FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

The sounds of the construction site were deafening. Somewhere someone was using a pneumatic drill with unrestrained enthusiasm, every staccato machinegun blast seeming to rattle Stephen's hardhat. It didn't fit properly, he thought. It wobbled on his head with every step.

He followed in the shadow of the foreman, trudging through the loose sand and patches of mud that were underfoot everywhere.

“They'll be around here," the man shouted over the noise in that casual way of someone used to making themselves heard.

He was right. They turned the corner of a nondescript slab of concrete, and there sat a collection of beast-people, loudly talking about one thing or another. They were massive, several of them having taken a flatbed trailer for a bench, taxing its suspension to the full. That would have been intimidating enough, but the fact that they fell silent and turned their stares on him made him clutch his clipboard like a badge of authority.

“Hey boys!" the foreman called, swaggering forward with a total disregard for the hostility they were showing the pencilpusher. “This is Stephen. He'll be following you around for the day."

“You the safety guy?" Rumbled the elephant man in a voice like two granite slabs rubbing together, a roll-up the size of a normal man's arm dangling from his lip. He expelled smoke from his trunk, throwing up a curtain of noxious fog.

“Uh… yeah." Stephen held up the clipboard as if it were meant to prove something. It just had a collection of checklists under the clip, nothing more. He gave a smile he hoped would be disarming, but did nothing to move the frowning faces of the enormous beastmen. Each of them was large enough to function as construction equipment, which was exactly why they worked here.

“I don't see the point," said the bear man in a deep rumble. Neither him nor the elephant needed to speak up to be heard. He was the smallest of the bunch, still taller than any healthy human could hope to be, but also with a stocky, broad build. He had claws like kitchen knives.

“No complaining. The boss says it's gotta happen, so it's gotta happen," the foreman shouted.

There was a grumble of begrudging assent. The tortured undercarriage of the trailer creaked as someone shrugged in response.

A high whistle sounded, miraculously cutting through the noise pollution of the site. The foreman turned his head, then nudged Stephen again.

“Gotta go." He looked back at the beastmen. “They're good guys. Just don't let them push you around too much."

With a wink and a smile, the foreman made himself scarce, hustling to the source of the whistling.

Stephen looked back at the beastmen. He was on his own.

“Can't follow us all, can you?" the bull with the nose ring asked.

He was right. They all worked at different locations, where-ever they were needed. But they had their own foreman of sorts all the same. Stephen tapped the clipboard with his pen, and looked at the name he'd been given.

“I'm looking for Frank."

Silence. The men exchanged glances, then looked back at him. He could see their faces beginning to contort in the typical way of someone who was trying to hold in laughter, but as soon as one realized the other was doing the same there was no stopping it. The entire group erupted in a deep, booming laughter. The elephant slapped his thigh, causing localized seismic activity.

Oh Christ, was that going to be it? Either Frank was some sort of shitty in-joke, or he was the psycho of the group.

“What the fuck are you idiots laughing about?" a deep growl issued from behind Stephen. From behind, and far up.

He turned around.

There stood a tigress, with fierce orange fur and aggressive stripes. Like the rest of them, she'd fought gravity for every inch, twice as tall as him, and many times heavier. Part of that was the gut that seemed standard issue on any construction site, stuffed into coveralls that could house a human family. But under the fat was obvious muscle. Any one of them would have the strength of a crane or earth mover, and she was no exception. The belt holding up his pants would just about fit around one of her arms.

She noticed him too. Yellow eyes meant to stalk prey looked him up and down, noticing the clipboard, the color coded visitor's hardhat, the jeans and sweatshirt that screamed 'I just dressed to get dirty, not to actually work or anything'.

“Who's the squishy?"

“Safety guy," the elephant puffed out another cloud of smoke that could smother a trench and force a breakthrough, “meet Frank."

The predatory eyes turned fully onto him, blazing beneath a knitted brow. He'd say she was sizing him up, but it felt more like she was sizing him down.

“You're here for me?" she said, the suspicion in her voice icing her words.

OK, she might be able to crush him into a ball and shoot a three-pointer with him, but she wasn't going to. No sense in being afraid, no matter how much the screaming, primitive part of his brain was trying to make it seem like a good idea.

“I'm doing a safety evaluation of working conditions for large scale employees," he yelled over the noise of the site, up to her round animal ears.

Good job, Stephen. Got the sentence out in one go, and having to shout his words concealed the tremble.

“Why haven't I been told?" the giant cat woman growled, planting her clawed hands in her sides.

“It's not fair if you get to prepare," Stephen shouted up at her, hoping to break the ice a little. No success. “They should have told you this morning."

She rolled her eyes and seemed to curse under her breath.

“Bus broke an axle. I only just got here."

He felt her eyes bore into him for a few seconds more before she flicked her gaze briefly back to her colleagues, then back to him. There was a subdued, heavy chuckle from the men.

“Fine." Frank let out a heavy sigh. “Follow me."

She turned on the spot with surprising speed. There was a woosh, and a brief breeze as her tail swept through the air over his head, pushing his hardhat askew.

Jesus, there was some fur padding on the thing, but it'd still be like being hit by a fur-padded baseball bat. Did she even know that thing was dangerous to wave around like that? Should he note it down? There was no category for tails, and technically they hadn't started yet. He opted for quickly jotting 'tail danger?' in the margin before following her.

It took some doing to keep up with her. Obviously, her strides were long, and she made no effort to adjust to a more human pace. For every step she took, Stephen had to take four, leaving him to scuttle after her uncomfortably, trying to maintain some dignity by not going into a full jog. To questionable results.

Her ass was as fat as her stomach. That wasn't something he normally would have been on the search for, but with it being this clearly in view, there was no getting around it. Quite literally, too. When she ducked into the unfinished hulk of the building there was no room to walk beside her. So he kept to her rear, wary to keep clear of her swinging tail.

They came out at the other side. A crew of normal size was waiting besides a trench in the sand. When they caught sight of Frank, and it was hard not to, they got off their asses and started moving around in reluctant Monday morning activity.

One of them jokingly commended her on her lax working hours, and she responded in a growl about the bus before taking hold of a truly enormous shovel. By all appearances it was a normal shovel, sized up, with a steel handle instead of wood, and menacing earthbreaking spikes much like the bucket of a mechanical excavator.

“You just sit and watch, right?" she spoke in his direction.

“Yeah," he nodded. “Just do what you'd normally do."

The meaning of the stares he got was obvious. The same man who called out Frank said something about having an easy job. Stephen just shrugged. He was right enough, at least for this part. He'd have to write a report, too, but no-one who lifted stuff for a living could ever believe that was the hard part. And if he was a smart-ass and asked why they didn't do it, then… things got less amiable. He thought it was a healthy habit to not piss off people who did physical labor.

The large cat got to work without further comment, thrusting the spade deep into the ground and bringing up mountains of sandy soil. It was a sight to behold, the muscles of her arms and back bulging under the coveralls. Her extra weight seemed to be no impediment, and with a few swings of the shovel she had excavated another length of the trench.

As she worked, he ticked off his checklist. Did people stay clear of the equipment? Questionable. Was safety equipment properly used? Yes. Everyone wore their hardhats.

The purpose of the trench became clear. When Frank judged it long enough, she lumbered out with two large steps, and went for a stockpile of concrete sewer pipes. With a grunt, she moved one from the top and carefully rolled it to the edge.

That thing could crush a man.

The crew moved around her, threading heavy duty hoist ropes around the bulk of the pipe. Frank took a length of rope in each hand and started lowering the thing into place, leaning back to provide counterweight. Two men of the crew jumped into the trench to give her directions and make adjustments. Within a few minutes, it was where it supposed to be.

Damn, she really is as strong as a crane, Stephen thought, then jotted down that a man could be caught under the weight due to equipment failure or operator error.

More of the same followed. While he kept an eye open for potential safety hazards, most of his notes for this activity were done. He just watched as the cat and crew moved earth and pipes. She looked impressive just standing around, but at work she was another beast entirely. At one point she decided she didn't have a good way down into the trench, and simply jumped. The ground shuddered, and he could see the water in puddles ripple.

Eventually, that most sacred hour rolled around. Lunch. Workers around the site abandoned their equipment to sit, unwrap sandwiches, light up cigarettes, go on coffee runs, or retreat to where-ever they had left their lunch. This, at least, wasn't too dissimilar from the office.

The trench crew, too, put down their work. Frank stabbed the shovel at the ground, burying it to the hilt. That was the real Excalibur, right there.

She made to move away, then stopped near him, looking down. Her eyes seemed somewhat less baleful than they had been.

“You're not as much of a pain in the ass as I thought you were going to be, safety guy."

Not a high bar to reach, with one as large as yours.

He slapped the thought down.

“Thanks," he said instead. “My name's Stephen, by the way."

A grin spread over her face, showing sharp teeth. “My name's Franky. With a 'y'."

So that's what was up with her name. That single letter made a real difference. With 'Franky' he imagined some slight, quirky girl, not the striped tank before him. But with 'Frank', he didn't imagine a woman at all, and he had an instant flashback to various times he'd been called 'Stephy'. It was hard to imagine who would be courageous enough to pull that joke on Franky.

It was still a weird name, though.

“So, Stephy…"

Goddamnit!

“…What did you pack for lunch?"

And shit. He knew he'd forgotten something this morning. He'd been looking up the commute to the site, he didn't work here, after all, and it had messed up his morning routine, he'd had to leave earlier, and… just shit.

“Nothing."

The tigress blinked at him. “You on a diet or something?"

“No, I just forgot."

“Fuck it, you can have some of mine. I don't think I'll miss your little mouse bites." She rubbed her belly. No, she shamelessly grabbed at it, digging her fingers into her fat, and let out a growling laugh. “Been trying to lose weight anyway. Come on, I bet the boys think you're cute."

She set off at a relaxed stride. This time the tail didn't swish dangerously over his head, but he was on his guard all the same. At least he could keep up, this time.

He didn't like the feeling of having to borrow lunch from someone, freely offered mouse bites or not. But at the same time he found himself wondering what it'd be. Raw meat? Certainly meat of some sort. Would he be eating a bloody chunk of steak, or a messy handful of tartare?

When they cut past a section of the building to be, there was a faint rumble. Chunks of concrete started hitting the ground around them, and Stephen felt the icy grip of crystal clear realization on his stomach. Somewhere in the distance people started shouting, their voices muddled and slow, as if they were stuck in amber. Everything seemed to slow down as his body's survival instincts kicked in. He was surprised at the sudden clarity it provided. He noticed the jagged edges of the rubble, the pitter-patter of the small chunks hitting his hardhat, the hail hits on his shoulders. He even had time for a few errant thoughts. Just like in a video game, he thought. Ironic, that the safety guy was going to be crushed by rubble. And he really should have cleared his browser history.

Despite going into bullet time, he couldn't will his limbs into movement. They felt sluggish, undefined, as if they'd anticipated the accident and just done away with their bones to get things over with.

Heavier chunks started hitting the ground with equally heavier thuds, sending up sprays of sand. This was it, then. One of them would hit him, probably more than one, and that'd be the end. The light of day was already dimming in the shower of debris, dust swirling into his eyes and nose.

Then everything went black.

Oh well, he thought.

But he noticed it wasn't sharp, jagged concrete choking him. It was soft, but coarse, with the smell of musky sweat. The weight bore down on him all the same, squeezing the air out of his lungs and preventing him from getting any in to replace it. If things were black before, they now went slightly blacker still.