"Agh! Disgusting! What is that?" Boone covered his face with one hand, the smell was making him nauseous. Shannon smirked contemptuously at him, sunning herself on top of her beach towel. She was lucky enough to be upwind from whatever they'd found in the cooler.
Tasha scowled down at it, "I think you meant what was that. It was kangaroo meat, I'd hoped the cooler was sturdy enough to keep the dry ice in, but I guess not." She had told her mother, half-way joking, that she'd bring enough kangaroo meat back for the whole family. There went that idea.
"Kangaroo? You weren't really going to eat it?" Boone said, muffled by his hand.
"People eat snake, frog, and alligator—why not kangaroo?" There was this place that made the most amazing fried alligator up in Baton Rouge... Tasha hoped a boat or a plane would show up soon, she'd make her father take the whole family on a road trip there when she got out of here.
"What people are these?" Boone asked, genuinely clueless.
"If this is headed towards some kind of racial insinuation, why don't I save time for both of us and knock you on your ass now?" One good strike to the back, she thought, and his face might freeze that way.
"W-what?! I-I wouldn't...!" Boone was shocked enough to move his hand away from his face, he didn't even notice Shannon laughing at him.
"The only one here with a problem is you, Tasha. Stop agitating everyone and get that awful smelling thing out of here. Some of us are actually working here." Unlike Shannon, Kimberly was downwind. Kimberly might have been thinking, Shut up and get rid of it!, but she could restrain herself and act like a civilized human being—unlike some people.
"Oh, please! We've been hauling stuff and digging though suitcases all day, but sitting on your ass with a pen and a pile of paper is working? Right," Tasha watched her clench her pen even more tightly in her hand.
Afraid of the potential catfight on the horizon, and in the interest of not being embarrassed further, Boone took the opportunity to escape, though Shannon yelled "Coward!" after him.
"I sure the..." Kimberly paused to look Tasha up and down, eyes settling on the tattoo on her back, "...motorcycle repair shop? Is really labor intensive, but some people have real jobs, or are working towards them. So if I want to grade papers for them, I'll grade papers for them."
Motorcycle? Tasha thought it was too hilarious to be offended, and so she started laughing. "Nice one, Tiger. Really tearing me up!"
Kimberly scowled as the woman kept on laughing and picked up her papers, storming further up the beach to get away from her nonsense. Did that woman have any idea how hard she'd worked? What she'd had to go through, to get where she was? Infuriating.
Tasha eventually stopped laughing and found a place to bury the contents of the cooler. Maybe if her work case hadn't ended up dumped in the ocean somewhere Tasha could show Kimberly a thing or two about real jobs. Of course, the guns, knives and ammo would probably send her off just the same—only scared instead of irritated.
A/N: I combined Kimberly and Tasha into one introductory chapter since they were literally made to play off each other--they were an exception to the gender rule. I rewrote this a couple of times, so I'm a little later than usual. Still have that open slot, must be like the last piece of pizza—everyone wants it but no one will take it. If nobody claims it by the next chapter I'm going to make up an OC to close things out.