Best of three (Commission for Ember)
Arno and Ember are taking a well-deserved vacation, but somehow all the poodle can think of is something very specific... Perhaps they should try to be more aware of their fixations?
I wrote this one for Ember (https://www.furaffinity.net/user/blzkn)), featuring Quinn's character Arno (https://www.furaffinity.net/user/sarcastickoopa2))! I hope you guys enjoy it.
It wasn’t a common occurrence, but there were times when Arno’s fixations got slightly out of hand.
The poodle was learning to recognize it by now. They were practically sure it happened mostly when they were deep in work. Their mind seemed to find something secondary to have on the background while they focused on other important tasks, and by the time they paid any attention to what was going on there, they already had a new obsession.
The explanation made sense and was satisfactory enough, but unfortunately it raised two problems. First, what were they supposed to do when that happened? It wasn’t like they could fight the urge to really like something, even if it was just for a while.
And second, why did it also happen when they were outside work?
Well, it’s not like it happens regularly when I’m not working, Arno thought as they lay on their towel, hands clasped together on their black-furred belly as they looked into the sky. It’s just this one time. And I bet there’s a plausible explanation for it.
The sound of a splash nearby interrupted the poodle’s train of thought. Ember must have gotten into the pool again. Good, they thought. That should help. They sat up and looked at the dragon as she swam back and forth in the water. Their eyes focused on the droplets of water rising with each and every stroke, on the wet waterfall of teal hair covering half of her green-scaled face, on the contrast between her body and the swimsuit… and then the poodle’s gaze was wandering down and Arno had to look away, a gentle blush on their fluffy cheeks. Not her feet again.
Ember and Arno had decided to go on a short trip a few weeks ago. It had been a very sudden idea. The dragon had suggested they should take a break from work and enjoy one weekend outside the city. Arno had hesitated at first, because summer was just around the corner and it wouldn’t be so long before they could have a nice, long vacation trip, but Ember had insisted. And the dragon tended to be very persuasive when she actually meant it.
“It’s nothing too fancy. Just a nice house in… a bit in the middle of nowhere, I think? It’s not too expensive now that we’re still off-season. Look, it even has a pool!”
“I’m not entirely sure the weather’s going to let us use it…” Arno had begun, but Ember had interrupted them.
“I’ve already checked and it’s going to be sunny from Thursday to Sunday. Oh, come on, it’ll be fun! We can watch movies, play games, all the usual stuff we never manage to do together.”
Ember’s enthusiasm was highly contagious, so Arno had ended up agreeing to her plan. Besides, she had taken care of everything. The poodle would have felt bad if they’d said no at that point. And it wasn’t like they couldn’t use the vacation, after all.
They’d spent the first day at the pool. Ember was right – the temperature wasn’t exactly torrid but it was warm enough to be in the water for long periods of time. When the night had come, they’d played some board games Arno had brought with them. Inexplicably, Ember had won two of the three rounds, even if it was her first time playing. Arno had rationalized it as a flagrant case of beginner’s luck.
The poodle’s obsession with Ember’s feet had started that night, when they were lying on their bed before sleeping. For some reason, Arno couldn’t stop thinking about them. They weren’t entirely sure when they’d seen them for the first time – the delicate yet strong scaled feet, ending in thick, sharp claws – but now they clearly couldn’t unsee them. It had taken them a long time to fall asleep, the thought of those feet sticking to their mind like a remora.
They’d hoped things would be better when they woke up, but Arno still caught themself thinking about dragon feet a few more times throughout the next day. Just a quick glance was enough to unleash a swarm of butterflies in their stomach and warm their cheeks. Arno wasn’t entirely sure what they wanted to do about those feet – but it was something intimate and intense, something that put them in an utterly flustered state.
The poodle had woken up that Saturday hoping their obsession would have disappeared by then, but there it was. Still ready to embarrass them in front of their friend.
“Hey, Earth calling Arno,” Ember’s voice came from the pool. The poodle let out a gasp and turned to her, slightly surprised. “You okay? Seems like you’ve got something in your mind.”
“Uh, it’s okay. Never mind.” Arno tried to come up with a way out of that situation. “Say, do you feel like playing a few games again? My pride is a bit bruised after losing to you the other day.”
“Fine! Let me dry myself and I’ll be with you in a minute.”
Arno made sure to look away when the dragon climbed out of the pool. The last thing they wanted was to find themself staring at those feet once again. The idea that Ember would find out they were so obsessed was mortifying.
“You’re going to lose again, though,” the dragon teased.
“Heh. Well, we’ll see about that,” Arno replied, still making sure their gaze was facing the other way.
They walked into the house. Arno would have liked to say they were more relieved now that those feet were wrapped in sandals, but the fact that they were visible was enough to send their thoughts in a chaotic swirl.
The poodle sat in front of Ember and exchanged a quick glance with her. They started playing the game – or at least, it felt like they were. Things grew sort of hazy as minutes went by. Arno tried to follow a particularly complex strategy to make sure the win wouldn’t be taken from their hands. In the end, however, they couldn’t match the dragon’s convenient stroke of luck.
She ended up winning another round. It was then when the haze lifted from the poodle’s mind and they wondered if they could have done things differently, somehow.
“See? Told you this would happen,” Ember said with a big grin on her face.
Arno opened their mouth to complain. To complain about what, exactly? Their eyes moved to the box of the game. It remained there, on the table. Unopened.
“Did we…” they started asking.
“Did we pick up the game already? Sure thing.”
There was something weird about the whole situation. Arno tried to make sense of it, but then Ember said something they couldn’t possibly ignore.
“Best of three?”
The poodle looked up into those eyes and found themself nodding. Yes. Best of three. This time, they’d teach her how one was supposed to win at that game.
Except they didn’t. They ended up losing again, in the blink of an eye. Too fast. Almost impossibly fast.
“What are we…”
“You’re losing.”
Arno was, somehow. They tried to think a bit more about it, but found out they couldn’t. They were sitting in front of Ember, playing and losing that board game whose rules they’d strictly forgotten about. How were they supposed to win?
Had they even won the first round the other day?
“Want to play a third round? Who knows, perhaps you’ll get luckier this time. Let’s do this – whoever wins the last round is the actual winner. Deal?”
“Deal,” said Arno’s mouth, as if it had a will of its own. No sooner had that word left their lips than they realized they’d lost again. Third time in a row. “Huh…?”
“Oooooh poor poodle. Well, I suppose you tried.” Ember’s words reached their ears as if they were muffled somehow. Were they still at the pool? Arno wasn’t entirely sure where they were anymore. Playing, they supposed. Losing.
The only thing they knew was that…
“You’ve lost. And you know what that means, right?”
Right. If the dragon had asked them a few minutes earlier – wait, minutes? The game was supposed to last far longer – Arno would have answered they had no idea what that meant.
But now they knew.
The poodle stood up, pushing the chair with their legs as they did. They slowly walked around the table, their steps feeling sort of automated, controlled – like those of a robot. The mist inside their mind kept swirling and getting thicker. There was no getting through it now.
When they were next to the dragon, Arno dropped to their knees and gently grabbed one of those feet with their soft paws. Their fingers twitched for a split second before they reached for the ankles and removed the sandals easily. They massaged the soles, caressed the toes, moved expertly over the smooth scales. A pleased sigh came from somewhere above Arno, but they didn’t pay any attention to the sound.
They were too focused on the object of their desire, the one they were holding tenderly between their paws.
Following an impulse that could have been learned or taught somehow during the past few days, the poodle lowered their head and brought their muzzle to the left foot, planting a soft kiss on it. It wriggled a bit under the touch of their lips and a soft chuckle could be heard. Arno didn’t care. They sprinkled some more kisses on those scales, their hands stroking them gently as their mind drifted deeper and deeper into blissful contentment.
That’s right. That’s what losing meant. Arno couldn’t remember before, but now they did. It wasn’t the first time.
As the poodle continued kissing the dragon’s feet, she regarded them from above, a playful smirk spreading on her face.
“Told you you would be losing again,” she teased, gently bringing her right foot closer to the poodle’s muzzle. “Can’t say I didn’t warn you, hmm?”