Squash and Stretch

Kotep doesn't let getting turned into a big dumb cartoon jackal get in the way of turning their friend into a big dumb cartoon wolf. Mature.

Surprise is an important part of being a jackal trickster god. Why just visit a friend when you can pop down to his apartment unannounced, fill it with magical traps ready to be sprung, and wait for him to stumble in and kick off the fun? The only problem was he didn't have the courtesy to show up on schedule. I'd been waiting for him for twenty minutes now, tipped back in his chair with my feet up on his table. I was bored of debating what to turn him into (maybe a cow, hadn't done that in a while) and had resorted to fiddling with my armbands by the time I decided to get up and get a drink. All this sitting around in the mortal realm was making me thirsty.

I slipped into the kitchen with my ears perked and swiveled toward the door, just in case he barged in while I wasn't looking. I didn't even have to hunt for a glass; a water bottle sat invitingly out on the counter. Nice of him to leave a drink out for me, especially since he had no clue I was coming. I tipped my snout up and downed the whole thing, then left it by the sink and headed back to my post at the table.

Something lingered in my mouth, like that syrupy feeling after drinking cheap soda. I ran my tongue along the roof of my palate and gulped. The feeling didn't go away; it was thick and gooey and clung to my teeth. I lapped along the backs of my fangs and swallowed again. I didn't want to be sloshing over my words whenever that friend of mine decided to show up.

No sooner had I gulped all that slick, viscous fluid down than my mouth began to fill up again. It clung to my tongue, making it feel blunt and slippery and too large for my mouth. My tongue squashed up against my own incisors, struggling to stay squeezed inside my jaw, curling and twisting and folding up against itself. At first I clenched my teeth and furrowed my brow, but soon the growing pressure was too much and I relented. My tongue flopped free and hung from the side of my muzzle, fat and round and inflated, pinkish-red with a glossy shine. A heavy bead of drool rolled from the tip like sticky sugar glaze.

Shooting up from the chair, I leaned over the table and stared down my snout at my dangling tongue. It was nearly twice as big as it should have been, and puffed up all plump and squishy. My startled spells bounced right off it; it refused to change back. I tried to curse, but my teeth bounced off my tongue and I wound up lisping horribly instead.

With a force of effort, I slurped my tongue back into my mouth and locked my jaws. I had to consciously hold it closed, and I could feel that heavy, syrupy drool oozing between my teeth. Soon, keeping my mouth shut felt like trying to hold my breath, and with a gasp, I let my tongue roll back out. Thick streamers of saliva hung between my fangs and my tongue. I was so focused on the latter that I didn't notice my teeth growing sharper and fatter, jagged and more feral.

I was panting like some sort of common dog, and with the saliva building up inside my mouth, it began to drip out along my lip. Trying to catch the drool, I twisted up my fat tongue and lapped at it once, then again, and again. Each lick left a fresh coat of sticky-smooth drool; each coat seeped in and made my lip bulge out bigger. Before long, it had grown dark and round and polished to a shine, and I was still compulsively lapping at it, coaxing it out fatter and more prominent.

I forced myself to stop, but my tongue didn't want to. Kept away from my lip, it decided instead to roll up over the front of my snout. It flopped over my nose, dripping and heavy, long enough that its tip reached halfway up my muzzle. Then it dragged itself back down into my mouth, leaving behind a coat of drool that clung to my fur like paint, matting it down smooth and wet and glossy.

All the willpower I could summon didn't help. My tongue moved on its own, slapping up along each side of my cheeks in turn, sopping wet with drool. The slickness coated my snout, clinging to it, flatter and shinier with every slow, exaggerated lick.

My tongue rolled up over my nose again, then pulled as it slurped back down into my mouth. A tingle tickled in my nose as it stretched, dragged along by my tongue, then slipping free and springing back up like rubber. Jutting from the tip of my snout, my nose bulged outward, like a bubble of black rubber being blown up. While it swelled, my tongue lapped underneath at my cheeks, pulling and stretching them until they bounced back and set the whole front of my muzzle wobbling. The taut swelling filled my whole snout now, straining broader and rounder, jutting up into my field of view. Small ripples in the slick drool ran along my snout, swallowing up the texture of my fur and intensifying its color to a bright, vibrant gold.

Now my entire muzzle was growing, stretching further from my face, pulled taut as it inflated. Jagged fangs poked from my gums, squeezing out from behind my fat lip and heavy cheeks. My rounded nose stuck out like a fat black ball, bulging at the tip of my snout while the whole thing widened out to match it. Its sheer heaviness hung from my face like a lead anchor and left me dizzy and panting.

Reaching out, I clutched my nose (barely able to get my fingers around it) and tried to squeeze my snout back against my face. My snout wrinkled up against itself and squashed back against my skull, but as soon as I let go, it sprung back out to its full size. The sudden forward momentum nearly toppled me right over onto the table.

The drool had covered my entire muzzle up to the flat of my face and turned it into some cartoonish caricature. My tongue was still too thick and clumsy to do anything but dangle between my jagged, overgrown fangs and pant. Every sniff from my oversized nose made it jiggle and made my head spin from the vividness of every single scent.

I pushed away from the table and tried to clench my mouth shut. One hand on top of my muzzle, the other hand squeezing up from beneath, wedging my fat fangs together, but I couldn't keep myself from drooling. Soon the weight and the slipperiness were too much. My jaw spilled open again, my tongue slopped out, and my drool sloshed free. Thick and glistening, it rolled off my tongue and splattered onto the floor in front of me.

Nothing could slow my growing snout. Had that bottle of water been a trap? Where had I put it? I turned from side to side, trying to look around the swollen shape of my snout rising up in front of my face. As I moved, something wet and heavy smacked against my right shoulder, then my left. My tongue. Thick splashes of gooey, glossy drool oozed over my shoulders. They swelled broader and bulgier, stretching my slick, saliva-coated fur.

Thick strings of drool dripped between my fangs like flowing stalactites and spilled over onto my chest. It spread in slow waves down my torso as I slurped and snapped at my lips, trying to stem the flow. My muzzle had grown to such an exaggerated size that I could fit my tongue inside my mouth again, but I still couldn't stop panting like some simple canine. I took in a deep breath and my chest rose, then surged suddenly outward, stretched taut into a pair of pecs that wobbled out further with each pant. Round and thick and jutting from my chest, they caught even more of the drool dripping from my maw and let it ooze down over my torso.

I staggered into the kitchen wide-eyed and panicked. I was swelling all over. My snout kept bulging bigger. My neck swelled with muscle as the spreading drool met across my back. My pecs puffed outward and my nipples popped out fat and swollen with a rubbery thwip-thwip! Beneath them, my abs popped out with a rolling pop-pop-pop like a string of firecrackers. The drool ran between my legs and a thick bulge boinged out against my loincloth, then dropped with a clang! to hang between my thighs.

A sudden rush struck me and I stopped in my tracks. My eyes rolled and my ears drooped to the sides. A deep, bestial growl rose out between my fangs. My tongue lapped at my cheeks, making a rubbery squeal as the slick surfaces slid against one another. I felt so hungry. Every base urge was magnified. The mere thought of hurling every transformation spell I had at my friend as soon as he walked through the door was enough to leave me panting and slobbering in excitement.

I needed to get myself under control. Reaching out, I grabbed my chin, dripping with thick glossy globs of drool. I slurped my tongue in, crammed my jaws shut, pursed my jutting lip, and tried to gulp back the saliva instead of letting it flow out. But no matter how I tried to adjust my grip, the slick stuff ran along my fingers, rippled across my palm, and dripped down my arm.

With a grunt, I tore my hand away and shook it off as hard as I could. It didn't help. The drool clung to my fur and seeped in. My palm puffed out, bulging rounder and rounder, forcing my fingers to spread back. Like a thick purple bubble, it rose from my hand until with a pop! it sprouted into the shape of an overstuffed paw pad. My fingers curled in against it, but they were forced apart as one by one they popped out into their own rounded, plush paw pads. Fat claws curled from their tips.

I clutched my arm behind the elbow, trying to push back the encroaching drool, but I couldn't make it budge. With a sloshing hiss like a hose turned on, my forearm surged with bulk. I clutched harder, but my bicep was already straining. I let go before my arm was swallowed up, and my other hand with it. My arm snapped up, pulled into a reflexive flex that made my bicep spring outward. Boi-oing! Its sheer size squashed against my arm and shoulder, while my silver armband stretched tight like rubber around it then twanged back into shape as soon as I let go.

I stumbled forward and to the right, trying to balance the new weight of my arm. The corners of my mouth were starting to curl into curl into a grin despite myself, making my chops bulge out. There was a raw delight in being so big and so beefy, but the loss of control worried me more. With my unchanged arm, I grabbed the water bottle from the counter. On its label was nothing but a logo of three water drops, or beads of sweat, or maybe...drool.

In retrospect, I should have been more suspicious.

Just then, my changed hand grabbed me by the wrist. Its clenched fist was huge, like a giant mitt closing around my arm. My bicep squashed against my chest as I dragged my hand up to my snout, gave it a drooling wet lick, then stuffed it firmly into my mouth. I fought my own body, trying to wrench my hand free from my own grip. As I staggered around the kitchen, my back bulged with straining mass and bent me over into a feral hunch.

At last, I spat out my hand—ptoo! It shot from my lips and flumphed out into a fat, clawed paw. Fresh drool dripped from its pads and oozed down my arm, forming an elastic golden hide that stretched tight around my burgeoning muscles. It wasn't far from catching up to my other arm already.

Although I could hardly see over my huge snout or my jutting chest, I could feel the saliva dripping along my thighs and calves. They bulged with mass and bent into a crouch, supporting the mounting weight of my body.

A low, wavering chuckle rolled from my throat. All this growing and swelling and all these pounding instincts made my body seem so much stronger than my mind. It left me giddy and light-headed, like my mind had sprung a leak and a slow trickle of my thoughts was dripping down into my drooling mouth. What a dummy, I thought, with a drunken grin.

My hands stuck themselves in front of my snout, which at this point took up nearly two-thirds of my vision. My tongue rolled out and slapped against them, lapping all around my palms and fingers until they were oozing thick with drool. Then my hands reached for my face.

My eyes went wide and my eyebrows furrowed, but I couldn't pull back. The bulk of my neck had hunched my head forward. All I could do was wrinkle my huge snout in disgust as one hand slapped square across my face, while the other smacked down on top of my head and let the drool seep over my scalp like shampoo.

The changes swept over my head. Bones bulged and twisted, my ears jutted out higher, and my hair flopped down in front of my eyes. My grin grew bigger. My brain kept drooling out between my overgrown fangs, and the less of it I had, the better I felt. I knew it shouldn't feel this good, but there was no reasoning with a feeling this simple. The desire to fight it was slipping. I couldn't think as far as I should have. It just felt so good and relaxing to be so big and cartoonish and primal that I couldn't care. My tail thwapped away against my back while I licked my lips, coating my fangs in a fresh layer of dripping drool.

The last part of me left was my feet. As they got swallowed up, they flopped out into big, padded, clawed things, and shot my ankles up into the air. That threw off my balance enough that I fell forward onto all fours with a thunderous thump! Panting and snickering to myself, I crawled over to the fridge, grabbed its handle, and hauled myself back up to my feet.

I was still hungry. Ravenous, both for food and for tricking stupid mortals. That wasn't a metaphor. I was literally hungry for it, like the only kind of desire my animal brain could process was hunger, so every urge just felt like hunger.

My thoughts sloshed between my ears and trickled out to pool around my feet. The less I worried about thinking, the more this body and all its bulging bigness and handsomeness felt like my own. It felt so good I wanted it all for myself.

A tingle tapped at the tip of my snout. I began to pant harder and lapped at my snout to soothe it. All I managed to do was make it bounce up and down like a spring. That tingle built and built until it was washing down into my chest and crawling up the back of my neck and rushing through my entire swollen body.

I tipped my head back. My brain tickled as it oozed down into my mouth. "Ah—" I snuffed, curling my lips. My head spun. I tried to remember why I was trying to think. Thinking just got in the way of having fun. "Aaah—" My tongue curled inside my mouth and my chest bulged as I took in a deep breath. My body strained, pulled taut like a balloon ready to pop.

"Aah-aaah-awooOOO!"

I threw my head back into the howl and curled my claws and arched my back. That was all it took to slosh the last bit of brain stuff out of my head. I came back down slouching and panting and grinning. It had felt so good to howl that I almost did it again. I felt numb and good and giddy and good and big and dumb and jackally and good.

Now that my brain was all gone, I wasn't so slobbery any more, but at least my tongue was still wet and dripping with drool. I'd never felt freer or powerfuller or tricksterier than I did now. Why hadn't I turned myself into a big dumb cartoon jackal earlier? I snickered and licked my lips. My friend was gonna get a real surprise when he saw me like this, and while he was surprised, I'd have the perfect chance to trickster him up real good.

I had a real good idea for what I oughta turn him into, too.

---

Juggling two bags of groceries, that particular friend of Kotep's fished his keys from his pocket. He let himself in, swung the door shut behind him, and then was tackled to the floor with a huge snout shoved into his face. Its tongue spilled out, dragging strings of drool along with it. The heavy panting fogged up his glasses.

A blunt voice rumbled out, "Surprise!"

"Wuh—" he began to say. He was cut off by that tongue smacking him across the cheek and dragging up along his face. It left behind a coat of saliva, slick and glistening and thicker than saliva had any right to be. Before he could even open his eye again, that tongue lapped at the other side of his face, then while he was still reeling, gave him a third lick from his chin up to his forehead.

Drool dripped from the frames of his glasses sitting askew on his face. He wiped his cheek with his hand. When he pulled it away, thick streamers clung to his fingertips. The drool was viscous, more like paint than proper slobber. As it rippled down his face, it parted around his bulging, broadening, blackening nose. His mouth slipped open. He began panting unconsciously. His heartbeat pounded in his temples, even though the initial shock of being ambushed and tackled was wearing off

Propping himself up gave him a better look at his attacker. Cartoonishly beefy muscles, an oversized snout, straining silver jewelry, and a pair of jackal's ears: it was Kotep, though a far bigger Kotep than usual. It had been a couple months of relative peace and quiet since the last time he'd shown up unannounced, and he'd never been this overt before.

"Whaddaya think? Pretty good trick, huh?" Kotep licked his lips and grinned.

"Ugh. What is this?" he groaned. Shaking out his hand just made the dangling strings of drool wobble and bounce back and forth. As he lifted himself back to his feet, the room began to tilt around him. He clutched the wall to stay upright. His head was loose and hollow; every so often something shifted and his ears gurgled or his sinuses glorped. Heavy and limp, his tongue hung from his mouth as he tried to catch his breath.

Kotep snickered. "It's drool, dummy!"

All at once his tongue sloughed out over his chin. Like a water balloon around a faucet on full blast, it surged out longer and rounder and purpler and dripping with drool. He made a surprised gagging noise and jerked back. The tip of his tongue flopped back and forth against his chin.

The dizziness kept him off-balance. With that sudden recoil, his hand slipped off the wall and he began to tumble backwards. Kotep lunged forward and caught him—or rather, grabbed him by the face, with his tongue poking out between those big fingers—and yanked, hard. His face stretched like rubber. Feeling his face elongating was almost as disorienting as his own lightheadedness. His skin pulled taut, and the elastic force jerked him back up onto his feet only to be struck square in the face by his own face. Wobbling and throbbing like a spring-loaded door stopper, his new snout stuck out in front of him: narrow, covered in blue-gray fur, and topped with a rubbery, round, black nose.

He clutched his snout with his hands to hold it steady. The blood pounding through his head had rushed out to the tip of his snout. Each thumping heart beat made his nose wiggle slightly. "H-hey!" he slurred, tongue flapping against the underside of his muzzle. "Pud it back!"

Kotep grabbed him by the snout with one fat paw, wedging his mouth shut with his tongue still dangling from the side. "Don't worry. I got this!" he said. With a great push, he squashed his friend's muzzle back against his face, then yanked it out again, falling into a steady rhythm of pumping

Each time his snout squeezed against his face, the fluid pressure forced its way back into his skull, sloshing up into his forehead and along his cheeks. Each time it stretched out, all that pressure slorped forward again, stretching his face larger and tighter. His bulging snout pressed back against Kotep's paw, forcing the jackal to take a wider grip the bigger it grew. Eyes crossed, blood rushing down to his snout, he struggled to stay on his feet. When Kotep let go, the sheer weight of his own head nearly pulled his chin down onto his chest. His nose was fat and bulbous, his cheeks rounded, and his drool-slick fangs were jagged and dripping.

A few guttural sounds of distress made it out of his maw as he stumbled back into the wall. It was a struggle just to focus on the foot-and- a-half of snout hanging off the front of his head. His heavy panting was broken up by wet, slurping laps at his lips. He couldn't stop himself. It was like having a wild animal twice the size of his head strapped to his face—a wild animal that kept feeding strange, hungry desires into his subconscious. Why did he feel so hungry? Drool dripped from the tip of his loose tongue.

In the confusion, he had lost track of Kotep, but now two big claws wedged their way into his nostrils. His snout wrinkled, his lips curled, and he fought to hold back his sneeze. By spreading his fingers, Kotep stretched his round, glossy bulb of his nose even wider. As soon as Kotep pulled his claws back, there was nothing holding back the sneeze. It came out as a snarling 'Aaah-choo!' that flumped out a tail from the small of his back. His swollen snout wobbled in the aftershock of his sneeze.

A muggy haze was clogging up his head. It made him feel loose and clumsy and sent shudders running through him if he tried to rub his snout. His head thunked back against the wall and he slumped, tongue hanging from his jaws, rolling between his fangs as he panted. He rubbed at his cheeks, warm and covered in fur. "What's wrong with me?" he groaned.

"Ooh, I know!" Kotep's ears perked up, his grin widened, and his tail started thwapping back and forth. "You need a blow job."

His eyes went wide, his cheeks grew hotter, and he squeezed back against the wall. If Kotep hadn't been between him and the door, he would have tried to make a run for it. Instead, he stammered, "I don't think—that's a bit personal isn't it?—I'm fine, really—"

Holding his head still with one paw, Kotep took a breath deep enough to puff out his chest and held it. He squashed their snouts together, making his friend's look almost normal-sized by comparison. His plush lip formed an airtight seal around his friend's mouth. Thick beads of drool rolled down his friend's chin. Then he began to blow.

Air hissed into his head. His eyes rolled back into their sockets. There was no fighting Kotep—he could squirm and wriggle all he wanted, but those overgrown muscles had him pinned. The light, dizzy pressure built and built until—thwip-thwip!—a pair of wolf's ears shot out from underneath his hair. The hiss deepened as the swelling shifted downward, bulging into his neck and bloating it outward. He clutched at his neck and tried to squeeze it back down to size, but squeezing it only pushed the air into his shoulders, which flumped out into taut, bulging muscle.

Kotep kept blowing.

His shoulders and biceps strained against the sleeves of his shirt. The seams prickled and snapped until with one great pop! the sleeves burst open and his arms surged outward. His blue-gray fur pulled tight around his swollen muscles. Next came his pecs, pushing up and outward like a pair of balloons, pressed tight together in the middle and bulging outward to either side. They pulled his shirt so tight that it could only cover a thin strip down his midline, with the hem stretched tight around the bottom of his chest. Broadening his frame and jutting from his chest, his pecs strained to a halt with a rubbery cree-ee-eak.

Neck was squashed against shoulders squeezed against biceps squooshed against pecs. His whole front was packed so tight he had to push out his chest and arch his back from the sheer tightness of all that bulk. That is, until his back suddenly filled out. A great thoom! came with the sudden shift of pressure, shoving him away from the wall. His spine popped and groaned as his back swelled into one broad, burly bulge. Forced forward, his snout only squashed tighter against Kotep's.

How was Kotep still blowing him up? And why did getting bigger make him feel so hungry? If his mouth hadn't been squished shut, he would have been slobbering all over himself. Instead, his tail was wagging furiously and Kotep's drool was dripping down his front..

A steady fssst hissed from his hands. One by one, his fingers thumped out into thick pads, followed by two great big thwumps as his palms puffed up. A broad bulge thudded against the crotch of his pants. He hadn't even gotten to take off his shoes before he sprouted a pair of thick paws that tore straight through them.

At last, his lip filled with air. It plumped outward until it was fat enough to hang from his snout, black and glossy like his swollen nose, and came to a halt with a rubbery squrrk!

Kotep stepped back, slopped his tongue up over his nose, and then went back to panting eagerly. He plucked at his friend's shirt. "What's the B stand for? Big Snout Beast?" he snickered.

Staggering on his paws, his friend clutched his snout with one big furry hand and his chest with the other. His glasses were askew, stretched around the bridge of his muzzle, and stained with drool. Just trying to balance his top-heavy body was a challenge all its own. He tried to speak, but instead his tongue slurped along the sides of his snout, then flopped out over his fat lip. He blinked blearily. All his thoughts were being dragged down toward his big bulbous nose. Thick drops of drool spattered onto the floor in front of him.

"So, how's it feel, being a big bad wolf?" Kotep asked.

He had to push the front of his snout down so he could see over it. Whining in the back of his throat, he asked, "Why'm I so dizzy...?"

"Cause you're trying to think with your brain instead of your snout!" Kotep jabbed his nose with a finger, which made his eyes cross and a shiver run down to his tail. "But don't worry. I can fix that for you!"

He didn't like the sound of that. "Wh-wait—!"

Kotep spread his arms wide, then swung both paws together, squashing his friend's face flat between them like a water balloon. A thick glorrrp! shot from up in his head straight down to his snout. His cheeks puffed, his nose bulged, and translucent pink goo splorted from his nostrils. Stumbling back, he stared cross-eyes and open-mouthed at the tip of his swollen snout. His tongue flopped up over his nose, lapping up the pink goo.

It tasted tingly, like bubblegum toothpaste. He giggled and snorted and licked his lips again. His mouth cracked into a goofy grin and he started panting freely. All those big brain thoughts had been stuffing him up. Now that they'd been cleared out, everything was easy and simple. He was a big hungry wolf. Hungry for big floppy red steaks, and hungry for being big, and hungry for acting like a wolf. No need to worry about nothing, just do what his hunger told him to do.

There was still some stuff rolling around in his head, though. Something warm and gooey pooled at the bottom of his skull and sloshed around when he cocked his head, wet and echoey like water stuck in his ear. His tongue flopped from side to side as he rolled his head around, but he just couldn't seem to work it free.

"I think I still got some brains up in there," he said, pointing a claw at his snout. "Wanna give 'em another clonk for me?"

Grinning and wagging his tail, Kotep obligingly smashed his friend's head between his hands, and threw in an extra bit of kneading and mushing too. Warm pink goo dribbled out from his nostrils.

When Kotep let go and his head sproinged back into shape, a tickle lingered on the tip of his snout. He lapped at his nose and licked up the pink goo, but that didn't help. Neither did snorting or wrinkling his snout. It grew stronger and stronger, trickling into his skull then washing down his back. "Ah..." He panted harder. His claws curled and his head tipped back. "Aah—" All his overgrown canine instincts were throbbing through his head. He was so hungry, he just had to—

"Ah-aah­-awooOOO!"

Along with the howl came a shivering feeling so intense his knees nearly buckled. He barely even heard Kotep joining in, spurred by a sudden intense urge to howl along with him.

His head slumped forward again and his tongue spilled out over his lips. His eyelids hung low and he panted heavily, but his tail was wagging furiously and he had a dazed grin. "Hee hee, that's a neat trick." On a self-indulgent impulse, he flexed his arm and puffed out his chest. His blue-gray fur strained across his cartoonish bulk. "Being a wolf feels goo-oooo-ood," he said, unable to resist a small howl.

Seeing this display, Kotep perked up his ears and flexed right back. He shoved his chest up against the new wolf's, squashing their pecs together. With a snort, he said, "Y'know what's better than being a wolf? Being a jackal."

"Why would I wanna be a jackal? Wolves are bigger," he boasted right back. To prove his point, he pushed back against Kotep, jamming his snout up against the jackal's nose and pressing their flexed arms together. By a margin of an inch or two, he had Kotep beat. They both shared an aching hunger to be big, and proving himself to be bigger was immensely satisfying. Better than steak, though not as good as howling.

Kotep wrinkled his snout and growled, "Well...that's cause...jackals can get bigger. Just wait till I pump myself up, then we'll see who's the biggest!"

"Not if I bulk up first!" he snapped back with a cocky grin.

For a few moments, they were locked together like that, eye to eye and snout to snout, broiling with cartoon canine instincts, neither quite clever enough to make the first move. Then in an instant, they were on top of one another: the jackal tackled to the ground, the wolf lunging up for the kitchen but caught by the ankle and falling flat on his snout. This devolved into several minutes of wrestling, pratfalls, and exaggerated violence until the two of them managed to wrench themselves apart.

In retrospect, it was a pretty good trick, even if it wasn't what Kotep had expected to pull. There was plenty of mischief to get up to for a pair of big, bad, hungry beasts like the two of them.