A quiet Kitchen Technician aboard a deep-space research vessel begins to recreate forgotten Earth recipes. The meals trigger powerful emotions and lost memories in the crew as they rediscover what it means to be human.

SYNOPSIS:

Far from Earth, aboard a sprawling research vessel drifting through deep space, daily life is efficient, sterile, and emotionally muted. The crew performs their tasks with mechanical precision, sustained by flavorless nutrient packs and a strict adherence to order. Among them is Mara, a quiet kitchen technician who keeps to herself—until the day she begins to cook.

What starts as a strange instinct, a craving she can’t explain, leads Mara to recreate a forgotten Earth dish using synthetic ingredients. When a crew member tastes it, they break down crying, overcome by a memory they’ve never lived. Word spreads. As Mara continues to cook. Peach cobbler, cornbread, roast stew. Others aboard the ship begin to experience powerful, visceral memories and emotions that don’t belong to them. Some feel joy. Others mourn. And one man, broken by what he remembers, takes his own life.

The ship’s command AI shuts Mara down, deeming her work a threat to stability. Isolated in her quarters, she dreams of a cozy Earth kitchen, a child, a faceless man holding her with love. Determined to understand the truth behind the feelings her food awakens, Mara escapes confinement with the help of Julian, a soft-spoken botanist who’s been experiencing similar dreams. Together, they uncover the ship’s buried history, and a secret that connects every crew member in ways none of them ever imagined.

As the line between memory and identity blurs, Mara prepares one final, extraordinary meal. It offers the crew not just flavor, but a taste of the past they never knew they’d lost. 

In the quiet aftermath, a question lingers: what if the soul of humanity was never in the stars, but in the kitchen all along?