How Did I Go To the Beast World in My Pajamas?

Chapter 30: The Future Awaits

When they stopped for the night, Samantha began the process of making good on her promise to Bub. In the world she came from, it would take so much less time to complete her project, but if she could find a way to get started on crafting in the Beast World, well, that was something too. Before St. Benjamin could set off to hunt, she made a couple of requests from him that caused him to crinkle his nose in disgust before reluctantly agreeing. Knowing only the supplies that Samantha had requested from him, he became much more curious as to what 'they' were going to give the bear cub. Spencer, who stayed to watch over Samantha and the exhausted Bub, had gotten fire building down to an exact science, and was free to help her search through the pelts they had gathered so far. As soon as she noticed his presence, however, she sent him to the stream they had camped by, instructing him to wash their collected chicken feathers in Samantha's doubled-up pajama top. This, Spencer considered while working, was much less fun than the activity Samantha had left for herself, which was continuing to lay out the rabbit pelts they had collected and muse over them in much the same way that she had looked at her deer pelt before making her current clothing from it.

Before long, the chicken feathers were drying by the fire and St. Benjamin returned with a couple of fresh kills. Not wanting to spoil the rabbit furs Samantha was studying, St. Benjamin called her over to inspect the additional materials he had collected from the deer he had slaughtered. Samantha was too lost in her own thoughts to wonder how many times in a row she had eaten unseasoned venison, and she happily took the stinking, bloody coils of entrails from St. Benjamin. "Thank you so much, he's going to love this," she whispered excitedly, though the look of disbelief on the scorpion's face did not change at all. "Could you gather up the furs I chose and stack them in order by the fire, with the one closest to the forest on the bottom of the pile? Please?" she wheedled. "You do know that I have to cook this, don't you?" Benjamin responded, his deep voice flat. He shrugged his shoulders to indicate the raw, unprocessed deer meat that was to be the primary component of that evening's meal. "Ah, right, sorry," Samantha began, coming back briefly into the world where necessities were things that had to be considered. St. Benjamin had stalked off, intending to get to work, but turned around to say, "I'll do it after I start roasting the meat." Samantha squealed out another thank you and took her smelly loot to the stream, beginning the long process of washing the partially digested food from the surprising amount of intestines the deer carcass yielded. She found a rhythm for removing both the dirt and fat before submerging the stripped segment of gut into the cold water.

The end of the intestines was finally in sight, and Samantha whispered a small apology to anyone downriver suffering from thirst. Now that there was much less danger of her throwing up, Samantha had grown bolder in her undertakings; there was no chance she would have been able to begin this process for Bub before Spencer had healed her body with his spar. In spite of the smell, Samantha was extremely gratified to see the results of her work. The fox appeared behind her, his tail waving behind him out of curiosity, as though her thoughts had summoned him. "It's time to eat," he murmured in her ear as his arms surrounded the gorgeous female, relieving her frozen hands of their burden. She had been messing around with these intestines for hours, not paying one bit of attention to anything he or Benjamin had been saying. Bub, as if he was in tune with Samantha, had remained asleep after the males had set up camp, and it was up to the scorpion and fox beastmen to reunite the two. "Wait, those need to dry!" Samantha exclaimed, trying to grab the offal back from Spencer. "I'll take care of it," he replied in a tired voice; he was the one who had been running all day, after all. "Let's do it together?" Samantha asked him, trying to compromise. Between the two of them, they made short work of the process of tying the leftover animal parts high in the trees, where they would hopefully remain untouched until morning.

The rest of the evening passed uneventfully, the males stuffing Samantha full of food while she attempted to do the same to both of them and the ever-hungrier bear cub that sat on her lap. Tonight, St. Benjamin had captured the pair on his lap, and Bub was endlessly amused by the extra limbs Benji extended, his pincers full of meat for the small bear to grab. "Be careful," Samantha whispered to him, trying to sound less concerned than she was about the potential revelation of her guardian's identity. "Don't worry so much," he murmured back, his mouth so close to Samantha's ear that she got chills from the vibrations of his voice. She was instantly speechless, the location of the place that the shivers ended being an extremely sensitive one; Samantha had to try her best not to move, lest she be unable to maintain the zoned-out expression that was already giving her difficulty. Spencer lost no time in holding a set of pinched fingers out to her, dangling a dripping slice of meat in front of Samantha's hungry face. She opened her mouth automatically, and he folded the meat into it, touching her sensitive lips under the pretense of wiping away grease and ensuring the food wouldn't be lost to the dirt if Samantha was unable to close her mouth when he was done with it.