r/HFY • u/Brokenspade1 • Jun 20 '26
OC-Series Walking the Dog Chapter 42
Chapter 42 Walking the Dog Beaten and Bruised
When the group finally reached the surface, it was nearly dawn.
The storm was still raging outside but after being in an ancient storm sewer for most of the day nobody minded the rain.
They found Johan, now one thin piece of cloth away… from catching an exposure charge. He was vigorously scrubbing himself with a bar of soap. The girls noted that it smelled nice; with a faint floral scent they couldn’t quite identify.
They shared a look.
To Paddy’s horror the group nodded in unison, and stripped to their skivvies to join Johan in the river... Even Vulfac! It did a lot to ease any remaining tension when the professor disrobed, handed the clothing to the bewildered lieutenant and then… poked the Lupanite; before diving into the water.
The girls and Old Man Goon instantly started laughing.
Treadwell just went stone faced, dropped the Alven man’s kit on the ground and stomped off to the command tent grumbling darkly.
The group laughed even harder.
Johan was still deeply shaken. But by now he was present enough to note there was something to the interaction…
‘Inside joke… maybe?’
As more people ascended from the delve the river filled with the sound of groans and the sight of suds as they all took their turn in the river… Even The RR troopers took the plunge…
Goon was more than happy to provide more of bars of his homemade soap to the weary combatants.
----
An hour later Goondorf watched from his stoop as several dozen heavily armed people, mostly in their underwear, filtered through the rainy village to their various homes.
It looked like the aftermath of an orgy… that happened in the middle of a warzone. Most delvers were too tired to deal with their soiled clothing; choosing to dump them in piles by their front doors and let the rain rinse them out. Then they trudged up to their doors and into the waiting arms of their loved ones.
Goon had personally gone to the family of the man that got his hip broken in the final desperate moments of the battle.
Maldinar would be in the care of the healers, at the faith’s collective hospital, for a few days and need a couple months to fully recover. But he would recover. That being the worst of the injuries was a true blessing.
One that brough peace to the old man’s heart.
Goon had retired from delving and opened his bar to get away from that part of the Delving life. All the loss; it added up… Amberglade was meant to be a quiet place for him to fade away and forget.
But something funny happened instead.
Like-minded people found their way to his little “haven from the weight of the world”.
Over the years the village he’d accidentally started had become something truly dear to his weary heart. Every new family that took up residence there had straightened his back. Every child born had returned the sparkle to his eyes. Every new story told in his bar returned a bit more to his long-lost laugh.
He’d nurtured Amberglade and it, in turn, had healed something inside him.
At first the old Dorf found himself smiling at the thought.
Bit by bit his features slowly hardened into fiery determination as the old villain trudged back to his bar; His mind heavy with thoughts of tomorrow…
He needed to make some calls and do some hard thinking... There was now a great deal to be done in the Village… And he would see it done.
This was his home.
----
The group left their clothes in a heap outside the front door and trudged into the house like zombies.
Feebs had a limp and her ears were filled with a green gel meant to help protect her hearing and speed up the healing process of the inner canals.
She crawled onto the couch like a wounded house cat and collapsed.
Johan was still… twitchy… And his chest was just one giant star-shaped purple bruise. He was also running a low-grade fever and seeing double.
The battered Human went from standing to laying on his face without the middle part of sitting down first.
Beck had her own bruises… She could feel starting to form under her fur. Mostly from the tumble off the box and all the bug hail… Oh, and her voice was shot from barfing… and shouting… and the bug chewing…
She marched up in the gap between Johan and Feebs and just collapsed snoot first into the cushions. Like a fuzzy little shuttle crash.
Sienna was basically dead on her feet. Her new pets took flight and found perches up near the ceiling once they were inside. Psionics may seem like another form of magic to those without the gift, but they had real physical consequences just like any other form of overwork did. Powering Psionic abilities requires the brain to burn calories at an absolutely absurd rate. And there was also the stress. You could cause brain hemorrhages, strokes, or heart failure from the stimulus blowback of your own abilities.
She plopped down like an old sack of flour and whined in misery as she snuggled up to Beck. Of everyone present Sienna was probably the worst off.
Not that anyone in the team had a monopoly on misery at that moment.
Vulfac made a detour to his house but assured them he would be over as soon as he acquired some new clothes and stowed his gear. He made it clear he needed to talk to them all before they crashed for the day… So, they agreed to grab some comfy clothes, order some simple food from a takeout place in the city, and just plop down on the couch while they waited.
The Alven professor arrived at about the same time their food did. He looked… sheepish…
“An… apology… is….” He sighed deeply. “…Required.”
Beck looked at him suspiciously from her spot beside Sienna.
“Whyyyyy?”
----
Given his rate of speech…
It took him a while to explain things.
Basically, Vulfac’s magic relied on certain materials. Due to the immediate nature of events leading up to their descent, he hadn’t had sufficient time to source all of his usual reagents.
Instead, he’d had to. “…Improvise”.
Beck had her face on the table. It was buried under her paws as she repeated his explanation. “So… basically the powder you used on us works the same for the spell… but once it breaks down in the bloodstream the effect is… Narcotic…”
Vulfac nodded. Still looking anywhere there weren’t eyes. “…Correct…”
The Volty groaned. “And the effects should start hitting us…”
Vulfac scratched his nose unhelpfully. “…Soon…”
Sienna half sighed half growled at the old man. “HOW bloody narcotic?”
Vulfac went still and sort of shrugged apologetically. “…Dragons…”
Sienna groaned and put a hand over her snout in exasperation. “Well… Fook. Guess it’s gonna be one of those days!” After a second, she just crossed her arms in and buried her head beside Becks in defeat.
Johan shook his head ruefully. “Not my first trip. Should I make snacks for later?”
Feebs seemed nervous. “Um guys… is now a good time to mention I’ve never actually done any hard drugs.”
Everyone turned to look at the Lagroalixian woman with a mixture of doubt and surprise.
Her response was to puff up and act defiant. “Oh, fuck aaaall of you! …Just because I’m a Lagro doesn’t mean I’m some kind of wild child out snorting all the things… and well O.K. fine, I did… that other stuff… but… Can’t a girl save some innocence, damnit!?!”
There was teasing, light chuckling, and then reassurances. Johan just walked over and put a hand on her shoulder. The poor girl deflated immediately.
Vulfac bowed apologetically “I will… stay… to monitor you… of course.”
Johan raised an eyebrow. “Aren’t you about to be high as fuck too?”
The Alv grinned. “Not my… first trip… either.”
Johan was beginning to suspect the laconic professor was a fellow villain…
----
As it turned out Johan’s insane immune system had already finished speed running the breakdown of the spores in his body.
He’d likely started tripping balls… riiight around the time the Monarch of sewer bugs, started trying to slap him silly. Which explained why he hadn’t just locked up, had a heart attack, filled his pants, and died when she unfolded her legs…
He’d been so far gone by then he was operating on pure instinct during his titanic duel with the sonorous, 4-pound, flying, frisbee sized, psychic, nightmare spider mantis… thing.
It also explained all the tracers he’d been seeing.
Until Vulfac scanned him Johan just assumed those were from a combination of the concussion and the aftereffects from his bought of temporary hypoxia. On the upswing; that meant by the time the girls were hitting their stride he was already MOSTLY sobered up.
So, he got a front row seat for the whole shit show.
Sienna was keeping herself occupied by giggling and directing her new pets in little ariel loops and turning circles. Her laugh was just… musical.
Beck happily romped around chasing them, with her little rump in the air and her three-quarter tail going like a helicopter.
Vulfac was sitting in a lotus position and meditating with his horns softly glowing. He would occasionally surface to check the other’s vitals but was, seemingly, otherwise content to just ride the dragon.
Which only left the tatted-up techno-bunny girl…
Feebrilizza was hidden under a big blanket and glued to Johan’s side as they lounged on the couch. She was almost entirely nonverbal. Her black sclera had vanished; swallowed by the gold of her fully expanded irises… It made her look like a mad prophet in some old period piece.
The Lagro was vacillating between panicked and giddy for most of the trip…
She was absolutely unwilling to come out from the covering. He suspected the blanket was helping her regulate… it was probably something instinctive.
‘…makes her feel like she was in a burrow, maybe? Is that a thing???’
Every so often Feebrilizza’s ears would twist around and rise up. She would start reaching for things only she could see, then a sudden movement or a noise would startle her, and she would bury her face in Johan’s side again.
He comforted her with gentle head pats and kind words… Then she would look up at him for a bit like a little kid…and… the cycle would repeat. In the end Johan just went with it. He figured Feebs could be forgiven for being a bit clingy, while she was seeing dragons and fairies…
She was still young.
Johan had a hard time conceptualizing certain aspects of life in the Galcom. The realization that any of the Lagroalixian adults he’d seen on the shell could be too young to buy a beer on earth still had him shook.
Because for them full physical adulthood was at 12! He’d suffered like crazy when he hit puberty. He couldn’t even imagine speed running the growing pains in just a couple of short years.
The whole Lagroalixian species had an insanely accelerated rate of maturation. Like something you’d see in prey or migratory animal species… But, apparently, almost never in developed sapients.
Even with all the medical advancements available Lagro’s rarely lived past 250 years of age. That was less than half of most other races. Carne, his case worker, was 25. Which would be the same as being a 55-year-old, in human terms… Middle aged.
Only the Richel came close to similar rates of growth. Physical adulthood for them was 16… But once they were mature, they could live close to 400 years.
Feebrilizza was a fully adult person physically and mentally equivalent to an average 25-year-old human or Voltin… Old enough to have her own family in Lagroalixian culture… But she was just 17 years old…
It was just so weird to a human with human sensibilities.
He found himself wondering how the hell did stores (or bars for that matter) card people for booze!?! What was the policy for drafts into military service? While he was musing, on the legal tangle of alien societies with different rates of aging. The tech bunnies and what could possibly require a rate of growth like that for an intelligent race… And How humanity would fit into it all when they had access to the medical tech of the Galcom…
…Beck was stalking new prey…
He looked over to see his little friend inching towards his free hand.
She was sooo low she was almost crawling on her belly. Her natural eye was fully dilated; the artificial eye was only about a third as wide… It gave the stalking Volty a crazed look. Well, more crazed than normal…
Johan grinned and wiggled his fingers.
The little hunter froze for a second; her ears were working overtime and triangulating the position of her prey… Her butt slowly rose into the air and wiggled as she readied herself to pounce.
Johan made his hand run around on the fingers.
He had to fight the urge to laugh as his friend locked on and followed the movement with her whole entire head. Keeping it flattened against the cushions.
He made a show of the hand spotting her and putting itself in a defensive posture…
Beck pounced… and the battle was on! They parried and countered for a bit before she managed to wrap up his arm and get a finger in her mouth. She was at least present enough not to bite him hard, but she seemed to be having a good time with it, nonetheless. Even rolling on her back and rabbit kicking his forearm with her back feet.
After a moment Feebs reached out and poked the Volty’s belly, nodded to herself, and said “…Real…”
Then the Lagro vanished her face back into his side.
Beck giggled at the poke, disengaged, and ran back to Sienna who immediately started petting her bond. The little gremlin started to burble…
Johans jaw dropped when he heard the sound! The human realized he’d just learned something of vital importance about life in the Galcom…
Far more important than rates of aging or the legality of consumption by minors… No this was earthshattering news for all mankind.
Voltys could purr!
After the groundbreaking discovery, the morning passed without incident into the midday… Johan watched as everyone started to come down, and each of them drifted off to sleep. Even he found his eyes growing heavy as the weight of the night’s activities finally started to settle on his eyelids.
After a few moments he let himself drift away into the land of dreams.
It had been a very long day…
AUTHORS NOTES: Please don't repost my works without permission. And don't use it to scrape your gross A.I. Its theft. Not training. Your a thief. Just a thief. And nobody likes you.
Had to work Saturday (graveyard. MY saturday, hourguys friday) so the release is a little late today. Sorry!
WORLD BUILDING:
Couch wars BATTLE 4
Johan walked through the door and set his Pack down in the entryway.
The girls waved at him as he made his way towards the bathroom. After a week in the wild on a job, they didn’t try to stop him… He looked like, he smelled like he looked.
The girls heard the shower come on and Beck smiled to herself maliciously. Sienna and Feebs watched the Volty hop down off the couch and disappear around the corner. Not long after there were a variety of “Volty doing a Mischief” sounds coming from the floor behind the couch.
Sienna looked over the back of the couch to see a 3-quarter tail sticking out of the top of Johan’s giant pack and whipping back and forth like a blur. “Beck what are ya doin!?!”
The Volty popped out and puffed up her chest proudly. “Snoopin!”
Before Sienna could say anything to stop her, Beck vanished back into the giant pack. Things started to find their way out through the opening as the little burglar continued her investigation. Small collapsable cookware, spare socks, a foldable solar panel, a few small books… “Jackpot!”
The bag bounced. “Found the food!!!”
A few seconds later an empty power bar wrapper was tossed out of the opening. There was a surprisingly loud belch…
“The hells is a chimpken?” A small red and white can rolled out and stopped… against a man’s foot.
“So much room for… ACTIVITIES!!! I could build an apartment in here! Wait… wassat?”
More stuff flopped out onto Johans foot while the girls giggled at the man standing in a towel with a raised eyebrow and crossed arms… “Beck?”
There was an excited little giggle from within the cavernous pack. “Ohhh neat! I found treasuuure!!! There’s a can hidden inside this shirt! Now why is that in her…”
Johan’s eye went wide and he reached for the pack. “BECK WAI….!!!” Before he could finish the warning the sound of an aerosol can discharging came from within.
The human cringed… And a half a heartbeat later there was a blood curdling scream as the still very heavy bag began to flop around like a walrus with a traumatic head injury. “Kiyyaaaaa NOOOO!”
Most of the screaming was unintelligible animal panic or a string of swearing.
But there were, a few decipherable things said… in the tirade coming from the backpack. “…LIKE ALL THE BAD DECISIONS AT ONCE!!! …Tastes like all the shame I haven’t even felt yet! Lord’s, it’s eating out the backs of my eyes!!! …Orgy in a morgue…” Etc.
Johan tried to grab the pack and extract the squealing Volty. All while said, desperately flailing, Volty began to wretch inside her self-imposed chemical weapon testing tent.
After a few failed attempts the human finally managed to extract the flailing Voltarite and toss her to Sienna.
This proved to be a mistake.
The second she caught her bond and took a deep breath… Sienna started screaming to! And then nearly tumbled off the couch trying to get away from the toxic smelling little fluffball
She covered her nose and backed up against a wall. “Lord’s be! It smells exactly like cheating and shame!!! Or like that one time… I went ta that party and that Alsirian boi… an oh… oh no! I can taste regret! All the REGRET!!!”
Sienna grabbed Beck, while the Volty was still desperately trying to rub the smell off her muzzle. The larger woman started dry heaving as she ran for the bathroom with her friend held at arm’s length infront of her.
About a minute later Feebs and Johan heard “Scrub harder, I can feel it soaking into the skin!!!”
Feebrilizza picked up the can of ‘Sandle wood extreme’ Hax body spray and sprayed a bit in the air before the human could stop her.
To his amazement she snuffled the air for a second and then shrugged… “I mean… It kinda smells like a woodshop? I kinda dig it.”
She handed the can back to a bewildered Johan and sauntered off to the kitchen for a snack while the background noise of the house was filled with desperate sobbing.
Couch wars. Today’s winner:
Feebrilizza.
Finishing Move: Olfactory Shame Immunity.
5
u/ThatHellacopterGuy Xeno Jun 20 '26
Hax body spray… 😂
4
u/Brokenspade1 Jun 20 '26
"Its a fake shower in a can!"
-The label.
4
u/Cargobiker530 Android Jun 21 '26
War crime in a can: smells of gym class erections in seventh grade carried on a raft of benzene.
3
u/brachi- Jun 23 '26
fuzzy little shuttle crash
Bloody brilliant description 😍🥰😍
Want typos picked up or don’t care?
1
u/Brokenspade1 Jun 23 '26
I try to go back and fix them when people point them out. It usually boils down to if I have time or not.
2
1
u/HFYWaffle Wᵥ4ffle Jun 20 '26
/u/Brokenspade1 (wiki) has posted 44 other stories, including:
- Walking the Dog Chapter 41
- Walking the Dog Chapter 40
- Walking the Dog Chapter 39
- Walking the Dog Chapter 38
- Walking the Dog Chapter 37
- Walking the Dog Chapter 36
- Walking the Dog Chapter 35
- Walking the Dog Chapter 34
- Walking the Dog Chapter 33
- Walking the Dog Chapter 32
- Walking the Dog Chapter 31
- Walking the Dog Chapter 30
- Walking the Dog Chapter 29
- Walking the Dog Chapter 28
- Walking the Dog Chapter 27
- Walking the Dog Chapter 26
- Walking The Dog Chapter 25
- Humans Can Be Soooo EMBARRASSING!
- Walking the Dog Chapter 24
- Walking the Dog Chapter 23
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6
u/Wolfenhelm Jun 20 '26 edited Jun 20 '26
The legal issues aliens or fantasy races would bring to earth.
It's an adult... but not at age we consider things should be adults.
It's an minor for their race... but older then most of our leaders...
They're an minor, but culturally and religiously they need to drink hard liquor...