Deen’s so fucking tall, I ranted in my head as I rubbed her back with the towel. The strong scent of alcohol irritated me. Makes me want to chop her legs until we’re the same height.

She had bunched up her matted blonde hair and held it in front of her body so I’d have an easier time cleaning her back. Like what she did to me, she also unhooked her bra, holding it across her chest to cover herself. I remembered she had bought sports bras to hide the artificial Core on her chest. Maybe she thought there was no need to wear it tonight…or today.

I had wiped away the larger patches of blood stains. Now, I was cleaning the smaller ones I had missed during my first wipe-through—Wipe-through? I’m just making up terms now.

But it was so hard to do because I had to crane my neck to check her upper back. I also had to raise my hand, holding the phone up high. Would it be awkward if I asked her to bend her legs a bit?

Not awkward; more like fucking pathetic.

Fuck this. “I think that’s it,” I said, wiping away a nonexistent smudge to pretend I was thorough. “Your back is clean now. Sorry in advance if I missed some spots.”

“Don’t worry,” Deen replied. “We’ll just be in the car anyway.”

“Yep. Anyway, I’m done. You can wipe the rest—”

“No, we’re not yet done.” She turned around. Our eyes met. She sported an annoying smirk on her face. Then my eyes went down to her chest. Below her ample cleavage, unfairly boosted by her arms slightly squeezing her boobs upward, was the artificial Core. She said, “Can you help me with something?”

“Oh, come on.” I tore away my eyes from the fascinating small tumor surrounded by weird throbbing veins.

“Help me wipe my abdomen.”

I groaned. “Seriously? And why do I have to do that? Don’t say it’s the Japanese thing because that was just with the—”

“I got a lot more blood on me than you did,” Deen explained, her voice almost cracking as she held back bubbling giggles. “It’s hard to look down at my body and—"

“Sure, whatever,” I sighed, not bothering to argue against her.

“—and clean myself, so…eh? You agree to it?”

“Yeah, yeah,” I said with a shrug. “Come here.”

I knew she wouldn’t stop pestering me about this, so might as well finish the job so we could continue our drive to Las Vegas. A shower at the condo was what I sorely needed. Oh, yeah, and I did decide I was going to be a good friend to Deen because she displayed her loyalty to me. That was a better reason to give in to her bullshit.

I shone the light of Deen’s phone on her stomach and hunted for dirty patches. The curves of her muscles cast sharp shadows, outlining her effing amazing abs. Lots of hard work was involved, and all that, but she was also a fucking cheat in the genetic lottery of life.

Yeah, I admit I’m somewhat jealous. Maybe I should transform into Blanchette and show off my super duper hot transformation. Minus the monster mouth, of course—although some guys might go for that. Next time I turn to Blanchette, I will check my abs.

“Do you feel some changes?” Deen asked, looking down at me.

I stopped wiping a particularly stubborn bloodstain and raised a brow at her. “What changes?” Was she talking about it in an Adumbrae sense?

“I’ve been working out a lot lately, but I’m not sure if it has an effect because of our regeneration. What do you think?”

I snorted. I thought it was serious, like she was concerned I was losing my mind to otherworldly forces. “Deen, I’m not keeping tabs on your abs—wow, that rhymes.”

“But you’ve felt it before.”

“Only once, when I wiped your sweat after your workout. I mean, you can’t expect me to remember that time.” I took a step back and examined her mid-riff. “Um, I think the lines are more defined now?”

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“Really? Are you sure?”

“Not really sure with this lighting. But like this line here is deeper now.” I traced a muscle indentation that started from above her hip bones, diagonally going down. I stopped my finger just above the hem of her shorts. I felt Deen shiver. “Is it ticklish?”

“Ye-yes—No!” Deen vigorously shook her head. Then she hastily said, “Are my V-lines becoming more visible?” She moved a step back away from my finger.

“V-lines? That’s what they’re called?”

“Not really sure what the scientific for those muscles, so I just call them ‘V-lines.’ People also call them the ‘Adonis Belt’ because they’re more prominent in guys. Women can have them too, of course. But it needs a lot of work.”

“You’re humble bragging, aren’t you?” I grinned at Deen.

“No, I’m not,” she indignantly replied. “I’m just saying what I know. Can you just continue wiping?”

I worked my way up her abdomen. Interestingly, I had no problem with touching Deen now. Her touching me—that’s still a big issue. But the other way around was acceptable. I think it was because of her amazing body. The kid part of my brain was awoken, and it was like I was watching Animal Planet again, observing all the cool animals with rippling muscles, tearing their prey, and eating them.

People have that little voice in their heads telling them to do stupid stuff, like jumping off the building or something. Not sure what that was called, but I think I was experiencing it now. I wanted to bury my finger into Deen’s flesh to know what her muscles felt like. It reminded me of hyenas tearing the stringy muscles of an antelope’s leg, pulling and stretching it like mozzarella cheese.

Deen would get angry with me if I did that, right? I think this was a bad thing to do.

Were these my thoughts, or was SpookyErind messing with me?

I focused on wiping until I reached Deen’s ribs. She cradled the bottom of her boobs on top of her arm and pushed them up. I raised my brow but continued upward. There was lots of blood that had dripped from her back when she carried the corpses earlier. But it was still weird that she wanted me to wipe beneath her boobs.

The bottom of her marshmallowy breasts brushed against the top of my hand. I could feel their weight even if Deen was mostly holding them up. Lean enough to have cut abs but still preserving her boob size? Just absolutely cheating in life. Deen should just get banned for all her advantages.

I hadn’t asked her if she felt back pain because of her breasts. Before she became superhuman, of course. I’m just thinking of the advantages of my flatness.

The temptation to poke her boobs crept up on my head. I was sure she groped me as a prank while wiping me. She did say that she had made a mistake because my chest was flat, but I didn’t believe her.

She tickled my underarm as revenge for me doing the same thing to her before. I should be equally justified in enacting my revenge for this slight, right? It sounded logical to me.

“Erind? You look like you’re thinking deeply about something,” Deen said. “I hope you’re not planning to do something weird.”

Stabbing her with my finger or groping her boobs? “You’re just projecting your thoughts onto me,” I countered. “I’m focused on cleaning you up so we can continue our trip.”

“If you insert your finger into my navel again, I swear—”

“I’m not thinking about that,” I honestly told her. But thanks for giving me the idea. “By the way, Deen. Did your Guardian Angel warn you I was going to do that navel thing last time?”

“No? It’s not something dangerous, so why would—ERIND!”

I jumped back after I poked her navel and wiggled my finger. I laughed loudly as Deen flailed her arms, instinctively shooing me away. She dropped her bra to the ground, but I couldn’t see her body because I switched off her phone and hid it inside my shirt to deaden all the glowing buttons.

She lunged where I stood a moment ago, but I had ducked and scooted left. I could hear her furious footsteps behind me as she tried to find where I was. Hopefully, her Guardian Angel wasn’t a lame snitch and instructed her how to catch me.

“What the fuck?” Deen yelled, almost growling at the end. “Turn on the lights!”

She sounded furious. I may have pushed her too far. “Say ‘please’ first, and then I’ll—whoops!” I realized that was a mistake because she realized I was close to her, just crouched down.

I felt movements. Swishing through the air. She was trying to grab me. I crawled to the left. The sound of crunching sand gave away my spot. Something soft slapped against the side of my face and covered my head. It reeked of blood. I pulled it off and turned on the phone’s light to check what it was.

“Deen! Don’t throw your bloody bra at me!”

“There you are!”

“Have this back!” I crumpled her stupid, disgusting bra into a ball and threw it at Deen. It unraveled mid-air and dropped to the ground before reaching her. “I’m sorry, okay?” I directed the light in her direction. She covered her chest with her arms, but her huge boobs still spilled out. “Can we talk this—”

“Let me do the same to you.”

“What? No way!”

“Let me insert my finger in your navel, and we’ll call it even.”

“Fine,” I said, rolling my eyes. “And the correct term is ‘poke,’ not ‘insert,’ okay?”