It rained.
It rained and rained and rained. The wind blew in a violent and unrelenting howl that rattled the walls. He didn't like the trembling and the banging and the whirring and the noise, and yet there was nothing for him to do: so he paced about their den to try and relieve himself of the too-many stimuli. Even the air itself seemed to feel wrong: too light or, maybe, too heavy.
And BFF was utterly useless, too. She sat with her book in her lap but her stare fixed vacantly out into the distance; her whole brain constipated with old pillow cotton, and choked on thoughts much too big to properly swallow. She seemed oblivious to everything, even with him cooped up jittery in the same room!
He paced angrily back to her and yowled to let her know her attention was demanded. Surprisingly, BFF only winced and looked away. He recoiled in bewilderment. A wince? Why? What was the meaning of this? Were they strangers that she should mistrust him so? Had her brain once more contracted some malady of Ideas and Stress? Absurd! Was it his fault that she thought about these things instead of simply going out to run, fight, posture, or- at the very least- smell these new interlopers? He grumbled and muttered and finally pushed himself in between her and her nothing to occlude her non-vision of it.
Many rooms away, a window shutter cracked free of its moorings, and the glass shattered with a crinkle, a crackle of appliances, and a bang as something heavy hit the ground.
Startled out of her arcane stupor, BFF finally looked up to see their own gaping windows, now splattered with a muddy shrapnel of debris, rust, and all the varied leavings of a strangely abandoned world. She gained her feet and hurried up to it. The air outside was black with grit. He peeked out beside her and then looked up worriedly to her face. She had a very expressive face.
"It's a hurricane," BFF told him, sounding awed. These were the times he was at the absolute mercy of BFF's old-world intelligence. She could identify so many things he could not; had so many words he did not; and for all that 'thinking' itself was clearly a burden on her, it also gave her a nearly magical power.
That was probably why The Cougher kept coming near to see her, nearer than was polite, nearer than was safe; it craved her understanding.
"It's not a small hurricane." BFF looked to him and twirled a finger lazily in the air. "We're inside of it, but we should be okay."
He concentrated very hard, because he wanted to think about all of this without losing his train of thought. Grr. Losing his train of thought was more than a looming threat: every nerve in his body was alight with useless energy.
Hmm. After the snow time and melting time, Snickers and BFF had seen cyclone dancing like a nimble white finger, white as snow. BFF had been afraid of it, and he hadn't understood. Then it had touched the ground and dirtied itself and shrieked and shrieked, much worse than this.
Spinning wind... Were they inside something like that? Inside a whirlwind? It must have been a very different sort of whirlwind, to look and sound so different and to be so big; and BFF didn't look half so frightened. Maybe 'fat storms' were like The Fat People: the bigger they were, the slower they wobbled... That made a sort of sense. Did that mean storms could puke?
His thoughts had derailed, and it took him more than a moment to realize they had and to wrinkle his nose at it all. BFF made thinking look easy; so easy one could get lost in it. Hey! She was looking back to her seat, and that would not do; he needed much more attention from her lest his nerves drive him crazy. He yowled and pawed at her, and when she didn't understand him he curled up about her legs and sat on her foot.
"Snickers! What are you-?"
He whined, because she'd been ignoring him for days and that wasn't right or fair at all.
And BFF laughed,yes! Excellent. And she reached down to him and pushed the edge of his hood back and scratched at the better side of his face and behind his ear and up through his hair. He hummed and purred and squirmed. Yes, yes, much better, much better. She laughed a little more and leaned over, and used both hands to scratch in big vigorous circles about his scalp, and he melted. Ohhhh, her not-sharp-claws were very nice. Very very very nice. He couldn't do the same thing, not even with his feet. Too sharp. Always drew blood. Mnnn.
Thinking People like BFF might have smell liked monsters/food, but they weren't. Thinking People were excellent. They just needed Climbing People to take care of them, was all. And to put down their boomsticks now and then and give scratchies and open cans. Though that was was probably much easier when no one thought they were monsters/food first or tried to kill them. Hmm.
Oh yes, scratch there, there! He tapped a foot rapidly on the ground, because that was so nice.
"Ha! Have you eaten lately...?"
No! No and neither have you! He howled at the terribleness of it all, but then got off of her feet so she could attend to this matter. Not-eating was a grave crime. Grave! He followed her over to search through their cans (where she found all the tins of tuna he'd, um, somewhat neurotically been chewing on).