Young Writers Society

He took a deep breath and approached one of the stalls. Seeing that Kazimir had the pressure hose, it looked like he would have to use some of the sponges instead. His essence was twisting and churning as knelt in one of the stalls and started cleaning it. He could barely focus on the task at hand; he was too busy trying not to feel sick.

"It really does smell bad in here, doesn't it?" he weakly said, hoping that a conversation would be the perfect distraction.

Kazimir had trouble hearing Leo over the hose. He responded back with what sounded more like a yell.

"What? Of course it smells bad!"

Apophis almost joins in the conversation before changing her mind - she might look human, but it's more of an illusion than an actual shape-change in many aspects, for it's still with her tongue that she catches a scent. In here, it's better to keep her mouth shut.

It looked like his previous plan had failed spectacularly. Apophis was ignoring him, while Kazimir could barely hear what he had said. He ducked his head and started to scrub as hard as he possibly could. He hated being here. He would be anywhere else in the camp if it meant being out of this shower.

Kazimir turned off the hose, looking at the remarkably clean shower wall left behind. He turned to Leo, gesturing to his handiwork.

"That's not half bad," he commented.

"Thanks," he muttered, trying his hardest not to focus on how close he was to the water. He continued to furiously scrub away at the stall.

Kazimir scoffed. "I was talking about myself, but, you too, I guess," he said as he walked over to the next stall with heavy steps. As he aimed the hose at the next shower wall, he paused, and looked over into the next stall where Leo was.

"Do uh, you wanna use the hose?"

He froze, briefly looking up at Kazimir like a deer caught in headlights - a sight he had seen many times during his stint on Earth.

"Uh, n-no thanks," he said. He quickly ducked his head back down and returned to hurriedly scrubbing away. Why did he have to be assigned this of all jobs? It was one thing to want to pretend to be human, but it was another thing altogether to keep it up in a situation like this!

Kazimir raised his brows, noting how scared Leo looked, but he just shrugged.

"Alright. It's your back," he muttered. "If you wanna bend over scrubbing all day that's your issue."

"Well, I don't," Apophis says. "If you don't want it, I will gladly take it."

To make matters worse, his meals from earlier were coming back to haunt him. His essence felt absolutely horrible as it struggled to digest something it should have never encountered in the first place. Combine that with the fact that he was so close to water, and Maahes was having an absolutely miserable day today.

It wasn't even like he could just run off to the bathroom like a human could. He just had to wait it out until it managed to digest it. If the past had been anything to go off, it would take at least several hours before that happened. He groaned as softly as he could and continued to scrub. If only he was a human! Then he could get rid of this stomachache and not be so miserable when it came to cleaning-

Oh.

There was a way he could get out of this temporarily. It would probably only buy him a handful of minutes, but that was enough for him to get his act together. He had been unprepared for how bad the showers were going to be. If he could just convince himself that things would be okay, he would be able to finish the job as quickly as possible.

Of course, Apophis and Kazimir were going to be more than a little upset that he was trying to get out of cleaning the stalls. But seeing that he was the being made of fire and earth here, they could manage.

He gently placed his sponge next to where he had been cleaning.

Getting back to his feet, he walked over to Kazimir. "Hey, Kazimir? My stomach's really been bothering me, and I think a quick run to the rest room might help a bit. Is there one in here, or did I need to get the guards to take me to one?"

Kazimir was about to tell Adophis that he was only offering the hose to Leo, since it looked like Leo was having a hard time. That hypothesis was of course, confirmed when Leo came up to talk to him.

He leaned out of the stall and looked over at Adophis, then looked around the room, and pointed to doorless bathroom stalls on the far side.

"If ya gotta take a dump, you can do it over there."

He looked at where Kazimir was pointing. Of course the stall had to be without a door! How was he supposed to get his bearings now? He wildly scanned the room for something - anything - that could somehow improve the situation. His gaze eventually landed on his cleaning cart. It was large, bulky and would undoubtedly be big enough to act as a door for the bathroom stall.

"Thank you," he said, grabbing onto his cart and give it a sharp tug in the direction of the stall. He dragged it over to the stall, stepped inside and pulled the cart in front of where the door should have been.

"Try not to make too big of a mess!" Kazimir called out, his face scrunching up as he imagined how disgusting it could get, if Leo was really feeling as bad as he looked.

"If you do you're the one cleaning that stall!"

"I won't," he called back, barely able to keep his voice steady as he closed the lid of the toilet and threw himself down onto it. He could already feel the discomfort that accompanied the water beginning to leave him, but it was a slow process. He doubted he would be free of it in the near future.