbly voice, gathering up the ingredients I’d shared. “Nooni yakki should taste different every time.”

They bent to their work and one of the shadow-like aliens hurried over to help. We quickly became involved in an endless round of bartering and questions as the rest of the aliens gathered around. Dove sat with her back to mine so she could keep an eye on the human end of the corridor, and Amur huddled nearby and cheerfully split bites of fruits and nuts with the alien I’d been thinking of as the chipmunk, though I finally learned she was called Nyrleen and was a female of the Ripali, a species who inhabited a moon in the Kithareen system and joined the Potluck centuries ago.

“Lucky for me, the humans don’t know I’m a servant of the devil,” she explained, her deep voice making mockery of the phrase. “There aren’t many of us, but you might see more along the way. Young ones usually travel before we become swimmers.”

That was baffling, but one of the toothy, shadow-like aliens interrupted to see if they could trade for some walnuts and kept me from asking questions.

By the time Seelah rose from the pot and hummed loudly to let everyone know that dinner was ready, my food stash had altered considerably. Many of my own bags now folded into more compact packages, half empty after sharing portions with the curious, but a stack of new delights more than made up for it. There was a bag of dried grains called, charmingly, mishmash which were native to the Ripalese moon and several dried fruits that tasted like carob. In return for the cardamom, Mina and Jaya gifted me a powdered substance called something like click brrrrrr click click that brewed into a tea that apparently made people very happy. Something about walnuts drove the shadowy people crazy, and I let them take my entire stash in exchange for a heavy bag of beans their people regularly traded to neighboring Exy colonies.

Then there were countless small bags of grains, spices, and seeds from others in the group in exchange for equally small portions of my own goods. Amur wrapped what I received in bits of paper torn from my notebook, adding neat notes about the contents so I’d know where they came from later. I surveyed the pile with pleasure, then gathered it up and tucked it back into my pack so I could accept a bowl of stew.

“Before we eat,” Seelah intoned, looking around at the loose circle of people, a motley variety of bowls and cups cradled in laps or paws or resting on the floor, “We remember.”

Silence fell. I felt momentarily awkward, then began to relax at the sound of soft breathing and movement around me, at the spicy smell of the stew rising up to my nose and the feel of the bowl, warm in my hands.

What was I supposed to remember? My mind drifted lazily, first wondering how my mom was doing and how the garden looked, then remembering the other people I’d spent time with before leaving home.

The farewell party with my coworkers at the pub next to the store, the worst D&D session ever as the group tried to say goodbye without making it too obvious that they thought I – just like Michael – would never return.

The phone call from Michael’s dad after one of the players snitched to him about my plans, begging me not to go and telling me it wouldn’t bring his son back.

And then, just like that, I was deep in the sadness of missing my friend, a place I tried to avoid because it was so hard to climb out of. Memories unfurled, and I let myself sink into them.

His thin teenage face, grinning and covered in dirt while my granddad yelled at us to shovel compost into the garden, not on each other.

Standing with his dad in the middle of the shed that we converted into my tiny house, the two of them arguing about whether I’d be better off with tile, carpet, or wood floors while I hollered uselessly at both of them that we were going to use a roll of old linoleum I’d found at a thrift store since it was what I could afford.

Frantic knocking on my door, and the bright excitement on his face as he grabbed and hugged me. We were going to space, he’d gotten jobs for both of us, and wouldn’t it be amazing?

Tears prickled in my eyes and I took a sharp breath, wishing in that moment, more than anything, that I’d said yes.

I opened my eyes. Everyone sat quietly, many with heads lowered or eyes closed. Seelah, though, gazed fixedly at me through their mask. He nodded once, slowly, then made a humming sound to bring the others out of their reverie.

As the others opened their eyes, Seelah spoke. “I remember the sweet smell of Olarian Beta’s vast high plains, and the way Olarian Prime looks in the morning sky, close enough almost to touch but forever forbidden. Tonight we eat nooni yakki in its memory.” He lifted his bowl, took a sip of the broth, and lowered it again. “Rose, what do you remember?”

I froze, because even if I’d figured this was some sort of ritual I hadn’t expected to be put on the spot so quickly. Before I could overthink it, I said what was on my mind. “I remember my friend Michael, who traveled to space and never returned. I eat nooni yakki for him, and wish he was here to meet you.”

I took a deep sip of the broth and was surprised at the rich and tangy flavor. It was a creamy pale brown and had the earthy richness of the metta herb mixed with something tangy. A hint of allspice and apricot sweetened it, and it brought a smile to my lips despite the sadness that weighed heavy on my chest.

Realizing I’d missed a step, I turned to Amur and saw that he’d been watching me. He gave another of his small, wry smiles as our eyes met. And all at once, I knew where the uneasy familiarity came from – his wide mobile mouth that always seemed turned up at one side, as though he very much wanted to laugh but had lost the trick of it long ago. He looked different in all the other ways, but that half-smile?

It was so like Michael’s constant smirk that I couldn’t believe it had taken me this long to see it. Except my friend hadn’t been afraid of letting his become a full-on grin or a rolling boom of laughter, and his eyes had been full of joy where this stranger’s were… kind, calm, but also terribly sad.

I swallowed in a throat gone thick and smiled weakly at him, aware that the silence was growing awkward. “Sorry,” I muttered, “I missed a step. Amur, what do you remember?”

Everyone turned their attention to Amur. He glanced over the assembled aliens but when he spoke, his eyes returned to me. “I remember trees that would make this ship seem small, trees so tall and wide they were like a whole world to the creatures that lived in them. I eat Nooni Yakki for sequoia sempervirens, for the beetles and squirrels and birds that I hope still live in their misty branches. Nyrleen, what do you remember?”

It circled the room, and by the time everyone had spoken my bowl was half empty and I had to blow my nose because the things people said made me weepy. We dug into our stew with more attention after that, and there was enough for everyone to have a small second bowl if they wanted.

Amur finished both of his quickly, then became noticeably twitchy until I turned to ask if he was okay.

“Sorry,” he muttered. “They’re leaving the cafeteria, I’d better go. They'll be looking for me.”

I nodded, then turned to dig in my pack. I pulled out five chocolates and wrapped them in a piece of paper, then pushed them across the floor in his direction. “I’d rather you eat these yourself, because my mom made them and they’re special. But maybe they’ll work as a bribe?”

The corners of Amur’s lips twitched as he reached for the package. “I’d rather eat them too, but it might work. Thank you.”

“Thanks for having such good timing.” I paused, knowing it might be rude but feeling I had to know. “Why are you here?”

“Revenge,” he answered shortly, surprising me utterly since that was the last thing I’d expected to hear from a debtor. “What about you?”

“I think you could call it a family feud,” I said thoughtfully. “Well, I also came for the food.”

Amur gave me that heart-breaking half-smile again, gave Seelah a farewell nod, and hurried away down the corridor where people were climbing into their bunks and settling down in groups. I watched him go with an uncomfortable mix of sadness and relief, and hoped the chocolates worked.