but then like, this mess of a guy shows up and he’s got a letter that says he’s the son of the previous chef and owns the business. the statue of limitations for the will, which makes you the official owner, passes in a few weeks and this guy is showing up right now, after years of you running the place. you hide this information in the hope that the deadline will pass and your life won’t be ripped to shreds by this. 

and the same night he’s hired (by your staff, without your permission), a rat shows up. you have the new guy kill it because the last thing you need to deal with is a health code violation. but it doesn’t go away. You start to see it everywhere, like a ghost. in the kitchen. on the street. probably in your dreams. You see it’s shadow out of the corner of your eye, and it’s always with the new guy, like he and the rat are plotting together. it’s a symbol of all your fears and anxieties. You try to prove that you’re not crazy, but nothing comes of it. And like, just when you’re starting to accept that you are, in fact, hallucinating, you go into your office, and you see this

so you stalk the rat man. maybe you can do something about it. you find out that linguini is nothing but the puppet and the rat is running the restaurant it stole from you. you call the health inspector, the only person who’s going to take a rat seriously, but even they barely listen. you even manage to trap the rat and put it in your car, but later you find your car totaled, the front completely smashed open by a gargoyle that fell off the roof of a building. the rat is gone.

you go to the restaurant. you will find the rat. you burst into the kitchen. it’s like all your nightmares burst into reality at once. there’s thousands of rats. they swarm you, bound you, gag you, and throw you into the closet. right next to the health inspector.