#mal revealing a bit of his cultural gastronomy XD

[mahvaladara]

Almost on queue they heard the singing of the hens as Syra rushed back up the path throwing corn with a whole bunch of chicks chasing her. She smiled at them and made a surprised sound when she saw the fixed coop.

Syra: You fixed it!

They smiled looking at the coop as it now looked better than it had ever done. As Syra came running with the chickens, they turned to Mal.

Fannar: And I am as prepared as I can be, and I intend to stick by him to the end, whenever that might happen.  -they nodded, then looked at Syra. - Impressive, they seem to know resistance is futile. - they chuckled and picked up one of the chickens. - See new house and all.

Syra: These aren’t the original chickens -she confessed sheepishly- But we didn’t want Arlo to get upset.

Fannar: Oh.

Syra: Sorry. Brightside though! Disposable Rooster #2 -and she pointed to the rooster- Will live a long happy life and not become chicken soup!

Mal: Waste of perfectly good meat. With his size and age, his liver is huge, tasty and healthy, his heart rubbery and tasty, and if I pull and snap his neck and hold him upside down long enough all the blood's going to accumulate on the neck and head and then I can boil him, clean him up and cook that neck with coagulated blood to make the most marvelous chicken soup.

Vy and Fannar stared Mal horrorfied.

Mal: What? You guys never had chicken?

Syra: No dad. I think they did. I just think you horrified them with the graphic description of how you prepare them.

Mal: Or, you're one of those "only eat chicken from the supermarket, injected with growth hormones, held up in tiny pens and fed the remains of their crushed siblings and rejected eggs, and killed by electrocution" kind of guys.

Vy: Well... but you actually snap their necks? With your bare hands?

Mal: With what else would I kill the chickens? You expected me to go ax murderer on the chicken? This isn't The Shinning. Wastes effort, time, it's messier, more painful for the chicken, can actually take longer to kill it, especially with a rooster that size that requires at least two good hits to chop off his head, and shooting a chicken would just be overkill. Besides, it would waste all the blood I'd want around the neck to cook.

Vy: Why do you want to eat the chicken's cooked coagulated blood?

Mal: Because it's a delicacy where I come from! Don't you people have cultural gastronomy? Where I come from we eat everything from the chicken! Everything from the pork too! And almost everything from the cow. Except the kidneys, the kidneys just taste bad.

Vy: No wonder you don't eat dragons. You eat everything else, devourer.

Mal: I don't eat cockroaches, and have only eaten bugs out of desperation. I am actually repulsed by them. If you want to incapacitate me in a battle, just throw a flying roach at me and I'll jump out a window to escape it! Or set the building on fire. I have done both in the past.