Break Down Build Up

You’d never had too many thoughts about how important May was to you. Sure, there were some special days, but it wasn’t that valuable. It was just another month in the year, after all. How could May be of any great importance?

That was what you tended to think up until König came along. Since becoming König’s handler, May had quickly become your least favorite month of the year.

“Sit still!” you grumbled, trying to balance yourself in the middle of König’s great black wing without tugging on his feathers, “you’ve got a couple of pin feathers here that are ready to come in.”

König whined and shuffled uncomfortably. You tried to avoid gripping his feathers as you were jostled side to side.

“You don’t want me tugging on your feathers, do you?” you snapped as you managed to catch your balance again.

“Boring,” König croaked.

“Boring?” you rolled your eyes, “yeah of course it’s boring. It’s not like I’m having a fun time here either.”

“Boring,” König repeated.

The monster rolled you off his wings with a disgruntled caw.

You faceplanted onto the foam floor, rolling into a full somersault before sprawling akimbo on the floor. With a grunt, you managed to scrabble to your feet and gather your bearings. You glared at König, who seemed to be more than happy to take things into his own claws by flipping onto his back and rolling side to side. Today was May fifth. You had a whole month of this. You didn’t know what you were doing with yourself. You thanked the heavens again that your superiors wouldn’t be seeing you floundering with König. You had a couple of months until König was set to be deployed, at least.

As you watched König squirm like a mirthful puppy on the matts, you couldn’t help but wonder again how this was KorTac’s prized war machine. How did they manage to keep him still enough to listen to a command? Better yet, how did they manage to wrangle him into following a command!? You were completely beside yourself by this point. You couldn’t even manage to get König to so much as sit still to be preened.

Your hands fell to your sides as you tried to understand what you were doing wrong. König obliviously wormed across the floor, leaving a trail of white keratin in his wake. You’d have to mop that up when König was finished. Well, considering what sort of diseases he carried you’d have to scrub the gym anyways. It was your responsibility to mitigate the amount of potential contaminants that could be transmitted to other soldiers. You’d signed up for this, quite literally. You still wished you could burn the place down rather than have to try and clean it.

König skittered off to rub against a tall pillar to try and rid himself of the unholy itch that was surely driving him wild.

“If you just let me help…” you muttered under your breath as you strode over to him.

König swatted you away with his tail.

“Excuse me!?” you scoffed as you stumbled back, “did you just push me?”

“Must move,” König cawed, “moving helps.”

You sighed and relented. There wasn’t much you could do, was there? How were you supposed to get something the length of one and a half school busses to sit still? If König wanted to move, there was nothing you could do to get him to rest.

Or… Maybe you could…

Your eyes snapped open as realization dawned on you.

“Hey König?” you called to the big shifter.

König stopped rubbing his back against the pillar to look at you.

“Can you stay right here? I just need to get something from the back.”

König cawed and went back to rubbing his back. Well, if that kept him occupied, so be it.

You left König to his own devices with a little nod. As you rushed down the halls, you just hoped he’d stay put long enough for you to go and grab some puzzles you found from the common room.

When you’d managed to grab a couple and head back to the gym, König was back to wriggling to and fro on his back. You whistled and bounded over to him.

“König!” you held up a couple of puzzles, “I found something for you to do!”

König rolled onto his front to get a better look at you. He glanced between the boxes and cawed. He slithered to your side before letting himself drop flat onto his belly. He lay his head down on the ground and glanced up at you like a moping hound dog.

“Okay, so, how long do you think it’ll take you to finish these puzzles?” you asked as you put the jigsaw puzzles on the ground in front of him.

“Small,” he grumbled, “hard work.”

“So you think at least half an hour?” you asked hopefully.

“Longer,” König huffed, “small.”

You grinned to yourself as König spread out his wings to let you on. It seemed you finally had a way to keep König occupied.

Konig Dump