“I am having a lot of fun in Mana, so I’m going to be staying at Pocketknife’s place for the night. Hope you guys have fun!” Ethan said, reading the text from Eli out loud. The afternoon sunset was shining down on the city, he had expected Eli to be back by now. But there were other questions to be asking, such as: “Who the hell is Pocketknife?” He exclaimed.
“I told you we should’ve gone with him!” Brook shouted, resting in her chair. “He’s a grown ass adult, yeah, but he is like a distracted child.”
“Yeah, that’s on me, I guess.” Ethan said, grumbling, sitting down in his chair. It was easy to tell whose was who by Brook’s being the messy one with a slight sticky touch to it.
“Well, at least it gives us some time to ourselves. I’m sure Eli will be fine on his own. He’s an army of one after all.” She said, with a content look on her face. She smelled of fish, having just got back from her job. “By the way, there is something I’ve been meaning to ask you? It’s kind of important.”
“Yes?”
“When are you gonna spend the money you got from that cheetah dude!” She motioned to the briefcase in the corner of the apartment, still sitting there for all these weeks.
“Hey, I bought Eli’s phone with it!” Ethan defended himself. “Plus got us new clothes and don’t need to budget our groceries or bills!” What was one do when they fall upon that much money? He wasn’t the type to know how and he was sure Brook wasn’t either.
“Yeah, I know, but you’re not spending it spending it! You got to spend it like a King! We could be getting all dressed up and going to some huge fine dining place. Drinking champagne from crystal places and getting foot massages from top of the line massage people.” She said, far too excited for her own good, she even pantomimed a champagne glass in her hand. “Come on, Ethy! Live a little!”
“If we were to go fine dining, you wouldn’t enjoy it, because it requires you to act in a civalized manner.” He said, tapping her on the snout with two fingers. “But I get what you mean, I… Guess a little bit of luxury could go a long way. It could be refreshing, I guess, after the life we’ve been living.” He took out his cellphone. “Plus, I just got the payment from Eli’s fight with Darnelle.”
“He had the fight and you are the one being paid?” She asked, as she leaned over and looked at Ethan’s phone. As it turned out, Primal had its own little phone app. The code for installing it was, of course, only given out to its handlers and its fighters. Right now, Ethan was looking at the payment screen: A dark gray background with the words KARMA at the top. Below it was the number 1,000,000 and below that was the command CONVERT. “Well, usually the fighter and the handler get paid, with the fighter taking the majority of it. But Eli said he didn’t care about the money, so all the money is going to me.”
“…And Karma is the currency they use?” Brook nodded, quickly catching on. She never heard of Karma before, guess it was specific to Primal. Good thing it looked like the conversion process was automatic. “…And it gets converted into the member’s currency of choice, right?”
“Yeah, I think so…” Ethan nodded.
“How much is a million Karma in Shells though?” Brook said, her eyes beaming, looming over Ethan’s shoulder. Money, money, money!
“I’m getting to that.” He said as he clicked on the convert button, which asked which currency they desired; that being Yisk Bismarks, Xivan Soma, and New Castor Shells. Clicking the Shells button…
In total, 1 million Karma equaled out to 850,000 Shells…
The two collapsed back, sinking into their couches, both of their faces locked in disbelief. Never had they seen such a large sum hung in front of them. “850k…” Ethan mumbled, staring at the ceiling.
“We’re fucking rich!” Brook cheered, bouncing out of her seat, throwing her arms in the air. She was going to brag to all her friends… No, wait, this was meant to be a secret. At least she thought it was one?
“This plus the money I have leftover that Hallmark gave me.” Ethan was grinning ear to ear, his bank account now in the 9 figures. “We… Well… We should…” He stuttered out, feeling his whole body tremble with excitement.
“Go out and enjoy some fine dining for the first time in our sad lives?” Brook said, prancing around the room, unable to contain herself any longer.
“Now let’s not go too ahead of ourselves.” Ethan said, nodding, “First we should actually figure out where we’re going, if you have any suggestions, feel free to toss them out there, because I got none.” The issue was, however, that Palegreen wasn’t exactly a place of wealth and taste. It had its upper class, if you could even call it that.
“Expensive but not too expensive.” Brook suggested, “If you go too far into rich territory, it becomes more about paying for the atmosphere than the food.”
“Good point… Didn’t even think of that,” He nodded, Brook was so much more street smart than he was. Mostly because she spent a lot of her day binge reading miscellaneous facts and trivia. “Although it might be a while before we actually go out and eat. Some of these places, they have so much time between reservations. Some of them months out. There is one place though. The Culture. A high end casino and fine dining experience.”
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Brook looked it up on her phone, checking the place out. She knew she recognized the name and there it was; the Culture, a luxurious as well casino, that also had a restaurant built into it, located on the coast not far from the local fishery. Sounded like a place to eat some super expensive food after losing the majority of it on the slots and scam artist blackjack dealers. “Hell, I think I can see that place from where I work, with how brightly it lights up, of course I recognize it.” She stretched, working all the kinks out of her body. “In that case, want to go and take a shower and get washed up? We do have to at least try and maintain appearances.”
“Shower together?” Ethan asked, looking up from his phone. “We don’t have to partition water anymore.”
“I know.” She said, walking over to the bathroom. “But old habits die hard. Plus, it isn’t like that’s the only reason we shower together.” She said, as she stepped into the bathroom, waiting for Ethan to follow.
“Old habits die hard,” He repeated with a nod, getting up to go to the bathroom with her, already removing his shirt. Didn’t have to tell him twice.
It was, indeed, an old habit of theirs that they did while living together. Due to their limited budget, in order to save on the water bill, they would shower together. It wasn’t uncomfortable as one might think. Neither of them could view the other in a sexual, nor romantic light. Seeing the other’s naked body gave no reaction in any direction. It was a relationship that wasn’t quite friends, not quite lovers, and not quite familial. There wasn’t a word that came to mind when trying to describe it; this is why they never brought up the fact that they showered together to others, not just because it was a private topic, but because it was so hard to explain their relationship. With the water pouring across their naked bodies, soaking their fur, they were locked in this close tender moment. It was a time when both of them could feel a sense of true comfort and happiness. So close to one another, both in physical contact, and emotional connection.
“We really are way over our heads, aren’t we, Ethan?” Brook smiled, washing Ethan’s head fluff. “It’s really been a month, but it’s felt like a week.”
“Yeah… Kind of my fault.” He sighed. “I was the one who agree to the deal.”
“Nah, don’t worry, I’m liking it.” She laughed, now rinsing the soap out of Ethan. “I just wish I could do more. You’re the Brains, Eli’s the Brawn, what am I?”
“The Heart of course.”
“Bah! Heart! That’s lame. I want to be Brawn too!”
“You can be the Dick then, why not that?”
Brook narrowed her eyes, looking annoyed, before flicking Ethan in the nose. “Hilarious, why not you be the Nose of the group then?”
“I’ll behave, sorry,” he laughed. He wouldn’t, however, agree that he was the Brains, though, he was kind of stumbling through things.
The two continued washing one another. Sometimes they would stay here so long that the time they spent with one another would take as long as if both of them showered separately. But, at times like this, it didn’t matter. Especially not right now.
“Masseuse.” Ethan said out of the blue, as he washed Brook’s back.
“What?” Brook asked.
“Earlier you said that you’d want a massage from a professional massage person. The word is looking for was masseuse.”
“Damn, Ethan, next you’re going to spell it and use it in a sentence.” She grinned her usual toothy grin.
The shower continued on a little longer, til an interruption reared its head, in the form of a knock on the door, causing them both to gasp.
“Company?” Brook said, opening the shower door. “Did you invite anyone over?”
“You know I don’t have friends,” Ethan said, turning the shower off. “It could just be Mrs. Siebert.”
“Right, but she doesn’t normally visit.” Brook said, slowly walking out of the shower. She put a towel on, going to the bathroom door, but not opening it. Wrapped in a towel as well, Ethan followed after her, still barely dry. They both pressed their ears against the door.
The knock was heard again. Followed by an upbeat female voice. “Ethaaaaaan! Ethan? You home?” A pause, “Brook? What about you?”
The two friends didn’t recognize the voice at all. But it was sickeningly sweet in tone, like someone coated their vocal cords in candy syrup.
“Well the door isn’t locked, so I assume you’re home. I respect your privacy by knocking, but as your superior first and your colleague second, I’m letting myself in.”
The two friends rushed out of the shower, as the stranger let herself in, and the three of them all met in the living room, staring at one another. The two friends, dressed only in towels, were face to face with a tall serval, dressed in a pink halter top and matching skirt, with plenty of golden jewelry, like a bangle, several necklaces, and a loose belly chain. She seemed completely nonplussed by the two being half naked, “Hey hey!” She waved to them, her bangles making a jangling sound, a wide smile on her face, showing her sharp teeth, her large ears perked up.
The two towel wearers stared at her, with Brook speaking first, stuttering out a few words, shocked someone would so brazenly enter their house. “Wh-who are you and what are you doing here? Excuse me, let me rephrase that… Who the fuck are you?”
“Hey now, language, but I guess I am the rude one in this case.” she giggled. Everything she said was accompanied by several motions and fanfare, like waggling her hips and moving her hands like a magician. “Please to meet you, figured I’d meet my fellow Handlers. I’m Kaya.”
Handler
Kaya “Endless Singing Voices” Kali
“Kaya Kali,” she continued, walking further into the place, looking around the area like a little girl in a candy store.
“Someone with Primal…” Ethan said to himself. “Yeah, okay, but why are you here, we didn’t invite you.”
“…And this is our house.” Brook said.
“Oh, fooey,” she said, sitting on the couch that Brook normally sat at; the hyena was going to tell her not to tell her to sit there, not just because of the stains on it. “Can’t a girl just stop by their colleague’s house and say hello? We’re suppose to be like family in our little secret organization. Not like you two have anything better to do, right?”
The nerve of this woman. As the owners of the house, Brook and Ethan both had every right to toss the serval right out and into the street. They both looked to each other, with annoyed expressions, silently saying to each other “get a load of this bitch.”
“We have plans to go out to dinner later,” Brook said, “So, uh, you could leave please, so we can get back to our shower.” Even if her entering kind of did kill the mood.
“I get a feeling you two don’t like me. That’s pretty rare actually.” She lowered her sunglasses, her voice switched from the bubbly cute one from before, to a deeper and more serious one, “I recently heard you guys talked with three fighters working under me. Well, one of you talked with them more than the other, but that’s beside the point. Well, from what they told me, and your friends little display in their fight, it got me to thinking.” She stood up, snapping back to her bubbly and fun personality than before. “What’s say you we have a business talk! Handlers to Handler!” She stood there, grinning, convinced the two will go ahead with her inane requests.
The two paused, looking back to each other, giving the other a nod, they looked back at her. “Can we get clothes on first?” Ethan asked. Yeah, looks like they were indeed going ahead with her inane requests.
“Go ahead.” Kaya grinned, clasping her hands together, her bangles jangling once more.