THE MOMENT
"Step one: the beans," Glory gestured at a rack with several white boxes with a red scissor logo on each one. They were about a foot tall and half afoot deep with a dispenser on the front. The rack itself was against the back wall of the restaurant. Dina came in after the breakfast rush for training and the kitchen area was mostly quiet. Glory held out the measuring cup to one of the boxes and pulled the handle once. "One pull for a Moderate cup, two for Massive, and three for Maximum," Glory turned to move to the next station; but, she paused.
"Oh right, I guess this is step two; the first is to make sure you've got the right beans." She tapped the side of one of the boxes to draw Dina's attention. The young woman leaned closer and saw small print that said 'Earth: One.' "These are from Sharp Development's private label," then, Glory tapped the two boxes next to it. "It's our most popular variety."
"Pint O' Java!" the call came from somewhere in the front followed by a bell *ding*.
"Great, you get to make your first cup of coffee on the job," Glory smiled at Dina.
"Sure, okay!" Dina nodded and reached for the cup of coffee beans. But, the green-haired woman pulled it away with a shake of her head.
"You'll learn the details as we go; but, 'Pint O' is a specific order; we don't use these," she said. She lifted the lid of the box and dumped the beans back in, then, spun around and headed to the stove.
"Which ones do I use?" Dina asked as she followed. She stood next to a tall pot and waited until Dina arrived. She gave the new employee the measuring cup and pointed at the pot.
"Just grab a scoop of that," she said. "And take it over to the prep station," she added with a tilt of her head.
"You're kidding," Dina looked down at the dark brown liquid.
"You have to stir it first," Glory shook her head and grabbed the nearby ladle to swirl the liquid around.
"That's beans," Dina uttered the only phrase she could as she tried to guess what was going on. She could clearly see dozens of beans along with what looked like chunks of bacon swirling in the brown juice. "Is this a prank cause I'm new?" Dina asked. "I'd rather be working...," she said.
"We're a 'multiverse aware' business," Glory said. "That means anyone from the multiverse can stop in and order a cup of coffee. Though 'coffee' is not going to be exactly the same in every universe," she nodded down at the pot and continued. "Someone's favorite coffee is a cup of bean juice," she shrugged. "Might sound icky to us; but, to them, it's still that same comfort we get from coffee."
"Okay...," Dina nodded. She knew of the multiverse but didn't do a lot of thinking about it. What Glory said made sense, even if it turned her stomach. Once she had a cup of liquid, she carried it to the prep station with Glory close behind.
"It gets a little more chaotic when we're busy, but luckily it's just the one ticket now," Glory grabbed the ticket from the board. She glanced over it, then handed it to Dina. The woman had taken the initiative to dump the juice into a proper coffee to-go cup.
"They asked for it prepared," Glory pointed at the top of the ticket with the word 'prep' circled. "If they don't ask for it prepared, you'd just toss in cream and sweetener packets." Dina nodded and looked down at the ticket to see what they wanted.
"One cream, four sugars,' she said.
"You're going to want to be extra careful," Glory said. "It says 'sweeteners' not 'sugar', they're different," she said. "The manual will explain what everything means more thoroughly; but, always follow the ticket. In this case; the order itself has a lot of unique substitutions built in." Glory walked to the nearby fridge and returned with a couple of items. One was a plastic quart with a pump, that Dina assumed was cream, and the other was a closed container labeled 'honey drops'. Dina's stomach did an extra flip-flop as she tried to imagine the combination of flavors she was about to concoct.
"This one is blue," Glory tapped the pump on the white quart. "Regular cream will be red, low fat cream will be green," she said. "They're all labeled and the non-dairy ones are distinct enough to not get confused. But, just looking at the color of the pump is the quickest way."
"That's not cream?" Dina asked. She was confused that Glory mentioned cream, low fat, and even non-dairy. But, the blue one wasn't any of those.
"It is," Glory nodded and she rotated the quart to show Dina the label. [Sour Cream]
"You're kidding...," Dina shook her head to suppress the queasiness.
"Multiverse," Glory shrugged with the answer. She pushed it toward Dina. "One pump," she said.
"Okay...," Dina pushed down and shot a dollop of sour cream into the cup of bean juice. "..and four sweeteners...," she said as she eagerly pushed the sour cream away to reach for the honey drops.
"Oooohhhh... wow...," The way her morning was going, Dina did not expect to see such a pretty collection when she opened the container. Golden cubes, the size of standard sugar cubes, sat perfectly inside. Each in its own little square space with enough room on each side to pluck them up. They were translucent, almost crystalline gold. Each one held a tiny yellow-ish green sphere in the center that only highlighted the differences between yellow and gold.
"They're pretty neat," Glory nodded as Dina began counting out four of them. "They keep their shape until heated. You can just plop them in," she said.
"I'm not sure if adding honey to the mix makes it more or less appetizing...," Dina chuckled as she dropped in the last one.
"It's more than honey," Glory said. "So, don't use them instead of honey, please," she giggled. She plucked up one cube and held it up to the light. "See the thing inside?" she asked. Then, she tossed it in her mouth and encouraged Dina to try one too.
"It's concentrated lemon juice," Glory revealed the trick one second after it was in Dina's mouth. She could feel the honey start to soften, and it was still early enough to spit out before she got to the lemon part.
"I'll pass," she said, wiping her mouth with a napkin.
"So, it's ready?" Dina asked. She was eager to put this particular cup behind her and learn more about the restaurant.
"Oh, no, one more thing," Glory said. She made a quick trip to the fridge again and came back with a bottle of cold-brew coffee. She seemed to realize they were taking longer than usual and took the liberty to pump three shots of coffee into the cup herself.
"It's not a 'Pint O' Java' without the java."