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Papa John's, Tuesday

"No, look," Raiden tried to reason with one of the TV-headed guys who were apparently running his pizza parlor today. "I don't have anything against Papa John's, except for the politics, and the flavor, and the...okay I guess I do have a lot against Papa John's, actually. But I can eat cheese bread and that fake garlic butter sauce all day long. Who couldn't? But this crust is...not it, and maybe we could make the sauce less sweet?"

The worker just looked right at him--he thought, the screen was pointed at him, anyway--and intoned, "Better ingredients, better pizza."

"I mean, that's true," Raiden had to agree, "but are we really sure these are those ingredients?"

"Better ingredients, better pizza."

"And while I'm at it, what did you do with the picnic tables for the squirrels, and the ingredients for the Reporter Specials?"

"Better ingredients, better pizza."

"I can't feed the squirrels a--a Doritos® Cool Ranch® Steak Papadia. I don't even know what a Papadia is. That's not a pizza." He would probably eat it, but gods only knew what it would do to a rodent. Where was Tito when you needed him? Come to think of it, what had they done with Tito?

Papa John's is open. And they're even running a seasonal special!

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Liliana didn't realize that Papa John's had ever been anything else; she'd never been to the restaurant before and wasn't from Earth and so lacked the brand recognition. But there has been three of those...weird entities...on the street trying to hassle her into signing up for something and Liliana had escaped into the closest building to keep from summoning something foul to keep them away from her.

But, while she was here, she might as well get something to eat...

"What is a pizza anyway?" she asked, stepping up to the counter to give Raiden the joy of introducing her to the entire concept of pizza.

...As made by Papa John's.

Raiden was getting used to this question, so instead of reacting like she'd asked what joy was, he exclaimed, "It's only the best food in the world!" Not this pizza, but. "It's a sort of flatbread--do you have flatbread where you're from?" He didn't like to assume. "And then it's covered with a sauce, cheese, and toppings. Typically the sauce is tomato-based and the cheese is mozzarella--that's a semi-soft white cow's milk cheese--but there are all sorts of other options, too. Uh, usually. Today the menu is sort of...I didn't make the menu today."

But hey, at least bad pizza was still pizza? He was clinging to that.

Edited 2023-10-24 14:10 (UTC)

It wasn't though. Bad pizza was an abomination, taking one of the few pure things in this world and ruining them. Like mixing puns in with otherwise stellar wordplay, bad pizza existed only to hurt the good-hearted and righteous.

"So...this is like a pasta dish?" Liliana asked, now picturing something in a bowl. "But with flatbread in the place of noodles?"

An odd use of flatbread, but it's not like the island was hurting for 'odd' even when it wasn't being overtaken by the concept of capitalism.

"Not exactly," Raiden hedged, since he didn't know where she was going with that comparison, "but if you've had pasta in this world it was probably Italian in origin or at least influence, and pizza also comes from Italy, so the flavor profiles are similar."

Look at him, using big words! But only for food.

Edited 2023-10-24 15:30 (UTC)

"I've had various things across the island," Liliana said, though how many of them were Italian was a mystery to her. "And a similar flavor profile in various places about the Multiverse. But I've never involved a flatbread with it."

Flatbread was more something she associated with Kaladeshi cuisine, or Jamuraan. Not that she thought either of those names would mean anything to people here.

"It sounds interesting, though."

Perhaps she was visualizing it wrong! Rather than a bowl, perhaps it was like Suq'Ata swallow foods, where you tore a bit off and scooped up the sauce?

Liliana was overthinking it.

"You should just...try it...and see what you think," Raiden suggested, a small part of the back of his brain reminding him that he was suggesting someone try Papa John's pizza, not what he usually served. "Uh, would you like something more traditional, or like...the BBQ Chicken Bacon Pizza?" Which sounded delicious, but, y'know. Papa John's. "We have a menu!"

Oh, look, there was an item that made a charitable donation to the corporation's own foundation with purchase. How...something of them.

"I cannot recommend ordering the Papadias because I still don't know what they are." Someone had said sandwiches. Papa John's sold sandwiches now?

Edited 2023-10-24 15:52 (UTC)

"A what kind of chicken?" Liliana asked, because today was just going to be a wholeass learning experience, apparently.

She did take the menu, noting that the images looked nothing like what she was imagining, and raising an eyebrow at 'Ancient Grains' as if using old spelt flour or whatever was something to be proud of. "...I'll have what you suggested," she decided, because Papa John's was definitely somewhere you should go for complexity.

"It's not real barbecue," Raiden warned her. "It might still be delicious?" Doubtful. "But it's not real barbecue. I'm not a barbecue purist or anything but..." He was just saying.

"I have no idea what barbecue is, but I'm sure it will be fine," Liliana said, because sometimes she was just absolutely wrong about things.

She was relying on her experience with street food of various (and often questionable) quality, not yet realizing that bad franchise food was a completely different category of bad.

"Well, yeah!" Raiden agreed, because he was a bone-deep optimist. "It's still pizza!"

Street food, when it was bad, at least still had soul. This was corporatized food. It was completely devoid of soul as a concept.

Exactly! At least with street food, you could just say that it tasted gross or had a bad mouthfeel. Corporatized food had you trying to explain that what you'd eaten was, technically, fine, except that it was the culinary equivalent of the color greige.

Or, you could get Papa John's BBQ Chicken Bacon Pizza and go for the hat trick!

"Well, then I'll take one of those, please," she decided, about to learn a new, heretofore unexplored avenue of regret. "Is a large suitable for one person?"

"I'm the wrong person to ask about that," Raiden admitted, rubbing at the back of his head under the bill of his ever-present ballcap. Look at him, Liliana. Even without knowing about the Gluttony it was obvious this was a man who could put away a lot of groceries. "It's good for me," especially if you added sides, "but I think most people would say they'd have leftovers from it?"

Especially if you managed one slice and then realized you loved yourself more than this.

"Leftovers are good," she said, since Ignis couldn't come cook for her for every meal and Liliana wouldn't go into her kitchen by herself even if she were allowed to. And, in general, she was correct, even if in this specific instance she was compounding her mistakes as a rapid rate. "Yes, a large one of those pizzas and oh! Mountain Dew? That sounds delightfully refreshing. One of those, please."

Just...so many regrets.

Raiden didn't see the problem with the Mountain Dew, but that was Raiden for you. "That'll be up in just a few...will you excuse me for a minute?" He had to go try to talk the kitchen staff into making this pizza less of a travesty.

The keyword here being 'try.'

The narrative appreciated the attempt! Liliana might one day, too, if she ever learned of it.

Instead, she was just going to sit down in a booth and very deliberately ignore any of the weird entities that tried to get her to sign up for anything. Ignoring, because Raiden had been very kind and helpful and didn't deserve to have his store wrecked to make a point.

Tempting as it might be by the time the fourth pitch had ended.

When Raiden came out of the kitchen he sighed in disappointment and headed over to Liliana's booth, where he told the TV-person pushing the Papa John's rewards program to, "Get back behind the counter."

"But you didn't even offer her--"

"Back behind the counter," he repeated, and then turned to the others and very firmly but politely said, "I'm going to ask that you either order something or leave."

The TV-people had some sense of self-preservation, apparently, because they looked up--and up--at him, and then headed for the door.

"I'm sorry about that," he told Liliana. "It's been like this all day." Also it had been a Papa John's all day. Which was worse, really?

That was some kind of hardcore existential question for a philosophy class, Raiden, and Liliana was just a simple immortal necromancer.

"What...?" She just kind of gestured at them all and figured the question stood by itself.

"Your guess is as good as mine," Raiden admitted. "Somethin' weird's goin' on." Understatement.

"How do you make it...not go on?" she asked.

You, specifically. Liliana was not a joiner. Or a helper. Or, Urza-forbid, a do-gooder.

Raiden thought about it very hard and finally concluded, "If there's a demon involved I could stab it." It was how most problems got solved in his experience, and he would happily stab someone to get his pizza place back.

Wait, would that mean the Waffle House would go away too?

Arden, at least, was willing to put up with a lot to keep the Waffle House, just saying.

Liliana, however, hadn't been as much of a fan. She was, however, raising a very interested eyebrow at Raiden now. "Do you find yourself stabbing a lot of demons?" she asked.

"Well, yeah, of course," Raiden told her. "It's my job. I mean, when I'm not making pizza." Actually it was more like this was his side gig, but he tried not to think about that.

Also it was a job he didn't get paid for and couldn't quit, but...details.

"Is that something everybody just does here?" she asked. "Leaps for the opportunity to fight demons?"

She sounded more intrigued than disparaging, though. Because she did just so happen to have this little problem of three demons still owning her soul and all...

"I don't think so?" Raiden said after thinking about it for a minute. "I think most people have other stuff goin' on. Like being from space or a Norse god or whatever." Just normal things.

Liliana couldn't even throw stones at those normal things, being an immortal, Planeswalking necromancer and all.

"Well, I wish I'd known about this back a few weeks ago," she sighed. "My battle with Kothophed would likely have turned out very differently if I had."

And had also been able to foist the fight off on someone else. You know, by saying, 'Eek! A demon!' or whatever.

"Kothophed?" Raiden asked. The name wasn't familiar, but that didn't mean much. He didn't know every demon, after all.

How could he? There were so many!

Liliana was quiet for a moment before answering, "One of the four demons that I need to kill to free my soul," she said. "Or, rather, the one I have killed, with three more remaining."

Raiden nodded. "So did you sell your soul to them," which was a rookie mistake, "or what?"

He wasn't mad. He was just disappointed.

"I assure you, the alternative was worse," Liliana said, still quietly. "And not just because I was dying."

His disappointment rolled off her like water on a duck. "The important thing is that when I'm done, four of the most evil, most powerful demons in the Multiverse will be dead and I'll be free."

"You too, huh?" Rey asked, looking around.

"They told me I couldn't fix the sauce because it would 'violate franchising standards,'" Raiden reported glumly. "I never agreed to be a franchise in the first place!"

He might not have realized yet that Pizza Planet was a chain in some universes.

Rey frowned. "What's a franchise?"

Who had two thumbs and never needed to know that before?

Raiden was the wrong person to try to explain how corporations worked, but by gum he was gonna try. It probably helped that this was food-related explaining. "So you know like Mooby Land? That's a chain restaurant. There are a bunch of other Mooby Lands." That was why the food was like that. "Some chains, instead of one company owning them, they let people buy the rights to run one of those restaurants, but they have to follow a bunch of rules and standards about how they run them. Which apparently includes not making the food better."

Rey Skywalker learns about capitalism!

"But why wouldn't they want to make it better? That doesn't make sense."

"Because they don't want it to be better," Raiden said. That part didn't make any sense to him either, but, "They want it to be the same. If you make it better at one Mooby Land you have to make it better at all the others, and that would cost money." But then you would get better food!

"But then I'd just want to have your normal stuff."

She'd still eat the corporate slop, mind.

Just not at Long John Silver's, our of horror and respect.

"Aw, that's so nice of you to say!" And possibly she was not remembering some of his previous pizzas. "But there's something to be said for chains, y'know? You can order a pizza in Iowa or Hawaii and know you're gonna get the same thing." He paused. "Actually, that's kind of depressing when I think about it."

"A little bit," Rey agreed. "Is it worth trying this kind?"

"Depends on what you think's 'worth it,' I guess," Raiden said after thinking about it. "I mean, it's pizza. Pizza is good, even when it's bad. But that's me talking, and you've gotta remember the Gluttony. You could try it, but it's okay if you don't like it." They were gonna take away his franchiseship or whatever at this rate.

"Woukd it be a betrayal if I tried it?"

Which was dramatic, but hey.

"Not at all! I mean, for one thing this is still...sort of...my restaurant, and for another you should always try new things! How will you know what you like if you don't?"

"All right then," she said. "I can try the special."

"That's a good choice! Probably." How many ways could the kitchen fuck up what was basically a pepperoni pizza shaped like a pumpkin?

...don't answer that.

"I'm sure it'll be amazing," Rey said, because even bad pizza was still pretty good pizza, except she'd never tasted pizza that included ingredients that somehow felt depressed.

"Uhhhhhh," Raiden said, followed by a series of noises that conveyed skepticism without managing to be actual words, and then, finally, "I'll just get your order right in for you."

"Optimism," she said firmly. "We're trying optimism."

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Papa John's, Tuesday

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