"Alright, I play a three of hearts, so I move my bishop three along the red squares, which puts it on your back row. King me!"

Feferi dutifully swapped Jade's bishop for a stack of two checkers, and just as dutifully took the offered shot. "In that case, I play my two and four of clubs on your three, giving me a short straight. That lets me mewve, I mean move, my castle three straight across the column to stand right in front of your knight. Shot!" she called, pouring one

Jade obediently knocked back a shot, coughing a bit as it burned unexpectedly. "Feferi, what the hell did you put in that one?"

"Oh, just a little Glenmorangie I nicked from Rose's stash."

"Wow, I didn't know she had anything like that hidden away. Still, that was rather naughty." Jade tried giving Feferi a sultry look, but decided shameless was easier to pull off. "We'll have to take care of that."

Nepeta put her hands on their shoulders. "Ladies, as pawsitively amazing as that would be, we do have a game to play." Jade and Feferi pouted at that, until Nepeta continued. "Save it for later. And thanks, Fefurri, for moving that castle. Since my corner of the board is empty, I get to do this!" Nepeta lay down her hand. "Six through ten of hearts, straight flush!"

"And that's Gin!" they all chorused together. Hoping to avoid any mishaps, Jade poured the shots this time, and they all drank.

Now that they were all pleasantly buzzed, Jade moved them to the pile of pillows, plushes, and mattresses that dominated one corner of their room. It was great for when they were feeling especially cuddly, and when it got colder it made for a fantastic place to sleep. Once everyone was comfy, they just dozed for a few minutes. Feferi was the first to speak up.

"That was reel-ly fun, Jade! Although the rules were a little confusing."

Nepeta snorted at this. "What rules?"

"Point. Anyway, where did you learn such a fun game, Jade?"

Jade pulled them closer, taking a moment to get her thoughts in order. "Well, back on the island, when grandpa wasn't too busy, he'd put on a lot of classic tv shows. One of them, well, we called it MASH, but I guess you would have called it "In which a group of doctors attached to a combat operation set up a mobile medical station in a war zone and get up to all sorts of hijinks while waiting to be returned to their ship blah blah blah. Anyway, they had a lot of games, but most of them were missing pieces, so they just combined everything and made up rules every time they played."

Nepeta mumbled against her shoulder. "You miss him." It wasn't a question.

"Yeah. I mean, I do have Jake now, even if I wish he would wear actual pants. But he's not my grandpa, he's just like him."

Jade would have gone on, except Feferi chose that moment to wriggle around in the pile, and all of a sudden something soft hit her in the face with a small poff.

"Nope! No more marlin business! I am too happy and snuggly and buzzed for it."

"Marlin?" Jade said.

"Oops, I meant maudlin."

"That one was bad. So bad."

"Hey! It wasn't that- oof!"

"Oof!"

Nepeta chose that moment to bean them both in the face with pillows of her own. "You snooze, you lose!"

Feferi and Jade shared a look before picking up the closest objects and flinging them at Nepeta, a squiddle and a Manthro Chap as it turned out. Their pillow fight quickly turned into Jade and Feferi versus Nepeta. Nepeta would tackle-pounce whoever picked up a pillow, leaving the other free to whack Nepeta with their own pillow. Squiddles, Manthro Chaps, pillows, bean bags, trolls, and humans all flew around the room as the fight devolved into general giggles and levity. When the laughter died down, they took a moment to look around their room. Just about everything was in the wrong place, and most of it was covered in pieces of the pile. There were even two squiddles that would have been tanglebuddies if they didn't have a fan blade stuck between them. Nepeta was the first to speak up.

"Wow, we ree- really did a number on this place, didn't we?"

"Yeah, sure did," Jade replied through a yawn. "I don't know about either of you, but I'm beat. How about we put the pile back together and get some sleep?"

Nepeta and Feferi nodded in unison before starting to gather things up and toss them back onto the mattresses. With three of them working and a relatively small room to work with, they finished up fairly quickly and turned off the light before snuggling back up.

Before they drifted off, Feferi managed to speak up again. "Don't... mmmm... don't forget about my surprise for you two tomorrow."

Jade and Nepeta both mumbled their assent, and the trio finally nodded off.

The next day dawned, and with it one particular troll carefully wriggled her way out of the flushed cuddle-pile and crept down the hall to the kitchen. It was her turn to get breakfast, and rather than the usual boxed stuff, she was going to surprise her matesprits with breakfast in, well, not bed precisely. But something like that. In short order Feferi had her hair tied back and four different pots and pans going at once. Omelettes, pancakes, canadian bacon (which, as far as Feferi could tell, was neither canadian nor bacon), and skillet potatoes were the orders of the day. She floated around the kitchen, twirling this way and that as she kept everything on an even keel. Finally, she took everything on a cart back to the room and, after a quick pit-stop in the garden, started laying out her morning surprise.

Feferi had just put the finishing touches when Nepeta and Jade wandered over, still rubbing the sleep out of their eyes.

"Something smells delicious," Nepeta mumbled. Both her and Jade's eyes widened as they finally got a good look at what Feferi had prepared. They all quickly sat down and started eating. After a few minutes of silence punctuated by the occasional clinking of silverware, Jade decided to speak up.

"Feferi, I had no idea you could cook! And excellently, I might add."

"Well, I kind of had to!" Feferi replied. "Not even Eridan could comfortably stay down where my hive was for very long, and my lusus was too big to really directly care for me, so I learned to be pretty self-suf-fish-ient. Don't tell Eridan, though. I'm pretty sure the silly-head still thinks I was almost completely dependant on him."

They continued eating for a bit, just enjoying each other's company, and occasionally feeding each other off their own plates. As they were finishing off the last bits of an omelette, Nepeta cleared her throat.

"So, if you two didn't have anything else planned for the day, I was hoping you could help me with a project."

Jade piped up with an "Of course!" as Feferi nodded.

"Great! You see, I spotted this behemoth out in the forest, and I wanted to try taking it down. I wanted Equius to come with me, but the big meany-pants won't let me! He thinks it's too dangerous." At this, Nepeta brought up air quotes as she did attempted to put on a very serious if rather sweaty face. "It wouldn't just be for the challenge. I know its muscular system would really help you out with some of your experiments, Jade! So, are you two still in?"

Jade and Feferi glanced at each other, twin smirks playing at the corners of their mouths.

"Of course we'll still help you, silly!" Feferi said. "And you didn't even need to try and justify it for us, either."

"Besides," Jade said, "just imagine the looks on Equius and Eridan's faces when we come back hauling that beast!" The three of them shared a very toothy grin that left a behemoth several miles away feeling very nervous.

With that, the trio set about cleaning up the remains of breakfast and packing for their impromptu hunting trip.