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Description
1

The sun beat down on the construction site, adding another layer of misery to the noise and dust that were already there.

"Komiya!"

Far away on the other side of the site, a small figure looked up from the ditch he was struggling to dig.

He lifted the rim of the hardhat he wore with a thumb to see who was calling him, as it was too big and kept getting in his face.

The sun then seized the opportunity to beat down into his eyes, causing him to squint, and he didn't see the huge warthog foreman approach him until his shadow fell over him.

"Komiya."

The meerkat looked up, his boss seeming to be a hundred feet tall as he stood at the edge of the ditch Komiya stood in.

"Shika wants to see you, pronto."

Komiya's mouth dried up even worse than it already was due to the heat and dust he was surrounded by. He had never seen Shika, but knew from hearing the others talk that he was the Big Boss, the Head, the Guy in Charge, and he was a force to be reckoned with.

Komiya knew that if he himself was getting called in on the carpet in front of the Big Boss, then it was either something very good, or something very bad. The way things were going for him here, this was looking to be Very Bad. He steeled himself mentally and swallowed.

"Okay, Buta, give me a minute."

"That's Mr. Buta, wimp."

Komiya's back fur bristled against his t-shirt and too-big work vest and he gritted his teeth and repeated himself, with the offending word added.

"Okay MR. Buta, give me a minute."

The small meerkat made a show of trying to plunge the head of his shovel into the ground and make it stick there like he had seen done many times before, but, to his further embarrassment it simply fell over, the tip not even going into the ground properly.

Buta crossed his arms and started laughing as Komiya struggled to make his way out of the ditch, the small rocks and dirt beneath his work boots betraying him every step of the way, making him stumble and fall to his knees.

He caught himself with his hands a couple of times as he fell, until finally he felt a hard hand grab him by the scruff of his neck and lift him up like a kitten. He was turned until he found himself looking directly into Buta's grinning face, and he immediately began struggling to get down, knowing something bad was about to happen.

"How's about I just carry you there, since you can't seem to get a handle on walking?"

Buta held onto the scruff of Komiya's neck, holding him out in front of himself like something foul that he was trying to keep away from.

Komiya struggled, but to no avail. Buta's hand was just too strong and he was unable to bring his head around to bite at him. He reached up and dug his nails into Buta's work glove, trying to get the big warthog to drop him.

Buta simply laughed maliciously at Komiya's futility, making sure to pass by the construction site's canteen area where most of the other workers were gathered for a break. Komiya squeezed his eyes shut in humiliation as he heard peals of laughter coming from the tables as the others workers took in the sight.

"Hey Buta, what'd you catch there?"

"Dude, throw it back, it's too small!"

"Collecting trash, are ya?"

Komiya stopped struggling and simply hung there in Buta's hand, realizing that that was what they wanted, that they wanted to see him struggle and fight so they could make fun of him.

He now wasn't about to give them the pleasure.

Buta gave his victim a little shake, making Komiya's teeth click together.

"Gave up, didya, wimp? We're almost there."

A quick turn around the canteen area and up a small hill overseeing the site led to a small brown and white trailer, with a single door that presumably led to Komiya's doom.

Buta, still hanging onto him, knocked on the door.

"Who is it?" A voice said.

Komiya brought his ears up. The voice sounded completely different than he had expected it to. This was the voice of a young male, maybe in his 20s.

"Brought Komiya, boss. He was havin' trouble findin' this place."

"Thanks, Buta, send him in."

Buta set him down in front of the door, where Komiya promptly snapped at his hand and glared at him the second he let go. Buta pointed down at him, glaring back. Like the coward he truly was, he kept his hand back from Komiya as he pointed.

"You're gonna pay for that, you little asshole," Buta said, then turned and walked away, leaving Komiya to his fate.

Komiya rubbed the sore back of his neck and steeled himself again for further humiliation and thought of his son, the one thing that kept him here. He had to do this for him, to be able to take care of him properly. His family needed the money.

He pulled the handle and opened the door, peeking his head in.

"Sir?"

"Take off your hardhat in here, Komiya. I want to be able to see your face," the voice said.

Komiya undid the strap that held his hardhat in place and removed it, the air conditioning in the trailer feeling alien against the damp fur on his head.

As his eyes adjusted from the light of the beating sun to the slightly dimmer, artificial lighting of the trailer, he became aware of a huge desk in front of him, with a couple of beaten down blue plastic chairs in front of it.

The desk was piled high with paperwork, blueprints, and a laptop, and sitting behind the morass was a 16-point young buck, who looked, as the meerkat had figured out, to be in his mid-twenties. He wore a button-down shirt and was writing something down, and his antlers were so tall they reached all the way to the ceiling of the tiny trailer, sometimes scraping the ceiling itself when he moved his head.

Komiya sat down, and waited nervously.

After a few minutes, Komiya dared to speak.

"Sir? Mr. Shika?"

The buck looked up at him.

"Komiya, do you know how long you've been here?"

The meerkat thought back. He'd been working here so much for the life of him he couldn't remember.

"Uhm, since the site opened."

Shika nodded.

"You've been here about 6 months. I remember when I hired you; I thought to myself, a meerkat will be fast, they're fast little buggers, he can get work done quickly."

Shika wrote something down again.

The general atmosphere was now tense; the feeling reminded Komiya of a cat stroking her claws on silk.

Shika looked up again.

"You know everyone gets assignments for the day, right? I've been following you, Komiya. You don't finish your assignments at all here lately. I've also had complaints from your coworkers that you rely on them to finish your daily assignments."

The more Shika spoke, the redder in the face Komiya got. It seemed like this job guaranteed nothing but embarrassment.

"Sir, it's just...I..."

Komiya closed his mouth, realizing that there was no point in speaking. Shika wouldn't listen and it was obvious he was already labeled as lazy; no point in fighting it.

Komiya knew he himself wasn't lazy, by any means; he was simply not built for the hard labor assignments he was given daily. He had found the hard way that he was either too short or didn't weigh enough, or simply wasn't strong enough.

Shika nodded again, keeping a poker face and writing something else down. The constant scrape, scrape of Shika's antlers on the ceiling was starting to irritate Komiya and he realized he was getting a headache.

"Sir, can I go?"

Shika looked up from his paperwork again, a look of annoyance breaking his poker face.

"Stay put, Komiya, I'm not done yet."

Komiya settled back into the chair to wait. Shika took his time, finally finishing his precious paperwork. Seeming to ignore Koimya completely, he turned to his laptop and typed something in.

The buck then turned back to him and folded his hands on the desk, fixing Komiya with an indescernable look.

"Komiya, you either start..."

Shika's ominous words were interrupted by a knock on the door.

"Hello?" A bright female voice came through.

"Hey! Come on in!"

Shika's demeanor instantly changed from one of tiredness and cynicism to one of energy and happiness. A big grin broke over his face as he looked past Koimya, who also turned to see who it was.

The most beautiful face he'd ever seen was looking through the partly opened door. It was the face of a small doe, with the biggest eyes he'd ever seen on a creature. They seemed to sparkle with their own natural light, and her fur was a lovely bi-color mix of snow white on her chin and throat and gold-orange on her head and arms. Her high cheek bones and large eyes worked together to form her tiny nose into an adorable heart shape, and her lovely head was crowned with a tiny pair of antlers. No, not even antlers, just a small pair of horns that went perfectly with her small features and large eyes.

Komiya's head followed her unwaveringly as she walked in and past him, setting a bento box on Shika's desk. The skirt of the pink sun dress she wore on her small frame swirled around her in a flouncy way and it made Komiya feel weird (in a good way) just to look at her.

"I tried to get what you ordered but they didn't have it," she explained to Komiya's boss, "so I got the other one."

"Thanks."

The little female hopped up and had a seat on the edge of Shika's desk, crossing her legs daintily in a ladylike manner and making a space for herself among the papers. She leaned over and addressed the buck from across the sea of work.

"Shika, you're going to have to start bringing your own lunch, I have work too, you know."

"I can't help it if I have a bunch of crap to deal with from Dad right now."

"What does that have to do with the price of gyoza in Tokyo?"

Komiya sat and listened to the pair going back and forth, fading into the background just like usual. The female seemed to be the more dominant one of the pair, and the more talkative.

"Noda, I gotta work and I got business right now," Shika said, finally acknowledging Komiya by a nod in his direction.

"Oh, I'm sorry..." The female said, hopping down, "You should have said something. I didn't know you had this guy in here to torment him."

"Ha ha, shut up."

"No, you."

"No you."

"Okay, okay, I'm gone..."

"Bye, see you later..."

The doe turned on her way out and stuck her tongue out as she left, Komiya's head once more following her as she flounced out the door, closing it behind her.

Komiya sat and stared behind him at the now closed door, secretly willing the doe to come back. It was like seeing a shooting star, there once and not to be seen again, no matter how badly he wanted it to come back.

He suddenly felt a pencil bounce off the top of his head, bringing him back to reality and making him turn and look his boss in surprise, who now sat with a bemused but defensive expression.

"Eyes off my sister, hairball, and up here."

Komiya felt both his heart race and his body relax at that bit of knowledge.

"As I was saying, Komiya, you need to either start doing your own stuff by yourself on time, or else I'm going to have to let you go. You have one week to redeem yourself."

"A week? But sir..."

The buck pointed at him.

"No buts, Komiya. I've given you every chance. Do your assignments yourself for the next week ON TIME and you're off the hook. If not, sorry."

Komiya looked down at his hands, bruised from his labor.

"But my son..."

He looked back up at Shika, who now wore a sympathetic mask.

"Sorry, dude, but them's the breaks. Get outta here and get back to work."

As Komiya stepped out of the trailer, the sun began its irascible tirade against his head and eyes again, which had become accustomed to the dim lighting and cool air of the inside of Shika's trailer. Putting his hardhat back on and adjusting the strap, he started to make his way down the hill, only to stop in surprise at the sight that awaited him.

SHE was there at the canteen, standing before Buta, looking up at him and giving him holy hell over something or other. She pointed her finger at up him hard and he looked genuinely afraid as he held his hands up in a non-threatening gesture. He'd try to say something and she would start on him again, until finally he gave up and walked away.

Komiya watched for a moment as she stood there, then seized the chance to walk down the hill to check on her, and hopefully, actually talk to her.

Description
1

The sun beat down on the construction site, adding another layer of misery to the noise and dust that were already there.

"Komiya!"

Far away on the other side of the site, a small figure looked up from the ditch he was struggling to dig.

He lifted the rim of the hardhat he wore with a thumb to see who was calling him, as it was too big and kept getting in his face.

The sun then seized the opportunity to beat down into his eyes, causing him to squint, and he didn't see the huge warthog foreman approach him until his shadow fell over him.

"Komiya."

The meerkat looked up, his boss seeming to be a hundred feet tall as he stood at the edge of the ditch Komiya stood in.

"Shika wants to see you, pronto."

Komiya's mouth dried up even worse than it already was due to the heat and dust he was surrounded by. He had never seen Shika, but knew from hearing the others talk that he was the Big Boss, the Head, the Guy in Charge, and he was a force to be reckoned with.

Komiya knew that if he himself was getting called in on the carpet in front of the Big Boss, then it was either something very good, or something very bad. The way things were going for him here, this was looking to be Very Bad. He steeled himself mentally and swallowed.

"Okay, Buta, give me a minute."

"That's Mr. Buta, wimp."

Komiya's back fur bristled against his t-shirt and too-big work vest and he gritted his teeth and repeated himself, with the offending word added.

"Okay MR. Buta, give me a minute."

The small meerkat made a show of trying to plunge the head of his shovel into the ground and make it stick there like he had seen done many times before, but, to his further embarrassment it simply fell over, the tip not even going into the ground properly.

Buta crossed his arms and started laughing as Komiya struggled to make his way out of the ditch, the small rocks and dirt beneath his work boots betraying him every step of the way, making him stumble and fall to his knees.

He caught himself with his hands a couple of times as he fell, until finally he felt a hard hand grab him by the scruff of his neck and lift him up like a kitten. He was turned until he found himself looking directly into Buta's grinning face, and he immediately began struggling to get down, knowing something bad was about to happen.

"How's about I just carry you there, since you can't seem to get a handle on walking?"

Buta held onto the scruff of Komiya's neck, holding him out in front of himself like something foul that he was trying to keep away from.

Komiya struggled, but to no avail. Buta's hand was just too strong and he was unable to bring his head around to bite at him. He reached up and dug his nails into Buta's work glove, trying to get the big warthog to drop him.

Buta simply laughed maliciously at Komiya's futility, making sure to pass by the construction site's canteen area where most of the other workers were gathered for a break. Komiya squeezed his eyes shut in humiliation as he heard peals of laughter coming from the tables as the others workers took in the sight.

"Hey Buta, what'd you catch there?"

"Dude, throw it back, it's too small!"

"Collecting trash, are ya?"

Komiya stopped struggling and simply hung there in Buta's hand, realizing that that was what they wanted, that they wanted to see him struggle and fight so they could make fun of him.

He now wasn't about to give them the pleasure.

Buta gave his victim a little shake, making Komiya's teeth click together.

"Gave up, didya, wimp? We're almost there."

A quick turn around the canteen area and up a small hill overseeing the site led to a small brown and white trailer, with a single door that presumably led to Komiya's doom.

Buta, still hanging onto him, knocked on the door.

"Who is it?" A voice said.

Komiya brought his ears up. The voice sounded completely different than he had expected it to. This was the voice of a young male, maybe in his 20s.

"Brought Komiya, boss. He was havin' trouble findin' this place."

"Thanks, Buta, send him in."

Buta set him down in front of the door, where Komiya promptly snapped at his hand and glared at him the second he let go. Buta pointed down at him, glaring back. Like the coward he truly was, he kept his hand back from Komiya as he pointed.

"You're gonna pay for that, you little asshole," Buta said, then turned and walked away, leaving Komiya to his fate.

Komiya rubbed the sore back of his neck and steeled himself again for further humiliation and thought of his son, the one thing that kept him here. He had to do this for him, to be able to take care of him properly. His family needed the money.

He pulled the handle and opened the door, peeking his head in.

"Sir?"

"Take off your hardhat in here, Komiya. I want to be able to see your face," the voice said.

Komiya undid the strap that held his hardhat in place and removed it, the air conditioning in the trailer feeling alien against the damp fur on his head.

As his eyes adjusted from the light of the beating sun to the slightly dimmer, artificial lighting of the trailer, he became aware of a huge desk in front of him, with a couple of beaten down blue plastic chairs in front of it.

The desk was piled high with paperwork, blueprints, and a laptop, and sitting behind the morass was a 16-point young buck, who looked, as the meerkat had figured out, to be in his mid-twenties. He wore a button-down shirt and was writing something down, and his antlers were so tall they reached all the way to the ceiling of the tiny trailer, sometimes scraping the ceiling itself when he moved his head.

Komiya sat down, and waited nervously.

After a few minutes, Komiya dared to speak.

"Sir? Mr. Shika?"

The buck looked up at him.

"Komiya, do you know how long you've been here?"

The meerkat thought back. He'd been working here so much for the life of him he couldn't remember.

"Uhm, since the site opened."

Shika nodded.

"You've been here about 6 months. I remember when I hired you; I thought to myself, a meerkat will be fast, they're fast little buggers, he can get work done quickly."

Shika wrote something down again.

The general atmosphere was now tense; the feeling reminded Komiya of a cat stroking her claws on silk.

Shika looked up again.

"You know everyone gets assignments for the day, right? I've been following you, Komiya. You don't finish your assignments at all here lately. I've also had complaints from your coworkers that you rely on them to finish your daily assignments."

The more Shika spoke, the redder in the face Komiya got. It seemed like this job guaranteed nothing but embarrassment.

"Sir, it's just...I..."

Komiya closed his mouth, realizing that there was no point in speaking. Shika wouldn't listen and it was obvious he was already labeled as lazy; no point in fighting it.

Komiya knew he himself wasn't lazy, by any means; he was simply not built for the hard labor assignments he was given daily. He had found the hard way that he was either too short or didn't weigh enough, or simply wasn't strong enough.

Shika nodded again, keeping a poker face and writing something else down. The constant scrape, scrape of Shika's antlers on the ceiling was starting to irritate Komiya and he realized he was getting a headache.

"Sir, can I go?"

Shika looked up from his paperwork again, a look of annoyance breaking his poker face.

"Stay put, Komiya, I'm not done yet."

Komiya settled back into the chair to wait. Shika took his time, finally finishing his precious paperwork. Seeming to ignore Koimya completely, he turned to his laptop and typed something in.

The buck then turned back to him and folded his hands on the desk, fixing Komiya with an indescernable look.

"Komiya, you either start..."

Shika's ominous words were interrupted by a knock on the door.

"Hello?" A bright female voice came through.

"Hey! Come on in!"

Shika's demeanor instantly changed from one of tiredness and cynicism to one of energy and happiness. A big grin broke over his face as he looked past Koimya, who also turned to see who it was.

The most beautiful face he'd ever seen was looking through the partly opened door. It was the face of a small doe, with the biggest eyes he'd ever seen on a creature. They seemed to sparkle with their own natural light, and her fur was a lovely bi-color mix of snow white on her chin and throat and gold-orange on her head and arms. Her high cheek bones and large eyes worked together to form her tiny nose into an adorable heart shape, and her lovely head was crowned with a tiny pair of antlers. No, not even antlers, just a small pair of horns that went perfectly with her small features and large eyes.

Komiya's head followed her unwaveringly as she walked in and past him, setting a bento box on Shika's desk. The skirt of the pink sun dress she wore on her small frame swirled around her in a flouncy way and it made Komiya feel weird (in a good way) just to look at her.

"I tried to get what you ordered but they didn't have it," she explained to Komiya's boss, "so I got the other one."

"Thanks."

The little female hopped up and had a seat on the edge of Shika's desk, crossing her legs daintily in a ladylike manner and making a space for herself among the papers. She leaned over and addressed the buck from across the sea of work.

"Shika, you're going to have to start bringing your own lunch, I have work too, you know."

"I can't help it if I have a bunch of crap to deal with from Dad right now."

"What does that have to do with the price of gyoza in Tokyo?"

Komiya sat and listened to the pair going back and forth, fading into the background just like usual. The female seemed to be the more dominant one of the pair, and the more talkative.

"Noda, I gotta work and I got business right now," Shika said, finally acknowledging Komiya by a nod in his direction.

"Oh, I'm sorry..." The female said, hopping down, "You should have said something. I didn't know you had this guy in here to torment him."

"Ha ha, shut up."

"No, you."

"No you."

"Okay, okay, I'm gone..."

"Bye, see you later..."

The doe turned on her way out and stuck her tongue out as she left, Komiya's head once more following her as she flounced out the door, closing it behind her.

Komiya sat and stared behind him at the now closed door, secretly willing the doe to come back. It was like seeing a shooting star, there once and not to be seen again, no matter how badly he wanted it to come back.

He suddenly felt a pencil bounce off the top of his head, bringing him back to reality and making him turn and look his boss in surprise, who now sat with a bemused but defensive expression.

"Eyes off my sister, hairball, and up here."

Komiya felt both his heart race and his body relax at that bit of knowledge.

"As I was saying, Komiya, you need to either start doing your own stuff by yourself on time, or else I'm going to have to let you go. You have one week to redeem yourself."

"A week? But sir..."

The buck pointed at him.

"No buts, Komiya. I've given you every chance. Do your assignments yourself for the next week ON TIME and you're off the hook. If not, sorry."

Komiya looked down at his hands, bruised from his labor.

"But my son..."

He looked back up at Shika, who now wore a sympathetic mask.

"Sorry, dude, but them's the breaks. Get outta here and get back to work."

As Komiya stepped out of the trailer, the sun began its irascible tirade against his head and eyes again, which had become accustomed to the dim lighting and cool air of the inside of Shika's trailer. Putting his hardhat back on and adjusting the strap, he started to make his way down the hill, only to stop in surprise at the sight that awaited him.

SHE was there at the canteen, standing before Buta, looking up at him and giving him holy hell over something or other. She pointed her finger at up him hard and he looked genuinely afraid as he held his hands up in a non-threatening gesture. He'd try to say something and she would start on him again, until finally he gave up and walked away.

Komiya watched for a moment as she stood there, then seized the chance to walk down the hill to check on her, and hopefully, actually talk to her.