One of my earlier jobs in life was at a little pizza place. I worked there when it was first starting up. It’s the only job I’ve ever been fired from and it was because a new manager came in and cleaned house. Because my state requires a reason to be fired he said I used too much pepperoni. So now on job applications I get to write that I was fired for “excessive use of pepperoni.” Never fails to get a laugh.
Anyway! For this story to make sense I’ve first got to set the stage. This pizza place started out as the Wild West of management but one of the original investors was super committed to work programs through the prison. We hired a ton of ex convicts and they were all, to a one, super hyped on Christianity. Like born again for the sole purpose of lauding Christ with their every breath.
I hadn’t been working there long but I’d definitely noticed the Jesus bug had gone around, and as I’ve never been religious at all I tried to steer clear of the topic for my own safety.
The day our story takes place, I was folding boxes. Anyone whose ever worked pizza can attest, there’s so much box folding. It’s something that happens at every lull, the pizza machine demands box folding on a grand and epic scale.
On my right folding his stack of boxes was a guy wider than he was tall, made of pure muscle, Corey. He was newer on staff, and due to a stutter he didn’t talk much. All I knew about him was that he got hired through the rehabilitation program and had done time.
On my left folding was a tall middle-aged woman who loved to yell at me, Cindy. She and I rubbed each other the wrong way and had nothing in common, leading to a tense working relationship.
We folded boxes in silence. This was really my best case scenario as a quiet Cindy was a Cindy not riding my ass, and Corey intimidated me.
But the weight of the silence grew too much for Cindy, who finally said, “I really want to go to bible school.”
I folded a box. I had less than no idea what bible school even was and I didn’t want to get sucked into a religious topic.
On my right Corey said, “W-why, Cindy?”
“Well, cause I believe what’s in the Bible, but I just don’t know it all.”
He nodded sagely to this.
Cindy continued, “And every time I sit down to read the Bible I get real sleepy. And I know it’s the devil.”
It’s so hard to convey her tone in written format. It was delivered with the emphasis and exasperation of an inevitable inconvenience. Like, I just know it’s the squirrels eating the bird seed.
I froze in place at this pronouncement. My only exposure to Lucifer was Neil Gaiman’s Sandman comics and I was trying to mentally twist into a frame of mind where The Morningstar cared enough about this one middle aged lady expanding her knowledge of the Bible that he followed her around cursing her with sleepiness when she picked it up.
I think I expected Corey to say, “Well that’s silly,” or something to acknowledge what a bizarre thing Cindy had just said.
Instead he said, “Yeah!” In a tone of complete agreement.
I didn’t look up. I tried to keep my face neutral at this development.
But something must have shown. Corey said, “You don’t believe in God?”
I shrugged casually and said, “If I did I wouldn’t talk about it at work.”
“C-cause it’s t-true. If y-you t-ry to r-read the B-bible on unsanctif-fied gr-round the d-devil m-makes you s-sleepy!”
I made a noncommittal sound and fled into the back room.
Over the next week it drove me crazy though. The logic of it wouldn’t leave me alone so finally one day when it was just Corey and I in front, and the restaurant was empty, I said, “Hey man, I have a question.”
He shrugged and listened.
“I really don’t mean this with any disrespect, I just genuinely want to know about the logistics-“
“J-ust ask.”
“Okay, so if Cindy gets tired when she reads any book, is it only the devil making her tired when it’s the Bible?”
His face went purple with fury and he yelled, “F-fuck you!” at my retreating back as I fled once more into the back room.
It will forever remain a mystery.
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Hello! I saw that you had a human design for the Tengu, and I wanted to ask: got any hcs for our bird demon as human? Or just hcs in general, wither will work
Hey! Bro- you won't believe it, but i literally was thinking about Humanized Tengu (for uh- reasons) when I opened tumblr just to see this ask, like deadass??? ad;kjdfdfsa Clearly it was a sign!
But I don't have that many hc about him tbh?? He was a very spontaneous creation for that day, so like here have just some basic info:
the original design i did for ninjavember is kind of how Tengu looked at the prime of his powers in human form, when it/he faced First Ninja.
He is very unnaturally tall, has bone white (practically ashen) skin, with the end of his limbs being dark grey (like literal ash/burned). His body is covered in blue markings like tattoos (very inspired by Law from One Piece haha) and his hair is a mix of feathers and fur-like hair (like birds). He is usually dressed in rich clothes, with his wings acting like sort of cape.
He likes to smoke the pipe ;) its less of actual smoking leaf and more 'energy and fire itself' type of smoking.
He is kind of an asshole, but he greatly (if reluctantly) respects First Ninja because he managed to defeat him and use his powers for his own means. He despises having his powers used by others, but he also kinda respects that it is for a noble cause.
When it comes to Ninjas who came after, he kind of feels like a dad who was forced to take care of kids he never wanted, and those kids literally suck life force out of him, lol.
And that's about all I got for now. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ But thanks for the ask i loved a chance to doodle him ;)
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bean and i have been locked in the kitchen, so like AU where beta niki is niki's older brother and otome niki is his younger brother right--
more below
Hiki (22 y.o.) - "nii-san" to his younger brothers; calls Niki "Nikkun"
dropped out of hs and left to travel and be a food journalist after the IncidentTM
pretty chill but would kill a man for his little brothers
rinne is scared of him (something something scary older brother, the 3 cm difference is the only thing keeping red guy from crumpling) (also hiki's basically another version of him and bro's good at dealing with anyone but himself)
he knows rinne is scared of him and thinks it's the funniest thing and will mess with him on purpose
super sensitive to taste, bro can taste if someone put in even 1 grain of salt
despite that he has horribly bad eating habits, bro has tastebuds gifted by the divine themselves but he's on his 12th pack of ramen this week
favorite is the instant noodles he'd make and share with his little brother when he had to watch him while parents were out working
sucks at cooking. rinne was scared of him until he saw him burn water
so chill with pda hes annoying and embarrassing they cannot kiss without him whistling or saying anything
feels guilty about leaving niki from running off to try to redeem the shiina name with his journalism
bicon
exes with oldest sakura nee-han (it's funny and they're on good terms)
drinking buddies with rinne, said nee-han and himeru post-reveal (older bees sibling crew)
Miki (16 y.o.) - "Mikkun" to his older brothers; calls Niki "Aniki"
stayed with other family in japan after the IncidentTM (niki didn't go with him 'cause he wanted to stay)
guilt from not visiting his aniki or trying harder to convince him to come with him to live with family
miki is an edgy brat, sweet but a brat
niki: aw he's just a little angel what are you so worried about
miki flipping rinne off behind niki's back:
Rinne once again thinking how he lucked out with Hiiro every time he interacts with Miki
niki spoils miki and miki clinging to his aniki cuddling up next to him being the first taste tester getting to choose what niki makes rinnekun on the side fist clenched about to blow a fuse thats his spot thats his job thats his choice and miki Knows
will play video games with rinne tho (sideeyeing the number of runs red guy has on niki's route in the otome)
cut his hair to be different from his brothers
has the opposite problem of niki, he doesnt wanna do food or chef work but all he's good at is food (specifically desserts and he would rather go to business school but he does enjoy making sweets with his aniki)
aroace
if rinne and niki kiss one more time around him he's gonna explode
gets flustered around hiiro in an "i wanna be friends but i'm bad at making friends" way 'cause he's so nice and genuine and excitable and nothing like his brother and rinne's like "yeah no he has a girlfriend"
tiktok kid, always has his phone on him; kinda famous?? people in his comments mostly just go "you look like that guy from crazy:b"
mario party nights with the younger bee sibling squad (hiiro, kaname, kohaku)
also gets into debates with them on who has the best oldest siblings
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