Haute Cuisine in the 22nd Century.

“Come on luv, finish yer spicy worm burger, there’s poor starving children in America who’d sell their siblings to slavery for one of those.”
“But I don’t like worms, mother, they’re all squirmy and yucky!”
“Bloody ‘ell Rachel, do what ye mother says, I work bloody ‘ard down factory to breed those. They’re fresh as God’s doings, alright? And where did you learn what worms look like?”
“Sorry Daddy, I found a film on the internet.”
“Christ, I’ve told you before! No lookin’ at any bloody internet, that thing’s been banned for years!”
Rachel looked at the half-finished meal on her plate. The burger, made of mashed and fried earthworms, looked decidedly unappealing, despite the funny cartoon worm printed on its surface.
“Can I let Buster have it? Please Daddy, he needs to get fat for Christmas anyway.”
Buster looked up hopefully at the mention of his name. Scrawny and flea-ridden, his halitosis forming a wall around him which none might venture to pass without serious eye and nose protection; he was chained to the floor beside a bowl of chem-water.
Father considered this ill-seeming work of evolution with nonplussed distaste. You couldn’t buy insecticide these days, not roach powder nor mouse poison, every scrap of animal matter, vertebrate or invertebrate, hair, bones and all, had to go towards each citizens’ monthly quota at the food factory. Each citizen was enjoined to capture all spiders, cockroaches, rats, mice or flies for the communal food-breeding program. Bar a few pets they’d let you keep for special occasions. Ever since the Great Ecosystem Breakdown of 2012, all life on Earth was protected from useless waste, the few human cities still left on the Planet providing huddled cover for a population numbering a few hundred millions …
“Oh go on then, let ‘im ‘ave it. But don’t you go raiding the protein bin tonight or you’ll feel the ‘ard side of my ‘and.”
“Thanks Daddy, I promise I won’t go looking at the internet anymore.”
“Too right there’s a good lass.”
As Rachel flipped the burger into the dog’s bowl, Joe whispered to his wife:
“Luv, how ye doin’ finding that ‘amster for ‘er birthday?”
“Oh I’ve looked everywhere darlin’, but you just can’t find mammals for any price nowadays. I’m worried it’ll have to be maggots again, just like last year.”
“Ah crap, we promised ‘er after that Gibson girl got a rat last august. She’ll get bullied at school now ye know, she’s told all ‘er friends.”
“Sorry Darlin’, I’ll go and find Sly Ronny.”
“Ok, but be bloody careful and remember ye code words!”
*******

As Mildred slogged her way through the deep slime of a pedestrian walkway, the interminable rain soaked through her protective gear, and she cursed the ancients. All that wealth, all that petrol, all that Nature and what had they left the present generations? Less than nothing! The interminable rain and low-lying cloud of the global weather patterns, the omnipresent mould and slime, medicine-resistant diseases, the planet’s global ecosystem was now a sick patient where before it had been a healthy resource. Bloody ancients, she hoped they were rotting in Hell! And yet she knew that they weren’t all responsible, not the poor or middle classes, but history has a way of judging entire cultures, and the political and business leaders whom they allowed to exist were, after all, responsible for the present rotten world- framework.
She arrived at the pre-arranged meeting point. No-one was there. She whispered into the night:
“Free rides at the Fair!”
The wind sighing through the twisted wreckage of London town was her only reply. She tried again:
“Free rides at the fair, Ronny are you there?”
Still no answer. First thing you learn is that you’ve always got to wait. She hunkered down into the wreck of a bus shelter, trying to keep the slime from her waistline.
“Free rides at the bloody fair!!”
“Alright luv, I’m here.”
A shifting shadow became the profile of a man, walking towards her through the daily downpour.
“Thank fuck Ronny, have you got it then?”
“Easy luv, the walls have ears. Well, if there were any still standing they’d have ‘em, eh? Got some maggots right ‘ere if you want ‘em.”
“Maggots? ‘ow much?”
“150 Euros per gram.”
“Christ, you’re steep Ronny. Alright though, give us 20 grams I’m desperate.”
She handed over a 5,000 Euro note and he gave her change in the form of a 2,000 alongside two bags of wriggling larvae.
“How about that hamster then?”
“Ok luv, wait here.”

He set off through the night, cursing the damp and the clouds and the ancients. Walking up a mildewed and graffiti-tagged, crumbling set of concrete stairs, he came to a door. He knocked once, then twice, then once again. A small hatch opened and a gruff voice spoke through it:
“Who rules the world?”
“Rich bastards like yourself,” answered Ronny.
The hatch shot shut and the door creaked open.

*******

“Darling, wake up I got it!”
“Unh? Wassat? Got what?”
“The hamster you eedjit, it’s right here, look!”
He raised himself onto his elbows and she held it out to him on the palm of her hand. Small, grey and stone-cold still.
“Nice and fat-lookin’, but couldn’t you’ve got ‘er a live one?”
“It was an extra 10,000 Federal Bureaus for a live one and you know they’re always snuffin’ it!”
“Alright then, better hide it in the ceiling stash or she’ll sniff it out and have it raw. You know what kids’re like.”
“Comes from never having eaten eaten steak, poor things.”
“Now don’t start that again, luv, you know that kind of talk leads nowhere. Remember that 3 gram monster we had for our wedding feast?”
“Now you’re the one starting! Stop it dear, please!!
“Alright then, I’ll stash that hamster, eh?”

*******

Rachel’s birthday dawned bright and dry. Bright, because the sky was a lighter shade of grey than what one would usually see (you could almost imagine a hint of blue peeping through the steely canopy); and dry, because a medium drizzle was all that was descending from the heavens. The sound of bees buzzing through the flowers on their busy missions echoed through the surrounding location’s spiritual memory.
As she opened her eyes, she knew this day would be special. Her parents had promised her this taste of that legendary dish, whole roast hamster, and she knew nothing would compare to this until her wedding feast. For an eleven-year old, that would not be for a long time. Nine years, eleven months and thirty days, to be precise. To Ronnie Talbot, currently a spotty thirteen-year old, but potentially, with a bit of luck and hard work, a mature man high enough on the food scale to own a St. Bernard.
She bounced out of bed happily, looking forward to the meal ahead with relish. A true coming of age ceremony for any young girl, and she wouldn’t be getting some greasy ol’ rat like Emmy Gibson did last august, not her! A real Hamster for lunch, Oh Yes! The meal of a lifetime. She shot downstairs to wake the household:
“Buster, Buster come here you crunchy old dog! It’s my birfday and I’m having Hamster for lunch! Mum and Dad said I would!!”
Buster looked up uncertainly from his tattered old gore-tex blanket.
“Woof?”
“Come ‘ere you three courses of haute cuisine!”
She got down on her knees to vacuum him with a small hand-held device, back-stroking him to flush the fleas out into the path of the food-bin hoover. “It’s going to be a wonderful day and I’m finally going to be a big girl, like Emmy Gibson only better cos I got a hamster for my birfday!!!” She hugged him spontaneously before conscientiously vacuuming the part of her pyjamas that had come into contact with him.
Dad was coming down the stairs in his dressing gown, scratching his belly and yawning:
“Eh oop now lass, ye’re making enough noise to raise the dead. Well, I say raise but that’s impossible cos we’re all recyled more or less immediately. Geddit?”
Mildred’s voice echoed from the bathroom:
“Joe, I told you not to make that kind of joke when Rachel’s around! It’ll give ‘er Ideas!”
“Oh come on Mildred, you’ve gotta laugh or you just start crying, see the world those old bastads ‘ave left uz?”
“I’m not joking Joe, no punky dark ‘umour!”
“Alright, ok then, no bloody jokes and no bloody tokes, and…”
“What was that? I can’t hear you.”
“Sorry luv, I’ll toe the line!”
*******
Her friends had all made her some lovely presents, turned up with silly, clown-like smiles pasted on their faces, and with imaginatively hand-made birthday cards clutched in their slimy hands: drawings of her in front of a huge, roast dog; or tucking into a massive dish of worm bolognese; even sucking the brains out of a living cat. The latter was particularly well illustrated. They contemplated her roast hamster feast with envy as they choked down their bowls of maggoroni cheese.