An Estrangement Intervention

All characters described are physically mature, young adults/18+.

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Pairs of Pumpkins- Patches #1: An Estrangement Intervention at the Mason Memorial Inn

("Patches" are standalone, supplemental stories in the "Pairs of Pumpkins" Universe that exist outside of the chapters of the main storyline. They are intended to explore and detail ideas and characters in the world with some secondary or tertiary connection to the cast and events of the main story line, even if they are never bound to intersect with it.)

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The heavy wooden door to the Mason Memorial Inn swung open for only the second time that afternoon and it did so with such violence to startle the young, canine barman. He jumped and nearly dropped the brandy sifter he'd been nursing in boredom before tucking the still-sloshing drink behind the counter. There were two new visitors standing in the doorway, their postures hunched down with exhaustion and annoyance and the barman straightened himself out to receive their guests. "Magdalena," he called out over his shoulder, through swinging, saloon doors behind him, into the kitchen. "We have visitors. They might be hungry."

"Don't let them order either of the specials. Or the salad," a sing-songy young woman's melodic voice called back out from the darkness of the doorway. "We're out of everything but the potato soup and the beef stew until tomorrow's delivery."

"Got it." He glanced up to the five items on the chalkboard menu and he pursed his mouth with thought. Dark brown eyes fell to the rag he used to clean it but a two item menu would not be fitting for an establishment of quality such as theirs. So he left it and turned his attention to the two new patrons approaching the bar, not the usual sort of travelers for adventure or commerce who would frequent this remote location.

He saw the female first, a striking but aging, white-furred, mink woman with sharp, triangle ears and a short, pointy snout. She was tall and her figure long and lean, befit of her species and she carried herself with poise below her low-slung head and a restrained sneer of irritation. Her headfur was white and short, cut into sculpted, fashionable bob with an asymmetry that reached below her chin on the longer side but whatever trauma they'd both been through had her hair frayed and neglected.

She, like the male walking in front of her, was postured as if they had come in from the pouring rain except they, like the world outside the windows, were perfectly dry. Drawing closer, it became clear they could both benefit from a bath and a wash as they dressed in a finery not fitting of travel, at least not outside of cushy caravans or stagecoaches. Both her long dress and his trousers, shirt and jacket bore signs of accelerated distress below the dirt and the mud.

The male of the pair was a rabbit of similar years, with an uncommon broadness for his species, suggesting some athleticism in his younger days, since grown soft and south with neglect and gravity. While his adornment spoke of an equivalent wealth to his female companion, his scowl seemed less out-of-character for his poise than hers did. His coat, where it was visible outside of his faded, bluish suit and half-buttoned, white blouse was a light brownish, freckled by spots of aged grey where the silver of his seemingly, once black headfur was further accelerated. The top of his head was barely shorter than hers and he could have cheated his way to a height advantage with his lapine nature but for now his long ears slumped, weighted down by their obvious troubles. As the pair shambled through the dining room, they both became aware of the peculiar finery surrounding them.

"What is this place?" the mink woman was the first of the two to speak, stopping to examine the white table cloth of one of the tables, round with chairs like a fine dining restaurant and not long and rectangular with hard benches for seats, that would be more expected from a roadside inn. The walls were white with paintings and tapestries hanging from them, gas lamps filling in the rare, would-be shadows where the ample windows in three of the four walls failed to bath the place with afternoon sun.

It was a few hours too early for a typical dinner time and late of lunch and the surprisingly opulent dining room was empty but for the canine barman and other patron: an older bull sat in a corner, focused on the steaming bowl in front of him that he ate from. In contrast to the finery of the dining room, he dressed like a farmer, which was the expected sort of local in this part of the land.

The bartender extended his arms out and open, his voice soft and silvery but confident. "Welcome to The Mason Memorial Inn, the finest luxury accommodations for the common traveler. We specialize in offering rooms and meals at Pauper prices at a quality that are fit for a King! My..."

"Not quite a King but it's nice," the rabbit spoke with a nasal voice and shrugged as he interrupted. His head craned casually, this way and that, evaluating the space around him. The mink was more polite and the young bartender caught her attention from across the room.

He was a good-looking, canine young man of an age dubious to be running this place at all. But there he was playing every bit the part and seeming completely comfortable in it, dressed in a white, silken, blouse draped over his tall and lanky figure while his waist was hidden mostly by the bar but it could be seen to be wrapped in a high, purple cumberbun. His coat was a sandy, blotchy beige which complemented his figure to suggest he was more coyote than anything else but his face, neck and inner ears bore ivory fur in a two-tone contrast uncharacteristic of the species. His bare hands at the ends of pressed sleeves offered a third shade of fur: black. The rabbit looked back and saw the mink's attention to him, however innocent and his scowl clenched further.

Looking between the two of them and the tension connecting them, the barman cleared his throat, otherwise undeterred and continued. "My name is Cormac. I will be your host and bartender for the evening."

"We need dinner for two, Cormac," the rabbit began. "Baths..."

"Separate," the mink interjected with a hiss and the rabbit continued without a hitch. "...A clean room, breakfast in the morning and enough rations for the road to make it home to Mudcrest".

"And drinks," the mink demanded. "Several. Stiff ones."

"For both of us," the rabbit flatly added.

"Of course. One bed for two?" Cormac turned his head in an anticipatory wince, his tone raising sharply.

"Two beds for one," the rabbit said with a glare at his mink companion, who scowled with equivalent disdain.

The barman gave a single, sharp nod and fetched a bronze key with an oversized, wooden handle from behind the counter and placed it upon the bartop. "Room Three. That'll be five silver."

"Five silver?!" the rabbit and mink were both taken aback by the price and exchanged glances for the first time instinctively, both in some disbelief. The barman also recoiled at their reactions and his mouth fell open to stammer out words but the rabbit continued first. "I've never in my life, stayed anywhere so cheap. You weren't kidding about pauper prices. Kassina, pay the man."

A slow, open smile of relief spread across the barman's face and he gave a sigh through it, his entire posture relaxing once again. The mink was back to her sour grumble and she raised her hands before her to slip off a gold ring and place it on the bartop. "That should more than cover everything."

Cormac reached out unsurely and picked it up to examine it. He held it to the sunlight, then looked up at them, through it. "I'm not an expert but I suspect this is worth much more than what your bill will be. But I can't appraise it to where I could give you back the difference. Are you sure you don't want to pawn it to a jeweler and come back with the correct payment?"

The rabbit looked over his left shoulder, then his right. "A jeweler where? Mudcrest is the nearest city of any wealth and we're three days away," The rabbit waves a dismissive hand. "She has plenty more of them at home. We just need to get there." The mink gave a glare to him and her cheek swelled with a toothy snarl. Cormac's eyes moved between the two of them before he pocketed the ring.

"I'll hold it for a few weeks, should you want to come back and pay the bill with coin."

"Do whatever you want. We're not coming back to a highway-side Inn for a stupid ring," the rabbit grumbled to an eyeroll of his mustelid companion. He pulled himself up onto a barstool and she blinked with some irritation, looking back over her shoulder at the mostly empty dining room.

The barman's demeanor was unwavered by his gruffness. "What can I get you two to eat?"

They both examined the bartop, looking for menus before Cormac pointed to the chalkboard behind the bar listing the wine, the ales, the meads and five meal options.

"Beef stew for me, please," the mink spoke, resettling herself in her barstool.

The rabbit squinted and leaned in, taking a bit longer before he relaxed back and spoke: "Potato soup. And an ale."

"Wine for me, please."

Cormac gave a genial smile and nod. "Of course. We'll have that right out for you. Maggie, did you get that?" the barman elevated his tone, looking back to the kitchen's swinging doors.

"Coming right up," The sing-songy woman's voice called out from within and the rabbit perked at the unseen presence. He peered back into the darkness of the doorway while Cormac got to work, pouring the wine first and placing it in front of the distressed mink, who nodded graciously. Next, he pulled an ale and served it to the rabbit, who didn't.

The silence was too much for a room of four and the tension, uncomfortable so the barman decided to speak, without addressing their obvious troubles or trauma.

"So, what are your names?"

The rabbit was annoyed but the mink answered for them both. "I'm Kassina. This lovely fellow is my husband, Walter."

"Nice to meet you both."

The rabbit only grumbled in his metal mug, which amplified it. The mink at least, gave a small nod of her head. "It is nice to meet you too..." Her words fell away and she tried to pinch her sentence at the last minute to hide that she'd obviously forgotten his name, if she'd heard it at all.

Cormac made several more attempts to draw them into conversation without probing them but their only interest seemed to be in staring laconically at the various, unimportant details of the dining room. The plates stacked on shelves behind the bar and the glasses and steins hanging below them. A tapestry or a painting, some which might have been familiar to one of them or the other. The set tables and floral arrangements at the centers of them. Only on occasion did one of them steal a glance at the other and when they did, eyes would quickly avert. Sometimes, with an eyeroll, sometimes with a glance to the floor and a hasty pull of their drink. They were nearing the bottom of their third round and their eyes were slightly glassy when the swinging, double doors of the kitchen abruptly pushed open, jolting the pair of them.

Stepping aside and sighing with relief, the barman moved out of the way. At least the bickering couple would have some food in them before they got too drunk and whatever was seething within them exploded into a scene. It was but for a moment though as he watched the slumping couple come alive at the sight of the chef and server, a striking and voluptuous vixen whose coat and features spoke to a familial relation to the barman. These were reactions neither of them were surprised by when new, male guests saw her but Cormac had expected a less dramatic reaction from this apparently, once-dignified couple but the entire silhouette of both mink and rabbit shifted.

Their eyes widened and their jaws dropped in unison. She was eye-catching by any connotation, seemingly the same age as her brother, with the same tall ears, dark eyes and a triangular face under coarse, sandy fur. Her mouth and cheeks were a lighter shade of beige with a clear line between the colors as the contrast ran down the front of her soft neck to her broad shoulders, down into the conservatively high buttons of her custom-fitted, white, cooking jacket. Within it, her thickness ramped from plump to impossible extremes with the cooking-scarred top pushed far in front of her and out to the sides with the bloated curves of a massive, restrained bosom taking up much of her chest. They were wider than her ribcage by an open hand on either side, jutting forward enough to almost reach her elbows with her arms at full extension and they curved back in to her belly just above where her navel would be. From there down, the girl was all but hidden by the high countertop.

The female canine's smile weakened at this different sort of attention and she cast an uneasy look back to Cormac under her forced politeness. "Beef stew for the misses and potato soup for the good sir." She set the dishes down in front of herself on the bar before sliding one, then the other forward to mind her reach. Both wafted enticing steam from the heat of their liquids, enough to dampen the muzzles of the duo. The smell was enough to make the barman hungry despite having had lunch not long before. "Be careful. It's very hot!"

"You're related?" The mink was the first of them to find her tongue.

"This is my twin sister, Magdalena. We own and operate the Inn together."

"Do you two... have other siblings?" the rabbit spoke next, looking over Magdalena's face before his eyes fell back into the gravity of her pronounced chest. The mink noticed but a moment later and jabbed him sharply and obviously in the side with her elbow.

Cormac and Magdalena exchange curious glances before shaking their heads in unison. "Just us two," the sister said with a polite smile before beginning her nervous and obvious retreat. "I need to clean up before the grease dries. Enjoy your meals!" She dismissed herself back to the kitchen, brushing past her brother and through the swinging doors of a doorframe that she almost filled.

"That isn't a question either of us have been asked before. Usually the guests are remarking about my sister's uncommon endowments, in comments of varying quality and taste."

"Not that uncommon, apparently," the mink gave an annoyed gaze to the ceiling, tilting back her head and finishing half of her glass of wine at once, while her husband watched her with some apprehension. She slapped it back down to the counter and tapped the bottom of the glass for a refill before her eyes caught Cormac's posture, his head canted curiously aside. With a puff of a sigh, she explained. "The thieves who robbed us? They were twins and they both looked quite a lot like your sister. More vulpine than canine in features and with bold, white and incredibly soft fur. But they were similar in age, features and figure, especially in that abundant bosom. Strikingly similar. Smartly dressed and styled for bandits, cocky in their swagger. They were quite tall and smelled..."

Walter's eyes were sideways on her when Cormac interrupted. "You were robbed by two women?"

The rabbit was about to take his first sip of the steaming potato soup but his huff of a laugh blew half of it right off the spoon. "Women. You're being generous."

"Girls?"

"Only if girls can have balls bigger than my fist and a cock like my forearm!" The rabbit was growing larger with his animation while the mink had shrunk but she ignored it enough to take her first, shaky spoonful.

Cormac recoiled his head. "I've not heard of... any such girls. None that match my sister and certainly none with... anything extra for a woman. That's quite peculiar."

"What's peculiar is how little effort it took for the two of them to fuck my wife!"

Beef stew blew across the bartop from the mink's bursting cheeks, almost hitting the wide-eyed Cormac's shirt. His ears blew back at the revelation while the mink was shrinking in slow-motion, open-mouthed and disgusted while her head tried to disappear completely between her shoulders, as if she could become a turtle with just a little more shame. Finally, with a sucking inhale, she reinflated herself and found words to speak. "I've told you a thousand times, Walter: they used some kind of mind magic."

"Of course: mind magic," the rabbit parroted with sarcasm. "I saw the way you were staring at their codpieces from the moment they stepped out in front of our carriage." He slapped the bartop and eyed the still-frozen Cormac to elaborate. "These girls didn't just have men's tackle; they wore these molded codpieces over their pants to make sure everyone knew how proud they were of their dicks and balls, like they were carrying three coconuts in their boiled, brown leather cockslings. My wife couldn't take her eyes off them!"

"It's not exactly a common sight, Walter."

His eyes threw daggers sideways at his wife before he looked back to Cormac, who had taken a step back. "Beyond that, they were definitely girls, with waspy waists and wide hips to go with those incredible racks. Like a trimmer, fitter version of your sister."

"My sister is an innocent party here. Please leave her out of this," Cormac bristled suddenly, folding his arms. "It seems like your wife wasn't the only one who couldn't take her eyes off them."

"Ha!" the mink barked in agreement.

"Yes, of course," the rabbit gave a broad, dismissive wave. "So these girls step out into the highway, one of them with a sword and the other with a spear. They explain how they're taking our carriage and all of our valuables but all the while they can basically smell it on my wife. She's just aching for those bulging girldicks. They force us off the carriage and one of them checks our cargo while the other kept an eye on us. Then one of them searches us; the chatty, redhead one. Me first, then my wife. Thoroughly."

Cormac's muzzle slowly formed into a wince. "It sounds like you were both assaulted."

"They were strictly professional at first! But then she starts panting and groaning in heat when one of them patted her down and stripped away her necklaces. The fox searching her, the redhead said 'I'm going to need some help with this one' and the quiet one came over and stood behind her. The twins were grinning up a storm, eyeing me as they touched and sniffed at my wife, starting to grind themselves against her. She was shamelessly horny, like I haven't seen since our wedding night. She could barely look at me."

Kassina gripped the edge of the bar, her claws digging into it before she burst out: "What was I supposed to do, Walter? They had weapons."

"You didn't have to beg for it!" the rabbit burst out at his wife before turning back to Cormac. "They were groping up a storm. The redhead was hiking up her dress. She was watching me and grinning. She even asked Kassina if she wanted them to stop. She couldn't look at me as she shook her head.'"

Kassina stared blankly across the bartop, her second attempt at spoonful of stew still hovering over her plate, trembling and clearly holding back tears. But instead of breaking down, she snapped. "Oh, and you weren't ogling at those giant breasts of theirs all the while?! You barely noticed I was there once they held your eyes! As soon as these girls came out of the woods, it's like I didn't have a husband anymore!" she pleaded to Cormac. "His eyes only found me again once they were all over me!"

"Well, it certainly explains how you acted! Trying to make me jealous?!" His attention turned back to Cormac, who was glancing down at the waning intensity of the steam from his nearly untouched soup. "The redhead unbuckled her leather cocksling and she's hung like a horse, no exaggeration. This huge, veiny erection, slapping against the bottom of her tits and greasy with arousal. The kind I'd expect to hurt a woman if it could fit at all. She squatted down to line herself up, watching me the whole time! Then, torturously slow, she started to stand up and Kassina looked like she was going to cry for a moment. Suddenly her mouth falls open, her eyes go bigger than I've ever seen them and she's sucking in all the air in the forest. There's my wife, taking this monster of a cock like she's giving birth in reverse! It was like she was halfway between having an orgasm and pushing out a baby!"