#dig up a bunch of dirt/mud

[tea-time-terrier]

The yearly ritual of sacrificing my worst pair of pants for the earthdog dig out ✌

[quarterlifekitty]

hii

can I ask for more scent kink soap? ugh just something about that nasty nasty man GETS me.

So first of all this is inspired by this post that I’m fucking obsessed with so. Omegaverse be upon ye

Freak Soap who finds a pair of used panties on the floor of the communal laundry room in his flat building. So, like the animal he is, he lifts it to his face to sniff.

And like. He’s never really believed in being able to smell someone and just know that they’re a perfect match. Like, that’s nonsense. But right now? If he had a tail it’d be thumping. Like, he whines when he pushes the gusset of your panties right up to his nose, that’s how amazing it smells to him.

He ends up waiting in the laundry room all night to see if the owner will show. No luck. Sulks back to his flat, keeps the panties bunched up in his face while he fists his cock more than a few times.

Every so often he’ll catch little whiffs of it. It’s actually a very subtle scent— it’s probably why he’s never noticed, not till it was concentrated in that slick-soaked fabric. Sort of like how there are some things you’d never find unless you already knew what they looked like. People tell all kinds of stories about scents. That their mates smelled of bergamot and lemongrass, teakwood and honeycomb candy, peppermint and vanilla— all sorts of bath and bodyworks style shite. God knows he’s heard the word petrichor enough for one lifetime.

Gaz told Soap that he smelled like salt and single malt whiskey. Also dirt, but they all smelled like dirt at the time.

This scent was fascinatingly, infuriatingly simple and yet it smelled like the embodiment of home, of comfort—

You smelled like wheat. Warm wheat. It wasn’t spicy, herbaceous, sweet, earthy. Just… wheat.

At the front door of the building. By the mail boxes. In the laundry room. Sometimes, in a cruel twist of fate— right by his own front door. Always weak— just traces. Never accompanied by the wearer. His unpredictable schedule of deployments and leave just make it harder to try to track.

Until one day he comes back. Long bloody mission, dragged through mud, run ragged. Just barely able to scrape through to the finish line before his rut started, thank god. And yet, he’s dreading it. That pair of panties has basically all but lost any traces of you, he’s had it and held it in desperation for so long.

When the lift door opens, he can feel his spine straighten in alert. Wheat. Abundant. Fertile. You’re so close, and so close to a heat.

He drops his duffel by his door as he loses the battle to think of anything but stuffing his knot in a soft, hot cunt. His cock is already painfully hard as the rut claws and pricks at his synapses, coiled and at the ready. But he doesn’t have to travel far.

The door across the hall from his.

He gets low to the ground, like he’s trying to squeeze himself under the door— trying to get closer and closer to the scent.

Knocking, introducing himself, and acting like a human being is far from the forefront of his mind. His first instinct is to jiggle the handle of the door, growling when he finds it locked.

His second instinct is to dig the picking tools from his duffle.

[justwinginglife]

Gimme a oneshot of Reader who doesn't have any experience in love so she panics when she gets feelings for Hoshina, giving him random things (a nice rock, random vegetables, ect.) And randomly blurts out embarrassing compliments "YOUR MUSCLES LOOK VERY NICE TODAY VICE CAPTAIN SIR" before she just fucking books it out of there.

I love you so much bestie. I will do this for you 100%, thanks for always matching my freak.

The Thing About Being In Love

You always thought you wouldn't know love if it hit you in the face. But then you fell in love and felt like you just couldn't stop taking hits. You had no idea how to process your feelings, no idea how to convey those feelings in a way that made sense, and no idea how to stop those feelings from overflowing.

The thing about being in love with Soshiro Hoshina was that your feelings always made themselves known to him before you wanted them to. Before you could even think about what you needed to say and how you needed to say it, you words were already tumbling out in a chaotic jumble. They always did. And it made you love him even more that he never judged you for it. He'd just smile the same sweet smile again and you could feel yourself falling deeper and deeper.

When you first met him, you made quite the first impression- after reflexively reaching out to ruffle his hair because you just needed to know if it was as soft as it looked, you earned yourself 50 push-up's and his undying attention going forward. He wanted to know more about the girl who'd said fuck it to all manner of decorum and propriety, ignoring the chain of command to satisfy her desires. It wasn't until he got to know you better that he realized that you just couldn't control yourself.

He'd been particularly amused when you'd complimented the way his muscles looked in his favorite compression shirt (it was his favorite only because you'd complimented him in it). In fact, you'd noticed that he'd started wearing it more frequently around you after you made comments on it the first time around. And you just couldn't stop making comments on it every time after that.

"Oh, wow... your back muscles are gorgeous, can I touch them?" You yanked your hand back before you actually did touch him and scurried off, red in the face.

"Your abs look so solid... shit, I'm drooling." You shook your head aggressively, wiped your mouth, and ran off again.

One time you'd even had the nerve to say "Do you think you could wear me like that shirt?" Immediately after, you slapped a hand over your mouth and bolted like you were on fire.

And when you'd taken up gardening for fun, after harvesting a bunch of potatoes, you wondered if Hoshina liked potatoes which led you spiraling down the rabbit hole, wondering if he was eating enough. So, of course, you made the walk to his apartment in your gardening overalls and offered him the potato, still covered in dirt. He took it, stunned, and watched as you proceeded to walk away as if you'd never been there in the first place. Little did he know, you were embarrassed that you'd trudged over to him, still caked in mud, just to present him with the most underwhelming of gifts. You still didn't know how you got these ideas in your head and why your body executed them before your mind could properly protest.

Then there was the time that someone had painted a smiley face on a rock and placed it near the sidewalk by your house- it had reminded you of his warm smile and you'd given it to him in the middle of a training session. Despite your malfunctioning brain, your strength and your skill were actually quite impressive, and he always enjoyed a good spar with you. It wasn't until he had you pinned to the ground that you felt the rock digging into your leg and you'd pulled it out of your pocket and gifted it to him right then and there. He did more than smile that time, he actually laughed. You flushed, wondering if he was going to make fun of you for once, but he didn't. He took the rock gleefully and even named it after you. You started giggling and soon, the two of you were just collapsed on the floor, filled with laughter.

At least some good could come out of these random bursts of affection and you wouldn't trade these precious little moments with him for the world. The thought that you were the one that made him smile and laugh like this, it filled you with the most genuine sense of happiness even if you were embarrassed at how you'd done it.

At some point, Hoshina thought he'd have some fun with the situation- he didn't want you to feel left out after all, and he wanted to compliment you too.

So he started running up to you, yelling something like "Your hair looks very pretty today!" or "Those curves of yours are looking mighty fine!" and then dart off; even though he wasn't embarrassed, he wanted to keep the same energy as you. It made you laugh. And he loved when you laughed.

And then it got easier and easier to be around him. You weren't stumbling over your words anymore, you were proclaiming them with pride.

"Thought you could hide those biceps from me forever, huh, Hoshina? Let me get a good look." You even had the nerve to fucking wink at him.

He'd smirk and flex them at you, then blow you a kiss.

And you went on and on like this, flirting with him, laughing with him, stealing little moments with him anywhere you could. The thing about being in love with Soshiro Hoshina was that your feelings always made themselves known to him. But somehow, someway, through all the awkward encounters, all the stammered words, all the heavy breaths threatening to collapse your trembling lungs, your feelings found their way into his heart. And he guarded them like they were his treasure. And he reciprocated them tenfold.

One day, he said the cheesiest thing about how when you had kids he'd have the best story to tell them about how you met and how you started falling for each other and you teased him for being so corny, but that was the day you knew you'd marry him.

Because the thing about being in love with Soshiro Hoshina is that it's the best feeling in the world, but being loved by Soshiro Hoshina is even better.

[haunted-girlyy]

Kevin is absolutely annoyed by ghouls and would like to send them all back to the pit

cw: Kevin hates ghouls

(he would prefer any other demon because ghouls cause so much chaos)

Kevin hates ghouls with a passion.

Not because he's afraid of them, no, on the contrary, you can't have less respect for them than Kevin. He just thinks they're annoying little beasts, like particularly vicious chihuahuas from hell. Dewdrop, Phantom and Rain especially get on his nerves. Phantom because he's always clinging to Kevin like a leech. Dewdrop because he's a little gremlin who just causes chaos that Kevin then has to clean up. And Rain isn't that bad but he isn't good at speaking human language that Kevin usually doesn't understand what the water ghoul is stammering anyway. Well, Kevin could speak ghoulish if he wanted to, but in the end these pests would annoy him even more.

The worst is when he has to fix something in the ghoul wing.

For example, the other day, when he just wanted to clean the clogged drain in the kitchen sink, he was surrounded by ghouls within a few minutes. They reminded him of a bunch of starving cats, the way they stalked around him and cast curious glances over his shoulder.

Phantom was immediately glued to him again, practically tugging at Kevin's hair and clothes. Then Aether, who kept his distance but intermittently gave advice that Kevin hadn't asked for. "You should unscrew the drain pipe first" and "Are you sure you've mixed the cleaning concentrate sufficiently? Otherwise it could damage the pipes."

Kevin wanted to hit Aether in the face. But instead he contented himself with glaring at the sink while he worked.

At one point he accidentally hit Rain's forehead with his knee because Rain was squeezing himself on the floor between him and the bucket that Kevin had used to catch all the muck from the drainpipe. With an annoyed look, Kevin noticed that the water ghoul had started collecting small pieces that had landed in the drainpipe from the bucket.

"Stop that! You're just making everything dirty," he growled as Rain pulled his hands back and placed a marble, dripping with dirt, on the ground.

Rain just babbled incomprehensible things as he began to dig in the muck again.

"Why do you forbid Rain that?", whispered Phantom and came so close to Kevin that he felt the ghoul's warm breath brushing over his ear.

Kevin sighed with the burden of a man who would rather tend a sack full of fleas than a handful of ghouls.

Why couldn't the clergy have chosen other demons? There were many species that were less unruly than ghouls. Kevin even had the feeling that chaos ghouls not only enjoyed themselves, but that they actually drew their energy from it. He had once expressed this thought to Sister Imperator, but she had just laughed at him and said that he just had to learn to assert himself. That could only come from someone who didn't have to deal with these plagues on a daily basis.

Annoyed, Kevin stuck the spiral into the drain to push out the last bit of snot, while at the same time swatting away Rain's fingers that had appeared on the edge of the sink.

Since Copia had risen to the top of the ministry and had a bit more say, Kevin was no longer even allowed to sprinkle holy water on the ghouls to keep them away. After all, that would hurt the ghouls, the youngest Emeritus brother had explained his decision. Simply ridiculous. When Kevin had started working for the clergy, ghouls had just been treated like ghouls. But since Copia had shown up here, Kevin had to treat these creatures as if they had more feelings than lust, hunger and thirst.

Finally, the resistance in the drain was released and with a slap, a pile of mud landed in the bucket.

"Is that...sand?" asked Aether, astonished. Kevin shrugged his shoulders in resignation. "How do I know what kind of crap you always pour down the drain?!" He pulled the spiral back and knelt under the sink to screw the pipe back on.

Phantom also knelt down next to him and grabbed one of Kevin's long strands of hair to chew on.

"I'm clearly not being paid well enough for this," the brown haired growled, shooing back first Phantom and then Rain, whose hand had already disappeared back into the bucket.

Under the curious gaze of the ghouls, Kevin screwed the pipe back on, sat up with his aching back and picked up the bucket.

"It would be nice if you could just stop breaking or clogging anything for more than three days," Kevin grumbled, looking sternly at Aether. The quintessence ghoul had spent the last few minutes watching with his hands on his hips and a critical expression. "I'm doing my best, but you know what they're like." Kevin only snorted in response. He watched as Aether disappeared into the living room before he too turned to leave. The ghoul was talking to Kevin as if they were eye to eye. Kevin shook his head.

Ghouls.

He was about to close the door behind him when Rain slithered through and tugged at his sleeve. His big blue eyes bored into his.

"What?" Kevin asked slightly suprised. Rain's mouth opened and closed a few times without any words coming out. Then, finally, when Kevin's already extremely thin thread of patience was about to snap, Rain managed to say a word.

"Encore."

He had always thought that Rain simply didn't speak human language, but apparently the ghoul was just stupid. In a good-natured tone, as if he was talking to someone particularly retarded, Kevin replied. "I know you did a great job on the ghovie. We're all very proud of you. But I," he pointed to himself, "have to go now," he pointed to the door.

Rain tilted his head, confused. He's probably doing this so that the few brain cells he has will slip into the same corner, Kevin thought spitefully.

The water ghoul tugged at his sleeve again, this time more frantically. "encore, encore, encore Dew."

Confused, Kevin turned around and froze.

Dewdrop stood at the sink and calmly poured a thick liquid into it. Kevin now also noticed the penetrating smell of ammonia. The damned ghoul poured wall paint into the sink. Kevin blinked. The man was too stunned to even utter a word.

He definitely needed a bottle of whiskey tonight. Better yet, two. And brandy. A lot of it.

[verdicloud]

pouncival ideas

before, i never really paid close attention to the ending of the show “the ad-dressing of cats”, there wasn’t much dancing or plot, and i just listened to ken page’s legendary singing. but i recently noticed something. pouncival. he’s front and centre of all the cats, and he even does slightly different poses/choreo than the rest of them. pouncival is also one of those cats that i never paid too much attention to, but he’s been nagging me ever since this discovery.

the more i thought about it, the more i realised that he doesn’t really have a proper “role” in the tribe other than being a troublemaker, which doesn’t help anyone. when i searched for inspiration on tumblr, there were hardly any pouncival hcs that were exclusively him. and even then, it was just things we already know about him.

i NEEDED to know him better. he would not let go of my brain for the past three days. but i’d like to thank him for giving me something to think real hard about. here’s my ideas for him!

this next part is a review of pouncival. feel free to skip to “finally, my ideas” below the screenshot of pounce —

what we know :

- pouncival is the youngest tom cat in the tribe

- he’s a mischievous and childish kitten with a knack for troublemaking

- he’s carefree and playful, just a happy kitten, sometimes callously so

- his alternate is carbucketty, a name invented by t.s. eliot for a “knockabout” cat

what we can infer :

- he loves his friends! (he pranks grizabella at tumble and plato’s idea, and he lets victoria snuggle up to him at the start of “mister mistoffelees”)

- he’s a comedic kitten who loves making people laugh, even at his own expense

- he’s the type of kid to roll in the mud and eat dirt (affectionate)

- he’s the class clown who’s lowkey an icon

• in my personal list of the cats and their three words (or more specifically “three adjectives describing their personality”), i gave him childish, blithe, and puckish.

his main character moments :

- causing trouble, and being the first “cockroach” to appear, during “the old gumbie cat”

- pranking grizabella twice

- getting reprimanded by jellylorum and electra during the jellicle ball “chant”

- being the pollicle who leads the march (it goes wrong, naturally)

- falling over a bunch, the little rascal (he’s very good at it too. top job, karl morgan /srs)

finally, my ideas :

other than the “boys group”, pouncival is also close friends with electra (and therefore etcetera). electra is something of a fussy and uptight kitten, like the type of girl who always wants to be the “boss” of the friend group and twist the story so she wins during roleplays. pouncival gives her the perfect excuse for someone to yell at as a frustration outlet. his carefree and playful attitude means that, not only does he not mind, he plays along and sometimes does cheeky things on purpose to rile her up or lift her spirits (electra is secretly very grateful).

pouncival’s childishness also means that he has a vivid imagination, and this lead to him being very inventive. also, as previously established, he has no qualms with being unhygienic, so he is very resourceful in digging through the trash, no matter for food, supplies or props for electra’s roleplays. as such, he was actually the one to make the costumes and props during jennyanydots’s number and for munkustrap’s play…

once, electra got really upset during a group roleplay, so as an apology and also to cheer her up, pouncival made mice and cockroach costumes, and along with the rest of the kittens, they performed a hilarious, modified to comedic version of the nutcracker for her. the costumes ended up being reused for jenny’s number.

another version of this could be: once, electra was scolded by jenny, and being especially sensitive to the disapproval of the older cats, especially one she admired, she got really upset. so pouncival and etcetera “took revenge” for her by sneakily asking demeter and bombalurina to help them write a musical number about jenny. pouncival made the costumes and they secretly performed it for electra, twisting the meaning to make fun of the old gumbie cat instead. normally electra wouldn’t be too happy about this, but she was still upset at jenny at the time and it gave her the catharsis she needed.

both were more than successful.

pouncival also made the notorious candy cane bagpipes. plato, being tugger’s other biggest fan, begged pounce to help him create a special birthday gift for him to give to tugger. pounce isn’t sure what tugger’s response was, but it left plato smiling for days.

during the production of “the pekes and the pollicles”, an extremely stressed out munkustrap gave pouncival the job of costume design, collaborating with mungojerrie and rumpleteazer. with the help of their smart looting skills, the three made exceptional costumes for all four breeds of dog as well as rumpus cat, earning them lead roles (though munkustrap might have regretted that) and a pat on the head.

pouncival the knockabout cat lives!!! or maybe pouncival the invention cat?

(also why are his eyes lowkey so beautiful)

[punk-chicken-radio]

Time to Get Dirty…..

…..no, not that kind of dirty…..I mean dirty dirty…..with actual dirt…..often in my work I encounter a lot of dirt and grime…..but like they say, where there’s muck there’s brass…..and sometimes there’s no other way to get the job done than get stuck in and get your hands dirty…..

…..and at the moment it’s not just at work…..I’ve just started some remodelling at home…..digging holes…..knocking bits down…..and generally making a big mess…..@loveaxiomatic said she’d come over and help but she lost her safety crocs in the swamp…..excuses 🙄…..

…..of course, mud and dirt aren’t the only type of filth I have to deal with at work…..nearly every piece of furniture I move has a ton of dust on the top or down the back…..it gets everywhere, even in my mouth, which is a bit worrying as they say a lot of it is dead skin…..

…..you know what’s up next…..a bunch of songs about dirty stuff…..

Cruddy Kisses 😘

love(it was lol)axiomatic

The Old(is 25 across Eastman?)Smelly

[tophatandboots]

It's great that as an adult, I am able to designate a pretty dress as my gardening clothes

And nobody punishes me for getting mud on it, because it is My gardening (or digging holes / dragging rocks / idk things I've done lately that involve dirt) dress. It is supposed to get covered in mud. It's black. It washes. I am the one in charge of the washing.

'why don't you wear jeans-' fucking hate jeans. Modern jeans are bullshit. If I squat to pick up a paving stone they'll split right up the crotch. Can't use them as a basket to carry a bunch of gravel either.

"You were digging the hole that fucked up your heart all night in... A dress??" And blue sparkly wellies! Even I try to avoid using a shovel barefoot.

[bannock-freak]

remember Chrys and Callum and Ren from shitshow? well i unearthed this wip of them being fail adults. may have posted it on tumblr before? and then deleted it? couldn't say. regardless it entertains me so rated M. yay? gore drugs murder suicide mention. but its funny. i promise. or i think its funny. anyways

The smell of the pine trees, wet dirt, and cold damp air reminded Callum of Nanaimo. 

‘Fuck,’ Was the thought which followed immediately thereafter. ‘Now I want Nanaimo Bars.’ 

Dismissing the craving that burned in him at the thought, for he wouldn’t be getting any of those any time soon in the state of New York, Callum flung another shovelful of dirt over his shoulder. 

“Feels like it’s gonna rain,” He said, looking over the line of the handle to the man on the other side of the hole.  

Chrys looked up and Callum was pleased to see that he didn’t cut a particularly romantic figure at the moment. His blond hair was plastered to his forehead, glasses crooked and smudged on his red dirty face, and his clothes were so thick with moisture and mud they hung in unflattering bulky wrinkles. It was a delightful contrast to the Chrys that Callum was adjusted to. Even hot off the soccer field Chrysanthemum “My Mom was a Botanist” Slate had managed to come across as fresh and happy as, well, as a flower. Chrys was always smiling. Always sweet. Rarely busted a sweat even when he was throwing around heavy crates full of delicates for his antiquities business. Right now, very little of those Classic Americana good looks remained, and the smug happiness Callum felt at seeing it almost made up for the fact that he was here, in this hole, probably looking worse than the man across from him.

After all, Callum had more hair to get dirt and sweat in.

Fuck the shower he was going to need after this was going to be the most embarrassing, frustrating, orgasmic medicine he would ever see in this life, Callum was sure of it. In the meantime, the schadenfreude would just have to do.

He really, sincerely, hated this asshole.

As he rammed the shovel into the ground again, Callum quirked a brow at the blond, blowing a strand of sticky black hair out of his eyes, and 'smiled'. 

“Betcha anything we’re gonna get soaked in thirty.” He looked at the dirt, trying to ignore the burning in his shoulders, his arms, his hips, fuck, his neck as he heaved another shovelful out the hole. “We should call it quits here, soon.”

“How the fuck would you know?” Chrys said more than asked as he, too, heave-ho’d another heap of dirt. 

 A bunch of it got into his hair. Callum managed to keep his snickering to himself but he wished he could take a picture of this. Memorialize this. Picture perfect Chrys, all over in dirt and mud. Wonderful. His scowl was deep. Metaphor demanded Callum compare the depth of said scowl to the hole they were in, and he did. 

The hole lost. 

‘Any other day and my bank account for a camera.’

“I can feel it in my bones!” Callum rattled out a groan, adopting a high humped stoop over his shovel and wiggling about with arthritic flair. “You listen here sonny, it’s gonna start coming down any minute now.” 

Chrys gave him a disgusted look, and cemented the vibe with an obnoxious roll of his eyes. Uhg. Disgusting.

“Well if it’s gonna rain,” He said, “Better dig faster, then.” 

Because he was an adult, Callum did not stick his tongue out at the man across from him.

It was a close call though.

Even so he couldn’t deny an eyeroll. “Yes, sir.” 

Sounded a bit more like “Fuck you” than he wanted to admit but whatever, cut a guy some slack. Callum had been fucking digging for two and a half hours and there was still at minimum one more foot to go, according to Sir Almighty Dick Face. 

“Why the hell’m I here anyway?” Callum grumbled to himself, no small amount of bitter about his present situation. “I hate you. You hate me. Why did you even call me. I wouldn’t help you paint your kitchen for a pizza and ten pounds of weed.”

He could be at home, he reflected. Ripping from his bong while he wrote or got nose deep in a book. Or better yet, Callum began to salivate, he could be in a nice, roasting hot bath up to his neck in thick luxurious bubbles, soaking up the scent of his favourite incense and sipping at some Pinot Grigio, which he usually hated because he was one of those unlucky people who could taste the tannins but anything was better than being in this fucking hole. 

His skin shivered through the damp of his hoodie, a fact which his aching muscles didn’t appreciate. Callum yearned with more ferocity than he’d ever felt for anything. 

‘And then,’ He thought, viciously stabbing the dirt. ‘I’ll order those goddamn Nanaimo Bars, straight from B.C., and I will laugh.’

The man across from him scrubbed his hair back from his eyes with his wrist, sighed, and buried the spade of his shovel again. “Because Ren didn’t want to break a nail and, while you’re not wrong, you’re also literally the only other person who can help me with this unless we get him involved.” 

Callum grumbled. Chrys grunted in mutual appreciation. 

Blast the power of mutual friends. 

But at least Chrys sounded a little sympathetic. At least Chrys was in the hole with him. At least Chrys wasn’t worried about getting his hands dirty.  

Or breaking a nail.  

“Whatever.” Callum said, the epitome of wit. “I still hate you.” 

“Feelings mutual, slut.” Chrys snorted. “Still digging, aren’t you?” 

Callum’s turn to roll his eyes. “Get fucked, cockwart.” 

Watching Chrys’s nose wrinkle in dismay was definitely worth the vulgarity. “Ew. Why would you say that?” 

“One, you literally just called me a slut. Two, better question. Why am I here?” 

“Like.” Despite how breathless he was, Chrys was still managing sarcasm very well. It was a nice change, actually, the guy usually liked to pretend sarcasm didn’t exist even as he maintained his joyful demeanour with enough irony to curl a hipster’s moustache. “Philosophically speaking, or?” 

Or not. Fuck this version, actually, because yes, that was exactly what he’d been getting at. Callum knew exactly why he was here. He even knew why Chrys had asked for his help specifically, and it wasn’t just in thanks to the power of mutual friends, one of which Chrys had done a major solid for.

No. Callum wrote a certain genre of books for a living. Of course he’d be the first person Chrys would call.

That didn’t mean he wanted an answer for his rhetorical bitching. 

“Hey, Aristo-thot.” Callum shook his head, feeling the coil of braided hair on the nape of his neck wiggle. “Do not.” 

Chrys said, “Whatever.”

He stabbed the dirt, stabbed the shovel in deeper with a good hard kick, and heaved it out in a motion that’d become so routine he’d bungle it if he took two seconds to think about it. Out of his periphery he blearily noted Chrys pausing to look up. A second later Callum felt a telling smack of water hit him right on the back of his sticky hot neck. 

Here it was, he thought as he straightened to squint at the sky. The joy of being right.

To Chrys, Callum said, “Oh good, your tone was so dry even the sky noticed.”

“Well,” Chrys said with a tone that was a confused mess of stubborn FuckYouittude, resignation, and pure out of breath exertion. “Guess you were right.” 

The way he said it made it feel like an accusation, so Callum gave him a nasty grin and hoped the crookedness of his teeth would aggravate Chrys even more. 

“Guess so. Wanna call it quits?” 

Chrys sighed, and looked at the ground for a long moment like he was considering it. Eventually, to Callum’s disgruntlement, his face journey gave way to resignation and he said, “No. We still have one more foot.” 

Callum couldn’t withhold his very heartfelt groan. Seriously? “Dude, fuck off, man, it’s been three hours and I’m tired and it’s literally starting to rain! You seriously wanna spend another one fucking digging out another foot in the fucking rain?” 

Chrys’s glower was powerful. “Well I’m sorry that it has to be six feet!” 

Callum threw down his shovel. “Doesn’t.” 

“Does too!” 

“Doesn’t,” Callum said and began to clamber out of the hole. 

“It does fucking too!” 

The sky was giving a friendly reminder via a gentle drizzle. Callum turned to face Chrys and threw his arms open wide. “Why.” 

Chrys blinked. His pissy face adopted a hint of confusion so Callum elaborated.  

“Why’s it gotta be that deep?” 

Chrys blinked again, good for him, and started, “Well-” 

“I’ll answer for you,” Callum interrupted because no. Just no. “It doesn’t. Not after the bubonic plague. Modern day America?” Callum held up his fingers. “Four feet.” 

Chrys decided to be obtuse, apparently, because in return he said, “Okay, one more foot then!” 

Callum looked at his best friend’s boyfriend for a long, long minute while he caught his breath. Rainwater tapped out faster across his head and shoulders, dripped into his shirt, trickled its invasive bony coldness into the heat of his scalp. Chrys gave him the finger.

Callum turned around, grabbed the body by its legs and dropped all of it onto Chrys’s very stupid feet, which would no doubt be flipping him the bird too if they could, and therefore deserved it. The yowl which resulted was something Callum felt to his soul. He closed his eyes to drink it in with all the revelry it deserved, the effect of it so much that when he exhaled his stress released.

“Don’t let him smack you on your way out,” Callum said, then left for the significantly drier interior of his car.

~~~ 

There were a lot of ways to dispose of a body.

Burying one, in Callum’s personal opinion, was probably the worst way to do it. Unfortunately he neither had the lye, the pigs, nor the wood chipper for his personal favourites, and buying any of the aforementioned body-get-rid-of-ers immediately after a death was a one way trip to the slammer that would end in a conversation with his mom he, frankly, sincerely wished to avoid. But they had an impromptu coffin cobbled together out of palettes and driftwood, one tarp, a deer carcass, a fireplace, and a meat grinder that Callum would never be using ever again, so.

There was that.

“We have deer in New York, right?” Chrys asked.

“Careful,” Callum muttered as he surveyed the mess with the sinking feeling that he was probably in over his head. “Your city boy is showing.”

“You say that like you hunt.”

“I go outside. I touch grass. I take nature hikes. Did you know,” Callum was sure the sarcasm was dripping from him just like other things were currently dripping from other, other things. “The state of New York also has gophers?”

Chrys hummed an acknowledgement. They stood in silence.

“...Is that a y-”

Callum nodded. “That’s a yes, yes.”

Then he turned to the man next to him, gestured at the mess, and said, “Jesus Tap-Dancing Christ on a hot dog, what in the sweet loving merciful good green Earth did you do to that man?”

If there was ever a way to describe blood at a crime scene, Callum thought as he looked back over the mess, that never failed to impress upon him, it was the word ‘everywhere’. Because sometimes it did do that. The method, the viciousness, the location of the body, those often had a lot to do with the amount of everything that ended up everywhere. In his research for his books, Callum had found the eeriest photographs to be the ones where there was actually mostly nothing.

He was revising this opinion.

The stink alone was enough to sizzle his nose hairs. Callum tried to find words to describe it for future reference, threw the lot out, and decided after this he’d make a jump to a different genre of fiction because this was turning his stomach. The feeling of being in over his head was pressing, now. In all fairness, Callum was an idiot, and an idiot practiced in denial at that. It was only when Chrys had presented the hands and feet for deboning like the world’s worst puppy (complete with the requisite puppy dog eyes) upon him responding to an 'emergency call' that Callum had even understood his best friend’s boyfriend was neither hopping the Halloween train a month early, nor had he been speaking in hypotheticals.

Yesterday evening, Callum’s best friend’s boyfriend had murdered a man. Who also just so happened to be Callum’s other best friend’s boyfriend. 

Chrys scratched the back of his neck, looking sheepish in a way that usually spoke to giving someone a belated birthday card as opposed to, you know, murdering a man. His ears were even red.

“At least have the grace to look a bit nauseated!” Callum snapped.

“I am! I am! I think.” Chrys shrugged and folded his arms, his shoulders bowing inwards. “Honestly I kinda stopped smelling it a little while ago.”

Aghast, Callum pointed at the everything of it all. “How?”

There was even poop. The really impressive part was the way it had hit the ceiling, like Chrys had used his victim’s intestines for silly string. That was not generally something Callum saw in crime scene photos. Callum stared at it and wondered if he really actually knew the man next to him.

“Uh. Got used to it, maybe.”

“Right…” Callum could follow that. “So...was it a machete, or…?”

“Among other things.”

Callum looked at the blond next to him. “You didn’t buy them from Home Depot, did you?” Uhg, the paper trail...

Chrys shook his head. “Oh no, no. He had one laying around. And a bowie knife, a hatchett, a couple of pistols, one of those really big guns you get from Walmart. I only used his stuff.”

The sinking feeling was sinking deeper. He didn’t really want to know this but all the same Callum asked, “How many murder weapons have his DNA on them?”

Chrys grimaced. “Uh. Moooore than one?” He looked at Callum, his eyebrows twisted and his honey eyes big, a look Callum was very familiar with because it usually resulted in watching Chrys get his way with something. This had never failed to infuriate him. “You know what to do, right?!”

Callum met the man’s eyes and rued the day they’d ever met. After he finished with his new favourite activity, he nodded. “Yes. I do.”

“What’s that?!”

Callum looked back at the mess and sighed. “Kill myself.”

“Or, I have a better idea!” A cheerful voice piped up behind them, marked by the opening and closing of the door. 

“What’s that?” Callum called back, turning to greet Ren with his most solemn expression. “Because I’ve heard the weather on the København is really nice this time of year.”

Ren’s sunny grin turned grim. “Way to be a buzzkill, Cal, shit.”

“There is that…” Callum muttered, gaze magnetized to the ceiling in a moment of intense word association. 

Ren’s eyes swung upward too and his full, rosey mouth pulled into a grimace so stark it almost made the rouge on his cheeks pale. “Ah. A little on the nose. I am...very sorry. Uhm. Chrys? Sweety? I just want you to know I love you very much.”

Chrys nodded with a somewhat more fitting expression of sadness and shame. “I love you too, Ren.”

“That said, the next time I ask you to get rough,” Ren looked back at the ceiling. “Uhm.” He looked at Chrys with a glimmering smile. “Ignore me!”

“I would never-”

“Ignore me or kill me?”

“...Both. I feel like the answer is both.”

Callum did not want to hear about how his favourite frenemy fucked, so decided to break in right then and there, probably in much the same way that Chrys had broken into this poor man’s home before he’d done the deed. He shivered.

“Anyways, Ren, you said you had a better idea?”

“Oh! Yes.” Ren nodded, and sighed heavily. “Now. We all know how much I hate to do this, but, and now hang with me here-”

Callum groaned. “Ren.”

“Okay, bad choice of words given the meat dangling from the ceiling, I know, I heard it as soon as I said it, I’m sorry. But just hang with me, here.” Ren steepled his hands in front of his face, his eyes closed. The long eyelashes he wore fluttered, and Callum saw all the hints that Ren didn’t like what he was about to say anymore than they were enjoying the smell of the room they were presently standing in. 

Which meant only one thing.

“You think we should call your dad.” Callum said, interrupting Ren’s air-suck to say what he’d just said.

The air exhaled from Ren’s lungs with a mightiness that came from blowing many breathalyzers. After a couple of seconds the shorter man turned to look up at him and said, “It is just eerie how you do that, but yes, that’s exactly what I was going to say.”

Callum shrugged. Why not? “I’m down.”

“I’m not!” Chrys said in the high pitched tone of a man feeling the press of his hopeful future father-in-law’s hand crushing his balls. “That’s an awful idea! No! Please don’t.”  

Ren turned to Chrys and captured the man’s face between his hands. Callum couldn’t help but notice the contrast, helped along by how pale Chrys was at that moment, and also the fact that said man had basically stopped going outside in his free time since his parents died a few years back. If they weren’t standing in front of a real waste of a mess, he might have been able to appreciate the aesthetic of tan against pale, but they were, so he couldn’t.

‘I wonder if that has anything to do with this. The dead parents thing. Raising his sister...’ Callum’s eyes flitted around again, drawn inexplicably with all the gravity of the world’s trashiest reality show, and he pulled his shirt over his nose. ‘Buddy finally cracked.’

“Chrys,” Ren said with a smile that was not smiling. “Babe. Father of our future adopted children. Man who I sleep next to at night. As I said, I love you very much. That is a beautiful result of having known you for many years, having grown up next to you, having watched you grow into a kind, humble, and giving man who inspires me to do better, who picks me up when I’m low, who will cuddle me and soothe me when I watch the Kardashians. It’s because I’ve known you for so long,” Chrys’s cheeks were rising up between the press of Ren’s hands, the glitter of the gems on his nails almost matching the beading sweat on Chrys’s greying forehead. “That I know for goddamn well sure that you’re not actually asking me to clean this mess. Right?”

Callum could hear Chrys’s gulp from here.

“Right.” Chrys agreed. “Of course not.”

“And while Cal did help you debone things that should never require deboning,” Ren continued with increasing pleasantness. “I’m pretty sure my bestie isn’t down for cleaning up your mess either. Right, hon?”

Callum reached out and met the blind low-five with a slap of his own blind five. “Right in one, babe.”

“Always got your back, boo. So that means either you clean up this toxic waste site that really should require a team of highly trained professionals well used to erasing every trace of human...well, of human,” Ren’s eyes had no doubt also moved to take in the mess of, yes, ‘human’ was a good way to describe it. “Or we call my papa, who can hire said team of highly trained professionals. Or tell me where to hire said team of highly trained professionals if I pose to him a hypothetical.”

“I wish it smelled like a hypothetical,” Callum couldn’t hold in his groan. “This is going to follow me into my dreams…”

Ren shrugged and nodded, his strawberry blond mop of curls bouncing with the motion. “Fair point. Speaking of,” He looked back at the man whose jaw was still housed in his hand. “So, man of my dreams, what do you say?”

“...” Chrys heaved a sigh. “I say that this is going to make my asking him for permission to marry you when I find the right ring very difficult but if you think that’s best then,” He reached up and pulled Ren’s hands to his mouth, kissing them. “I trust you, and am grateful for your help out of this mess.”

“Oh don’t worry so much, papa’s seen worse...even though it’s one hell of a mess,” Ren smiled, this time for real, but it waned somewhat when he looked at the expanse of human on the everything again. “To...put it lightly. Uhm. What on earth did you do to him?”

Callum whipped around. “RIGHT? How is there even anything left to bury!?”

Ren nodded rapidly. “I don’t know whether to be impressed or scared.”

“Honestly,” Chrys said with a grimace of his own. “Me either.”

[drowning-in-cacophony]

Fractures

Written for @flashfictionfridayofficial Prompt 268: Fractured Forms

[Summary: what is fractured never heals back perfectly normal]

“Sorry,” he says.

She winces, a hand slipping past the cracks spiralling up one side. The fingers, the skin, phasing like a laser out of sync with a camera’s frames; even the ghostly touch burns acid against what shivering organs lie inside. It’s not his fault, not really. He didn’t know it’d turn out this way.

But he’d done it, so she blames him a little anyway.

“I’ll fix it,” he promises, a falsehood off his tongue. Sure, he believes it as honestly as his lungs crave air. She knows better. When you fracture something, it’ll never heal back the same it was before the crack. Her unbroken form is a long gone memory now.

He should have left her in the dirt. He should have left her.

“We need to focus.” Her voice raspy, her throat painful. Is this what it’s always going to be like now? She forces a hand away from her gaping insanity, something that never should have been possible and yet here she is. Dressed in borrowed clothes, her old jacket over the top – he’d kept that, and if she presses her nose to the collar, she thinks she can just about catch her old perfume. Freesia blooms, staining the fabric like the blood scattered on the hem. Freckles, haunting proof of the near past.

The clothes slip and phase into the fractures. A slippery slope their mere drape cannot fight.

His eyes sharpen, his nod a shaky mess. “Yes. Yes, we do. Do you… do you have an idea what we should do about it all?”

Her sigh tastes stale against the back of her teeth. Her tongue flickers, bone then gum then something foreign splitting against the inside of her cheek. He’d break reality for her, wrap fingers around something so stuck it’ll break as pulled, and yet it’s still at her altar he’d implore. That’s the whole driving reason, likely. Staring off into a world churning, and there’s only one mind that he could rely on to dig them out of this.

“After you show me what’s happened.”

“As soon as this bus turns up.” He cranes around her to check the winding road, empty of the hulking rectangular shape. His eyes distracted, she peels back her coat and peers down at herself. The fracturing of her form. An ugly wound, the eye-aching edges. The colours burn at her retinas, the impossibility of it all. Looking at it has her teeth on edge – or is that just the fissure growing against her mouth, a sensitivity to set them off? He shouldn’t have done this. Not if he was going to deliver her dripping in thoughtless selfishness.

Desperation, though. It does horrid, crazy things: he’d probably been a horrid crazy thing without her.

Not too much longer, the bus comes trundling towards them, bright yellow streaks to banish the gentle autumn chill on their ankles. Her coat falls over the crater, the casting of a shadow, the closing of her eyelids when she’d turned to that blissful dark before. They take a seat, his knee bumping against hers, and let the thing drive them into town. The landscape blurs outside of rain-spotted glass. His fingers twitch and brush against her leg. Fingertips scraping against her jeans like they’re wet sand, pieces of her bunching up underneath blunt nails.

If she looks at him, she’ll trace his next apology from his eyes. So when she winces, a split throbbing brighter on the threads of her sweater, she keeps looking at the window. The chipping of cheap rubber, the grey sky stretching out beyond.

“When we get to town, lead me through the epicentre,” she tells him, still not looking. “Show me all the damage. Then we can see what we can do.”

He’s close enough, in these small bus seats, that she can smell the thick constant of his signature scent, that chemical deodorant undercut by the mustiness of his coat. It’s still covered in a fine layer of dust from the Facility, mud decorating the sleeves like tatty embroidery from where he’d dug. His consequences will wash out with a good cycle around the machine.

He’s made hers permanent.

“I know you’ll be able to see what I can’t,” he says. Like it’s obvious, like she’s his saviour descending down from the sky. She’s always been able to see what he can’t; she’s always been the one he turns to. “We’ll find a terminal afterwards if you need it. I know a couple places – things have-” He coughs, a small thing into his coat, unable to muffle the awkwardness. “Things have changed a bit.”

Her reflection doubles as the bus begins to take a corner. An unwieldy thing that’ll still squeeze through the gap because it has to, and the angle has her face splitting. Her eye overlaps at the edges, an image in sympathy.

Her side gives a stirring throb.

His fingers give a sweaty, apologetic pinch.

The city rears up, a handful of engine growls and pin-tight corners later. They’re not the only ones to get off, an old lady with a cane scampering off before her, paying no mind to the shallow ditch cracked through the dirt. One of the new scars for her to greet. She stands underneath the flag of another bus stop, gazing out at a city bearing its own fractures. Torn through concrete, weeds already starting to determinedly claim back what they can. If they grew on her, maybe they’d knit her into some sort of togetherness, fix the mistake he’s left shattered throughout her form. It wouldn't be the same, however. She's never going to be the same.

He steps down behind her, his sigh coffee-dark in the strands of her hair.

“This way,” he says, holding out his hand to her.

Keeping one hovering underneath the fabric of her coat, acid splashing against her palm, she lets her other hand go to his.

[reallyhardy]

actually i need to put some GOOD in my life onto the blog, bye bye 🩸period vent posts🩸, hello really wonderful experience i had recently:

so most months once a month i get my sweet sweet gig of outdoor art messy play with families at the art gallery in our garden. we make magic potions with leaves and water and sometimes dried tea and spices for extra magic, and we do mud painting with just like dirt that i dig out of a big hole in the ground.

it's THEEEE most fun i get to have, basically just rush around refilling buckets of water and seeing kids have fun learning about how to be creative with what there is around us to use (for free) but of course it generates a lot of mess...

well last summer during our outdoor play sessions i got quite a lot of different volunteers who would come help out on different days, and we encourage family volunteering where people can bring their kids and the kids get to wear volunteer t-shirts but we basically just tell them their job is to be in charge of 'fun'. anyway this one lady brought her twins, boy and girl, age about 6 on a few days and OMG these kids. such shining little humans, and always so ready to help out with tidying up. i remember by the end of summer i had to send their mum a message just to tell her what a great job she's done raising her two lil superstars honestly...

anyway last saturday i was doing the first outdoor art club of the year and it was getting to the last hour when this lady and her twins arrive and the absolute JOY on their faces 😭😭😭 never seen any child look happier to see me that wasn't a member of my family - or maybe more so i cannot lie. they were like "OMG LOREN'S HERE! the guy at the desk said it wasn't you running it today!" and i was like "WOAH well i am here and what a wonderful surprise to see you guys here!" like literally. so so sweet and adorable.

so we played around for a bit, they tried out painting and all the activities, anyway obviously i had still to attend to all the other visitors but i kept circling back, then when it was packdown time and me and the other facilitator started tidying... the twins came back around and kept on asking all the different ways to help out, they helped me rinse down all the mud paint palettes and put everything away, even helped me carry a bunch of easels inside... i kept trying to tell them "okay great job thank you for your help! i got this from here" but they were SO determined to make sure they helped me with every little thing 🥺 like obvs. little children i am much stronger than you yes i can lift this easel on my own and prob get it done way faster too but i SO so appreciate you wanting to help me.

anyway sent another message to their mum the next day just gushing about her lil critters, she sent me a whole heartfelt message back saying my thank you message is going in a scrapbook. just... so so sweet. maybe on those days, i literally DO have the best job ever i can't even deny it. for me it's perfect

[weirdkayak]

A little story I want to add to this, but there's an elementary school I pass by almost daily on my way to work, and near the back of the field is a fence and then farmland, the owner of the farm put stakes in the ground behind the fence because the kids were digging a hole under the fence.

Eventually the kids stole the stakes and started using thwm as rudimentary tools to dig the hole, it was interesting to watch their progress over the span of a month they had dug a hole depe enough for a six year old to stand in it and not be seen, it was really very impressive.

At this point they were just digging for the sake of digging, but of course summer break started and in less than a day the school had the hole filled in and the area blocked off. I felt disappointed, it was an impressive hole and the fact that upwards of ten kids would come together to dig it and take turns was interesting, it made me think about the prospect of studying stuff like that, why a group of kids were able to come together to do something so pointless to an impressive degree.

It all brought back memories of when I was in elementary school, during recess a bunch of kids, myself included, would all race to the back of the field where there was a little patch of trees in the corner, we would dig up dirt and use sand and small pebbles from the playground and mix it together in a hole with water from other kids water bottles to make mud and clay, and we would stack rocks and sticks with it, making a stone wall.

There wasn't a point in building the stone wall, we just liked doing it and it felt like we were accomplishing something. Of course after summer break we would all come back to find it gone and our holes filled, but that didn't stop us from going right back to building a new wall.

My point is, kids will do things for what seems like a pointless reason, but why does it need a reason? Dig a hole, build a wall, kids don't care why they're doing it, it's just fun and makes them feel like they've accomplished something.

i think it is unjust to deny a child their right to dig a hole motivelessly

[mistakenot4892]

Nebula blevdog April '24

This post was crossposted from cohost.

Quite a bit to talk about this month! Mostly relating to the various crafting and building systems being put into place for the low-fantasy map, currently titled Shaded Hills.

Nebula SS13 is an open source project based on the Baystation 12 version of Space Station 13. SS13 is a topdown multiplayer simulation game where you play the crew of a ship, station, colony, etc. depending on your fork and map, with the Nebula and Bay forks having a focus on roleplaying and simulation interactions.

Notable changes

Fair bit of boring backend stuff - some HUD code has been streamlined, the way stack recipes are handled has been redone, and using an item with even the slightest heat difference to the target will no longer 'carefully heat' it.

Penny removed a metric shitload of unused procs and variables, cleaning up the codebase and revealing that a bunch of really fiddly DNA code just... doesn't need to exist anymore. Blessed.

The fantasy map is now merged into the main dev branch, and has been receiving periodic updates from Penny and I. It's slowly approaching a state where it can be playable...

Flame sources like matches and lighters have been reworked, and now include fueled lanterns and torches, which can be crafted. This is mainly to support the fantasy map, but also means you can hotbox the station in carbon monoxide with 200 lighters burning at once, if that appeals to you.

Farms have been redone. Rather than building a plot out of stone, you now dig a plot into a dirt or mud turf. Plots will take water from adjacent water sources or rain, and you can fence them with bricks to prevent people walking over them and squashing your crops.

Various other crafting systems are in, albeit in skeletal form. Metalwork, tanning, making catgut, and weaving cloth are now supported. You can grow cotton, process it on a spinning wheel to make thread, and then weave the thread into cloth on a loom.

Fishing got merged. It's basically Stardew Valley without the minigame, currently. If I can get through my backlog in a reasonable timeframe I'm going to try working on a proper little minigame for it, but it's a pretty chill mechanic currently.

Bugs of note

r5 is overdue, mostly because I've been putting my after-work dev hours into random stuff like weaving or clothing code. Hoping to get onto that before making any more big feature PRs. I have instructed the dev channel to smack me if I open more feature PRs before r5 is stable.

While testing campfire cooking I was saddened to discover that all of my food would get up to cooking temperature and then instantly melt into 'liquid nutriment' which fertilized the ground under my campfire.

Downstream on Scav, dexterity changes resulted in one of the species being totally unable to pick up or use items with the only inventory slot they had capable of doing so (their mouth). 'Baxxid Stares Longingly At Vending Machine' indeed.

Current priorities

r5 is the main priority, we need to get that stable as soon as possible. r6 is going to be enormous due to all the crafting changes and several big backend rewrites like the removal of /turf/simulated.

I'm working on getting the fantasy map into a state where we can actually run a round, off and on. There's still a pretty big laundry list of props we need to be able to get the map populated, but it's all pretty achievable.

My storage rewrite PR is now up to its fourth or fifth rebase. Please save me from this PR.

[haunted-girlyy]

A rough day

(mean, insulting, Kevin hates the ghouls)

Kevin hates the ghouls.

Not because he's afraid of them, no, on the contrary, you can't have less respect for them than Kevin. He just thinks they're annoying little beasts, like particularly vicious chihuahuas from hell.

Dewdrop, Phantom and Rain especially get on his nerves. Phantom because he's always clinging to Kevin like a leech. Dewdrop because he's a nasty little gremlin who just causes chaos that Kevin then has to clean up. And Rain isn't actually that bad but he isn't good at speaking human language that Kevin usually doesn't understand what the water ghoul is stammering anyway. Not that he would care anyway.

Well, Kevin could speak ghoulish if he wanted to, but in the end these pests would annoy him even more.

The worst is when he has to fix something in the ghoul wing. For example, the other day, when he just wanted to clean the clogged drain in the kitchen sink, he was surrounded by ghouls within a few minutes. They reminded him of a bunch of starving cats, the way they stalked around him and cast curious glances over his shoulder. Phantom was immediately glued to him again, practically tugging at Kevin's hair and clothes.

Then Aether, who kept his distance but intermittently gave advice that Kevin hadn't asked for.

"You should unscrew the drain pipe first" and "are you sure you've mixed the cleaning concentrate sufficiently? Otherwise it could damage the pipes."

Kevin wanted to hit Aether in the face. But instead he contented himself with glaring at the sink while he worked.

At one point he accidentally hit Rain's forehead with his knee because Rain was squeezing himself on the floor between him and the bucket that Kevin had used to catch all the muck from the drainpipe. With an annoyed look, Kevin noticed that the water ghoul had started collecting small pieces that had landed in the drainpipe from the bucket.

"Stop that! You're just making everything dirty," he growled as Rain pulled his hands back and placed a marble, dripping with dirt, on the ground. Rain just babbled incomprehensible things as he began to dig in the muck again. "Why are u so rude to Rainy?" whispered Phantom and came so close to Kevin that he felt the ghoul's warm breath brushing over his ear.

Kevin sighed with the burden of a man who would rather tend a sack full of fleas than a handful of ghouls. Why couldn't the clergy have chosen other demons? There were many species that were less unruly than ghouls. Kevin even had the feeling that ghouls not only enjoyed the chaos, but that they actually drew their energy from it. He had once expressed this thought to sister Imperator, but she had just laughed at him and said that he just had to learn to assert himself. That could only come from someone who didn't have to deal with these plagues on a daily basis.

Annoyed, Kevin stuck the spiral into the drain to push out the last bit of dirt, while at the same time swatting away Rain's fingers that had appeared on the edge of the sink.

Since Copia had risen to the top of the ministry and had a bit more say, Kevin was no longer even allowed to sprinkle holy water on the ghouls to keep them away. After all, that would hurt the ghouls, the youngest Emeterius brother had explained his decision. Simply ridiculous. When Kevin had started working for the clergy, ghouls had just been treated like ghouls. But since Copia had shown up here, Kevin had to treat these creatures as if they had more feelings than lust, hunger and thirst.

Finally, the resistance in the drain was released and with a slap, a pile of mud landed in the bucket. "Is that...sand?" asked Aether, astonished. Kevin shrugged his shoulders in resignation. "How do I fucking know what kind of crap you always pour down the drain?!" He pulled the spiral back and knelt under the sink to screw the pipe back on. Phantom also knelt down next to him and grabbed one of Kevin's long strands of hair to chew on. "I'm clearly not being paid well enough for this," the brown haired growled, shooing back first Phantom and then Rain, whose hand had already disappeared back into the bucket. Under the curious gaze of the ghouls, Kevin screwed the pipe back on, sat up with his aching back and picked up the bucket. "Would be nice if you could just stop breaking or clogging anything for more than three days," Kevin grumbled, looking sternly at Aether. The quint had spent the last few minutes watching with his hands on his hips and a critical expression. "I'm doing my best, but you know what they're like." Kevin only snorted in response. He watched as Aether disappeared into the living room before he turned to leave. The ghoul was talking to Kevin as if they were eye to eye. Kevin shook his head. Ghouls.

He was about to close the door behind him when Rain slithered through and tugged at his sleeve. His big blue eyes bored into his. "What?" Kevin asked slightly suprised.

Rain's mouth opened and closed a few times without any words coming out. Then, finally, when Kevin's already extremely thin thread of patience was about to snap, Rain managed to say a word. "Encore."

He had always thought that Rain simply didn't speak human language, but apparently the ghoul was just dumb. In a good-natured tone, as if he was talking to someone particularly retarded, Kevin replied. "I know you did a great job on the film. We're all very proud of you. But I," he pointed to himself, "have to go now," he pointed to the door. Rain tilted his head, confused.

He's probably doing this so that the few brain cells he has will slip into the same corner, Kevin thought spitefully.

The water ghoul tugged at his sleeve again, this time more frantically. "Encore! Encore! Encore! Dew!" Confused, Kevin turned around and froze. Dewdrop stood at the sink and calmly poured a thick liquid into it. Kevin now also noticed the penetrating smell of ammonia.

This fucking little shit poured wall paint into the sink.

Kevin just stared at him. The man was too stunned to even utter a word. He definitely needed a bottle of whiskey tonight. Better yet, two. And brandy. A lot of it.

[thegettingbyp2]

So I was thinking for a smutty Johnny fic, maybe something where he comes home all exhausted and dirty so you jump in the shower with him and clean him off, then leading to you making him feel better in other ways😏, leading to some loving shower sex ?

Cleaned Up

It was late so you decided to wait for Johnny to come home in bed, reading your book. Your ears perked up when you head the front door bang closed and footsteps making their way up the stairs until Johnny appeared in the doorway of your bedroom. He was covered in mud with blood dried along his temple and down his cheek so you put your book down to get up and go over to him.

‘Heya, sweetheart,’ he breathed out, he sounded tired.

‘Hey,’ you said, leaning up to press a quick kiss on his cheek. ‘How was your day? What happened?’ you asked as your thumb rubbed lightly along the dried blood coating his face.

‘It was alright, hit my head pretty bad but got checked out and I’m all good, I’m just tired. I’m gonna hop in the shower and then I’ll come to bed.’

‘Are you too tired for company in the shower?’ you asked, looking up at him and biting your lip lightly. There was something about Johnny being coated in dirt that you couldn’t help but find attractive. Johnny perked up at your words and his arm came to wrap around your waist and pull you tight against him.

‘I’m never too tired to see you in the shower sweetheart,’ Johnny said, leaning his head down until his lips were brushing yours, ‘why don’t you go and get the water going and I’ll be in in a second,’ he said, his hand brushing down to land a light slap on your ass before gently shoving you in the direction of your shared en-suite. Decided to be a bit of a tease, you slowly undid the knot of the silk kimono you were wearing and turning around before you let it drop, revealing that you were wearing nothing underneath before walking into the bathroom and turning the shower on.

From the bedroom, you could hear the sound of Johnny’s clothes hitting the floor before he bunched them in his arms and tossing them in the hamper in the corner of your room. You stepped into the shower and sighed as the warm water rushed over your shoulders. You soon heard the shower door open and close again, a pair of arms wrap around your middle and Johnny’s lips landed on your shoulder, trailing up into your neck and settling along your jaw.

‘You look amazing, sweetheart,’ he murmured against your skin as his kisses got harder, his teeth nipping at your skin every now and then.

You turned around in his arms and looped your arms around his neck, connecting your lips together. He immediately took control of the kiss, moving you both backwards until your back was pressed firmly against the tile wall and Johnny was standing directly underneath the shower head, the warm water washing down his face and body.

‘PJ,’ you gasped, fisting your fingers in the dark, wet strands at the back of his head as he groaned against your mouth. You turned your head to the side, Johnny’s head diving back to your neck straight away as you pushed him back lightly and reached to the side to grab the shower gel from the shelf. Johnny stepped back slightly to give you some space as you poured some shower gel into your palm, rubbing your hands together until it formed a lather and you ran your hands up his chest, working in the soap and cleaning away the day.

‘Sweetheart, that feels so good,’ he groaned, tipping his head back as the dirt washed down the drain. You moved your hands up to work the soap into his hair and he leaned into your touch, relishing in the feeling of your hands on him after a long day.

After you had washed all of the soap from his body, he wasted no time in crowding you back against the wall and yanking your thighs up so your legs were wrapped around his waist and he was holding you up against the wall. You moaned as his erection brushed against your pussy and you clenched around nothing but air, your nails digging into his shoulders. ‘PJ, please,’ you moaned, trying to push your hips against his.

‘(Y/N), sweetheart, I’m not gonna last long tonight,’ he said, lining himself up and looking into your eyes to check you were okay.

‘I don’t care, just hurry up.’

With that, he pushed into you with one thrust, leaving the both of you panting against each others mouths. Johnny’s head fell into your neck as he breathed heavily against your skin, trying to stop himself from cumming then and there. You clenched around him which made his hips twitch up into you before pulling back and slamming back in. He set a fast pace which you could tell he needed, releasing any pent-up frustrations of the day onto you and you held on as tight as you could, feeling yourself getting closer and closer to your high with every thrust of his hips.

‘You’re so good to me sweetheart,’ Johnny groaned into your neck.

‘PJ, I’m so close,’ you gasped as his hips sped up slightly, the rhythm turning almost erratic, a clear sign that he was on the edge. One of his hands slid up your body to cup your jaw and his other hand moved until it was resting against your stomach so he was still holding you against the wall but it also allowed his thumb to brush lightly against your clit.

‘I’ve got you sweetheart,’ Johnny murmured against your lips as your body began to shake as your orgasm hit. Your arms tightened around his neck and your head fell into his neck as tears began to prick at your eyes, quickly spilling over your cheeks as your face was buried against Johnny’s neck. Shortly after, Johnny’s hips began to slow before coming to a halt as he emptied himself inside you. He set your legs down, still standing close to you in case your legs gave out as both of his hands cupped your cheeks, thumbs wiping away the tears that were mixing with the water still coming from the shower head. ‘You okay, sweetheart?’ he asked softly.

You nodded and leant into his touch as your eyelids began to feel heavy and he reached up quickly to turn the shower off before sweeping your legs out from underneath you so he was holding you bridal style in the middle of the shower.

‘I love you,’ you mumbled, as you snugged into his shoulder, inhaling the clean scent of his skin.

‘I love you too,’ he said softly as he stepped out of the shower. ‘Now howabout we get you dried off and crawl into bed and stick a movie on,’ he said, kissing your forehead.

‘I was supposed to be the one helping you wind down,’ you protested lightly, not attempting to get out of his arms.

‘Sweetheart, believe me, I’m the most wound down I’ve been all day,’ Johnny chuckled before taking you both back into the bedroom.

[monterraverde]

[You’ve weathered worse. Stand firm, we’re at home in the mud.]

She’s laughing, practically cackling until Belles little fist connects with Adniels jaw, and both her and the Garchomp react to it.

She FELT that- Mega evolution was on a whole new level of syncing, it was almost terrifying. She’s the one tasting blood in her mouth, now.

What a RUSH.

Adniel roars, and now he’s Outraging, taking the hits and rolling in the mud with the Raichu and thrashing until he manages to throw her off and swat her with his tail.

He strikes at her repeatedly, letting the Outrage run its course before he’s struck confused, but managed to pin Belle under his tail, and Rika holds a hand out as she steadies her stance.

[Focus-]

Then she stomps her foot into the dirt hard, and Adniel follows suit, digging his feet into the mud as [Earthquake] rocked the whole area. It’s erratic because of Adniels confusion, and winds up tearing up a bunch of the earth around them and creating a mess of difficult terrain. Both pokemon and trainer let out a triumphant roar before Adniel swats Belle away with his tail and back toward Gold.

The Mega evolution would fade after that, and Adniel collapses to the ground. Triumphant, but tired, and Rikas clearly riding a head rush after it based on how hard she’s breathing.

“Nahaha!! Come on!! I know thats not all you got in you!!”

She recalls Adniel, hes done enough, and she throws another ball out behind him. Crashing to the ground came a Donphan- A hulking BEAST of a Donphan with sharp, serrated teeth and giant tusks, covered in scarlet fur. It scoops a canister of some deep blue liquid into its mouth and bites down, releasing a portion of the serum that seemed to invigorate it and awaken some kind of primal rage, a rage that manifested as scarlet lightning arcing across it whole body.

It scrapes its foot against the ground, wiggling its head and planning to charge whatever Gold throws out to face him.

Kaminas proud of himself, its clear on his face, the sandstorm empowered him enough to dodge several strikes, moving almost like lightning to dodge a few of Pidgeots attacks… That was until it suddenly took off into the sky, and she saw Gold move in sync with the bird.

It’s enveloped in a rainbow light, and the power all but explodes across the area.

She swallows hard, and she’s sweating, but her mouth cracks into a smug smirk.

This was fun. This is what she’s been searching for.

The sandstorm is whipped away as the Hurricane hits its mark, and before she can run for cover, Adniel , her Garchomp, bursts from his ball and covers her with his form to protect her from the shrapnel and winds. She hardly gets to see Kamina bobbing and weaving like his life depended on it, only to be struck by the beak and sent careening into a nearby tree that had somehow survived the hurricane.

Recalled, she’s two matches down, she hates it, but the battle highs raging.

She pats the garchomp on the arm, pointing to the battlefield as he stomped out and roars at Opal, the chain necklace on his neck rattling in the wind as he widens his stance, notably in sync with Rika.

If gold looked close enough, he could see the sclera of her eyes had turned black, as if to match her chosen partner.

She takes a slow, deep breath, and theres a brief moment of quiet…

Hassels voice echoed in her mind, words of joy and praise, congratulations, and this little Gible babbling away the whole time. The bites, the fights, the history of fighting side by side…

Sorry Finn, it had to be him.

“Fun trick, let me try.”

Theres a flash of rainbow light from her fist as she tightens her grip, holding her fist out as power filled the area, the wind that generated knocking down some branches from the nearby trees and causing a minor, centralized earthquake as out of the purple shell of energy suddenly erupted a newly transformed Adniel- Mega evolved and taking to the sky like a jet plane to match Opals speed. The two bash against each other several times in an exchange of blows, before Adniel finally gets his scythe claws on her and Crunches onto her neck, sending them plummeting toward the ground.

[wellthebardsdead]

Shimada coffee and a glass of lemonade?? ~Bambi

———

Jack: okay! Today we’re gonna take a big step in taking down your fear of dirt hannybee!

Hanzo: *in a tiny pair of overalls, a sun shirt, some lil mud boots and gardening gloves* m-mm…

Jack: don’t worry kid, after today you’ll be one step closer to seeing there’s nothing to be afraid of! *places a sun hat on him and takes his lil hand walking him into the garden where Gabe and Cole are already planting seeds*

Jack: see? Even coles getting in on it!

Cole: flower! We got seedlings!

Hanzo: kōru-chan…

Jack: *leads him over to a garden bed with a bunch of herb seedlings waiting for them to plant* okay! First we need to dig a hole! *hands him a lil spade* can you do that for me?

Hanzo: m-mm… *shakily digs it into the dirt trying to keep his hands as far away from it as he can before lifting it up and immediately squealing and crying upon seeing a worm* ICKY!!!

Jack: *smiles and kneels beside him gently picking up the worm* I know right? I think they’re icky too, but this is a very good thing Hannypie.

Hanzo: *sniffles looking up at him then at the worm* h-huh??

Jack: Mhm, this means the soils healthy, so our plants will grow very big and strong, like you!

Hanzo: hu?…

Jack: and the best part about touching icky things? You can always wash your hands afterwards. *sets the worm back into the dirt and gently hands Hanzo a seedling* dirt can’t hurt you, but it can grow things, things that’ll help you, things that’ll taste nice, things that’ll look pretty. Like flowers.

Hanzo: flower??? *points at himself referring to the nickname Cole gave him*

Jack: *snickers and nods* Mhm. Like you. Why don’t you plant that seedling and we’ll dig another hole Huh?

Hanzo: mm! *gently places it in the hole and pats the dirt down feeling more confident with the gloves and jacks advice*

Jack: great job!

*Meanwhile*

Sojiro: *watching from the kitchen window, making sandwiches and lemonade for lunch, quietly tearing up with pride his son is conquering his fears* well done little rabbit- GENJI NO!!

Genji: *somehow got a hold of a lemon slice, now having an existential crisis after taking a bite* AEEEEWEHBEH!! (I THOUGHT IT WAS AN ORANGE! FRAUDULENCE!)