Fankasia: Slothcubus

Anon tied his bootlaces, checked his MAC-10 and ammunition. After months of recovery after an intimate introduction to the business end of a magic trap. His battered greatcoat still held together stoically, still capable of protecting  him from the random temperature drops of the dungeon. A Millennium gas mask and spare filters hung at his side, it had a good, wide field of vision and was a good counter to poison gas. His helmet had a single eye night vision goggle attached, which let him see in the dark and spot ghosts. He nodded to himself in the mirror, it was time to get back to work.

“Are you sure you should be going back to the dungeon so soon? you were only deemed fit yesterday.” Marzena had appeared in the doorway behind him
Anon had met Marzena after his accident and had taken it upon herself to take care of anon while he was mostly confined to his bed. She was a well built woman with long black hair that never seemed to be without a plush, fluffy or otherwise very comfortable sweater. Over the course of the months, they had grown close and marzena now stayed at Anon's place.
Her concerned expression almost made Anon second guess his decision to set out. Anon shook his head, six months was more then enough to recover from being blown up.

She sighed, reluctantly giving him his bag of MREs and water bottles. Anon took the bag, slightly hesitating to turn away to the doory to the door. He reached out and ruffled her long black hair

"Hey, don't worry, i’ll only be on the first floor, and it’ll only be a three day trip" He said, a determined steel in his voice.

Anon Hugged Marzena and with the promise that he would take it easy, he left.

Once the door had closed, Marzena cupped her hands over her face. She let out irritated Slothcubus noises. Where had she gone wrong? She had met anon after he had been injured, and after caring for him and satisfying his every need as a slothcubus ought to do. He’d decided to up and ruin all her hard work by going back to work. Was she not doing her job properly? Was he unsatisfied with something? Impossible, she had spent months getting to know him almost as well as he knew himself. But she wouldn’t be so easily discouraged, she was close to getting Anon to succumb to slothful ways. Or at least, she was pretty sure. She would have to ramp up her efforts in order to keep him away from the dungeon.

Marzena had a day to come up with a new idea to keep him from working. She sighed and steeled her resolve, she wasn't giving up on Anon yet. The best she could do is make sure everything was in order for when Anon returned. Sweeping the floor, wiping off the shelves and polishing the relics anon had found and kept from the dungeon. A “Stahlhelm” and a “88mm projectile” along with some fancy pots. Anon had shown her a few relics like them, he said they were old weapons from the old world. After she had finished, Marzena flopped down onto the couch and wondered what she could do to coddle Anon. she ran through a couple of options before she landed on the one. She would make Anon’s favourite food for when he got back. That would be a good place to start, and just maybe would soften him up to being spoiled.

Anon’s favourite food was chebureki, a deep fried russian meat dumpling. She looked through the fridge, she had all of the ingredients for the crust, it was basically just flour, sugar and water, but she didn't have dill or green onions for the mince filling. The only problem was that she didn't know where to get them. The local farms probably wouldn't grow them, they weren't exactly critical foodstuffs. Maybe she would find them in the wild? Or with some traders. It was getting late, so nobody would be up selling anything at this time. She would have to get everything ready tomorrow for anon’s return tomorrow night.

The next day, Marzena set out for the markets. She managed to find the green onions without much effort, but no dull, after asking around she a vendor gave her a list of people that grow herbs and might have it. The only problem was that they were all on different sides of the town. She didn't have a car, so she would have to walk. She sighed and rubbed her eyes, this was going to be a long day.

Marzena had lost track of time. She had secured the dill, but at what cost? Of course only the last person she checked had it. after an exhausting trek around town she was ready to just go to sleep. She shook her head, as if to dislodge the tiredness with physical force. She finally returned to the small apartment block and dragged herself up to her door. She went inside, put the groceries on the kitchen counter and prepared to start cooking. Then, from across the living room she saw the couch. It looked so comfy after walking around all day in the heat. It couldn't hurt to lie down for a couple of minutes and recover in the air conditioning. She moved over to the couch as if in a trance and collapsed onto it. She closed her eyes for a second, savouring the cool air as it blew onto her from the mana-powered aircon. She told herself she would get up in a couple of seconds to start cooking. Maybe a minute or two, or five.

"Hey Marzena"
Marzena awoke to the smell of something cooking and someone gently touching her shoulder.
"Hey, dinner's ready" Anon was knelt down beside the couch so his face was in line with marzena's.
Marzena shot up, realizing what just happened.
"I saw all the stuff on the bench, and I didnt want to wake you up, so i just made chebureki. I hope that was what you were making"

Marzena nearly kicked herself for going to sleep, but she was hungry. She and anon sat down for dinner.
“Thanks for getting all the ingredients together, it was probably pretty hard to find it all.”
"You don't know the half of it, '' Marzena giggled.
They both shared the events of their day, while partaking in the customary vodka accompaniment to the Russian dish. Anon had done some simple work on the first floor, recording some ancient inscriptions in the less travelled parts of the floor. Anon remembered something.

"Oh, my co-workers and I are going out drinking tomorrow night to celebrate my return. Do you want to come too?"

Marzena had not met Anon’s coworkers yet, and despite her research, couldn't find very much on them. Treasure hunters were a secretive bunch. But getting to know anon’s coworkers was definitely a big step in her plans.
“Yeah, of course!” Marzena’s face burned with the drunkenness.
“Great! This was great, but I need to get to sleep” Anon yawned.
A devious idea appeared in Marzena’s fuzzy thoughts.
“Alright” she smiled drunkenly
She stumbled to her feet and helped anon to his. Draped over each other, they made their way towards anon’s bedroom. Once in the room, Marzena tactically tripped, sending th her and anon onto the bed. She fell on top of Anon, her ample chest smothering his face. All according to keikaku. She hugged anon close, and Anon hugged her back. They both lay there for a while savouring each others warmth. Marzena closed her eyes for a second, in another few seconds she would enact phase two. Maybe a minute or two.

Anon awoke to a soft warmth pressing down onto him.  looking around, He found marzena hadn’t moved an inch from the night before, her chest planted firmly over his face.her arms were wrapped around him in a soft embrace the comfort of which was greater than anon had ever felt before. In his hungover state, he could do nothing to resist the temptation of Marzena’s warmth. He was off work for the day, so there was no harm in staying in bed for a little while extra. Anon decided would get up when Marzena woke up.

Meanwhile Marzena was internally freaking out. Her memories of the night before were kind of fuzzy, but why was anon being so relaxed?! Usually he was up trying to blow apart his stitches with pushups and other exercising at this time of morning. Could it be that she pulled off something absolutely amazing and Anon was finally ready to be cared for? Of course she pulled it off, she thought smugly to herself. She was simply just that good, even though Anon was her first target, that only meant she was a natural. The prospect of her greatness made her start to get out of bed to go make breakfast.

Anon felt marzena begin to get up. If he didn’t get out of bed now, he and Marzena might spend the rest of the morning there. But with Marzena still over him, he couldn’t jump out of bed like he usually did. Instead, he tactically rolled off the bed, crashing down onto the nice hardwood floor he had put in just before his injury.
“A-Anon? Are you okay” Marzena stammered, her surprise clear in her voice
“Yes! I’m Fine!” anon jumped to his feet “Its alright if you want to rest for a little longer, i’ll go make breakfast!”
Without further argument, Anon retreated from the room, the sounds of pots and pans clanging echoed from the kitchen

Marzena collapsed back onto the bed and screamed into a pillow.

Anon made bacon and eggs. He was pretty good at cooking, having to survive in the dungeon and other wildernesses saw to that. Yesterday’s mission had been successful, useless to him, but the elven archeologists were pretty happy with the knowledge that the ladie’s bathroom was to the left and the men’s to the right. He would never understand why such clever people were so interested in such inane garbage. He was told to take it easy going back to work, so he was going to have to deal with them a while longer.
He hated having to be such a handicap to his team, forcing them to do such menial, pointless work. They could be working with anyone, in any of the dungeons of the new world. Or any of the wars for that matter. But they had decided to stick with him and he was grateful for that.

Meanwhile, Marzena had mostly got over her dashed hopes. This was just a temporary setback, but she seemed to be making progress, he did stay in bed with her till after the sun had risen after all. She tought about last night, the last thing she remembered was agreeing to go drinking with Anon’s coworkers. She hadn’t gone out drinking much, but it was a favourite passtime of treasure hunters, so she would have to adapt. She’d have to ask where they were going after Anon finished making breakfast. She shot up, realising yet another failure on her part. How could she let anon go make breakfast? She was meant to be the one caring for him, not the other way around. She flopped back down onto the bed, thinking sad slothcubus things until anon came to get her.

The rest of the day passed with little incident. Marzena was not in the spirit to seriously attempt anything, and instead focused on getting ready to meet Anon's coworkers. She realised that she lacked any semi formal clothes that one might go to a work party in. All she had were comfy sweaters. She kicked herself for not anticipating having to go somewhere nice.

Meanwhile Anon was cleaning up after breakfast and reorganising his shelf. The various relics he’d recovered were still spotless after marzena dusted them yesterday. Unfortunately, the helmet and the projectile were the only ones in good enough condition to display. The rest of what he’d found were rusted out guns, rotted crates and a few busted trucks. Anon was determined to find nicer things, and he was certain he’d hit the motherload sooner or later. Then he’d repay Marzena for her kindness, until then, he’d have to do his best to get back into work as fast as he could.

Eventually after a few hours of doing things around the house,it was time to head off to meet Anon’s friends. Marzena had settled on her nicest looking sweater while anon had added a few damaged badges to his display.

They made their way into town. The streets got more crowded as they walked, they had to stick close together to avoid being separated. Anon took Marzena’s hand as he had to push through the foot traffic in order to get to their destination.

Their destination was a secluded bar in an alleyway off the main street. Marzena was suddenly worried about the shiftyness of her surroundings. Anon looked around the dim space before a group of four near to the back of the room waved him over.  He and marzena shuffled their way through the bar, around stray chairs and people. At the table sat a dwarf, two elves and a human.

“Aye! Anon! Finally. These elves ‘ave been doing the most fucked up things to me” The Dwarf exclaimed

“Not drinking until everyone is present is just courtesy, Gaddael” the female elf scolded.

Marzena studied the group. The dwarf was short and bearded, as dwarves are. his features were rough and squared, like an unfinished stone sculpture. He was not taking sobriety well. The Elf was a stern looking woman with the well defined features and the longer than average ears of the high elves. The Harpy was tiny, not much bigger than a fairy with dark green feathers. And the other human was tall, even hunched in his seat as he was, he was still at eye level with the rest of his companions.

“Hi everyone, this is Marzena, i told you about her” Anon gestured to Marzena

The group looked Marzena up and down, making her very uncomfortable. The dwarf was the first to break the silence.

“What’s a nice young lady like yourself doin’ with this crazy bastard?” Gaddael smiled, the comment more pointed toward Anon than her. “If he’s holding you against your will, it’s one wink for yes, two for no''
"Shut up, you manlet" anon pulled up two chairs for Marzena and himself.

The rest of the night was mostly Marzena answering questions about herself. Where she came from, what she did for a living, how she met Anon, if she was totally sure she wasn't a kidnapping victim. It seemed to her that these people were less like coworkers and more like a family. She supposed that people would become very good friends while fighting for their lives in the dungeon. They regaled her with tales of their exploits in the dungeon. The time Anon parachuted down a massive chasm to skip a few floors, the time they used old explosives they found to bring the roof down on top of some bandits.

As night turned into very early morning, and the group went from drunk to wasted, with the exception of Gaddael, who, as he said, had three hundred years and a hundred thousand beers under his belt.  The group began to break up, going home to sleep off the killer hangover to follow. Marzena hadnt drank much, so she helped anon to his feet. As the others went their separate ways, Gaddael insisted he help drag anon back home, an offer Marzena was happy to accept, as Anon was completely incapacitiated, and very heavy. Together they managed to get anon home and onto his bed.
As Gaddael was leaving he turned for a last word to Marzena.
“Say, you don’t have a human smell about you, do you?” Gaddael had a dark look on his face.
Marzena’s heart seized, she had been found out. The certainty in the dwarf’s eyes made her resign to her fate and tell the truth. He looked like the kind of person who knew when they were lied to.

“I-I’m a Slothcubus. B-but-” Marzena started to stutter

“Oh, don’t worry then, I thought you might be something dangerous, like a succubus” Gaddael laughed.

“Hey! i’m... what?” marzena stuttered, she had no idea where the dwarf was going.

“Well, you have fun trying to make Anon relax. That’ll be a miracle and a half”

With that, Gaddael stumbled away. Marzena had no idea what to think, she had been found out, but he didn’t seem all that concerned. He said it’d take a miracle for her to succeed. Marzena shook her head, as if she wasnt determined enough, now she had a point to prove to the dwarf. For now, she was tired, and she had an Anon that needed cuddling.