[fic] KHR - The Cat Came Back (What Happened After)

[lysapadin]

Title: The Cat Came Back (What Happened After)
Pairings: Yamamoto/Hibari
Summary: The bipedal life isn't all that it's cracked up to be.
Notes: In which Hibari explores the pitfalls and perquisites of being human. A sequel to "Cats Have Staff." Adult for a bit of smut in passing. Chary readers ought to consider that and the pairings field carefully before reading, I'm just sayin'. 10,152 words.

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The Cat Came Back (What Happened After)

A lot of things have changed.

He feels the loss of his claws and his fangs most sharply. Humans have such pathetic excuses for claws—their nails are blunt and mostly useless, no good for climbing and insufficient for scratching. Their teeth are blunt, made for grinding and chewing more than biting and tearing.

Human noses are worthless as well. They wander through their lives without the slightest idea how much information they miss every time they inhale. They deliberately obscure or conceal their own scents by incessantly bathing (in water) or by wearing layers of artificial scent. He has kept some of the sensitivity of his own nose, but even so, when he wanders through his territory his sense of it is blunted. Muffled. He can barely even scent the traces of his own presence—his markers of this territory.

It worries him, a little, that these are fading, because he cannot tell whether it is because he can no longer distinguish those traces or because he has not been able to renew them.

Human hearing is far less acute as well. He blames it on the shape of their ears, flat and pressed against the head. Immobile. Now if he wants to hear something better, he must turn his entire head and perhaps cup a hand.

He has no idea how the humans can stand not even having a tail. The less said on that score, the better, though he misses his tail and his ears and has not entirely grasped how the humans manage to communicate anything to one another.

He hasn't decided how he feels about the eyes. Humans need entirely too much light to go blundering about. However, the world has a depth and richness of color now that is disorienting. The profusion of color confounds him and he spends far too long trying to parse out the ways humans use color to communicate—surely they must, if this is the one thing they do more skillfully than cats?

He cannot contain his disapproval when he discovers that it's a far less integral part of their communicative practices than he'd initially supposed it to be.

It's the words, then: his human isn't anything unusual. They drench themselves in words, endless cascades of words that tumble and jumble through their useless ears, swirling past in so much noise. There is so little propriety to this profusion of words that he feels he must set an example of some sort, and retreats into silence.

So that hasn't really changed.

Neither has his human.

They warned him when he made the trade, one life for another, that his human would not be likely to understand. That his human might not comprehend what it is he has done, or why, or appreciate the magnitude of his decision. That his human might not accept his new form.

They were wrong. He had assumed they would be, of course, but they were entirely wrong. His human hasn't changed at all.

His human opens the door to him, takes him in and tells him off for being an asshole and finds him a towel to dry his hair, feeds him and finds him something warm and dry to wear (clothes: another change; fur is much more efficient), and asks him question after question. And listens to the answers. He makes no fuss at all, just as he made no fuss the first time.

If his human throat allowed for such things, the vindication of that fact would have made him purr.

His human only asks him one question the first night, or at least only one question that matters, and it's after they're both warm and dry again and he's helped himself to the noodles—acceptable, he supposes, if sadly thin on the meat front—and the drink—not acceptable at all, and he has no idea what his human sees in the this thing he calls beer. (His reaction makes his human grin, at least until he scowls, whereupon his human schools his expression. If his new nose weren't so pathetic, he's sure he'd be able to smell his human's laughter, even so.)

"So," his human says, hoarse from all the questions he's asked. "What should I call you?"

This is another human thing, the need for names. Wearing this new form, he understands it better: humans can't differentiate one another by smell, not easily, and it seems they come into contact with so many of their fellows every day that relying on sight and distinguishing features isn't practical.

He curls his fingers around his glass of milk (far more acceptable than either the noodles or the beer) and contemplates this question. His human shouldn't need a name for him now any more than he did before, but when one is a human one must do as they do. "Hibari," he says, and his human's eyes crinkle at the corners like he wants to smile some more. "You may call me Kyouya."

"Kyouya," his human says, slowly. If words and names had flavor and texture and density, Kyouya would almost say that his human is tasting his name. He does smile then. "Nice to meet you. I'm Takeshi."

"I know that," Kyouya tells him, irritated, but it only makes Takeshi laugh.

Eventually his human starts yawning and then can't stop and says, with yet another smile, that he needs to get some sleep. It is past time for such things, but Takeshi has an apparently bottomless appetite for silly questions about how and no really, how did you do that and what do you mean, you're not going to say, that's not fair. They'd suggested that this might be a possibility, though Kyouya had discounted them.

Apparently his human can't be sensible all the time, however, vexing as it is to admit as much.

"Finally," he says, and uncurls himself from his corner of the couch. It would have been better to have stretched out along the back, but what had been a comfortably broad cushion for his previous form no longer seems as useful a perch. One more sacrifice, he supposes.

Takeshi blinks as he stands. "Where are you—" he starts as Kyouya pads through the living room, heading for the stairs.

Kyouya misses his ears, the ability to flick them to show that he's not listening, and keeps going. The couch springs creak as Takeshi rises and follows him.

The perspective of the house is all wrong from his new height in a way that less familiar places weren't. Kyouya grumbles under his breath at this and stalks down the upstairs hallway to the bedroom, which is both familiar and not. It smells like Takeshi, though he can't pick out all the subtle nuances the way he used to, and the bed is as rumpled as always.

Takeshi arrives in the doorway behind him as Kyouya finishes divesting himself of the loose pants and shirt his human had loaned him and slinks onto the bed. He makes a startled sound as Kyouya does. "What the—what are you doing?"

The mattress gives under Kyouya's weight in a way that it didn't used to; he wriggles around on it, trying to decide what he thinks of this, and doesn't bother answering until he's found a comfortable spot and has arranged the sheets and blankets to his liking. Takeshi is staring at him when he looks up, and his cheeks are red. Kyouya wonders, briefly, what sort of human signal that is, and says, "Going to bed."

Takeshi blinks at that, rapid, and the color spreads down his throat and along his ears. Kyouya observes this and the way Takeshi opens and closes his mouth several times before he says, voice funny, "But that's my bed."

"Yes?" Kyouya says, waiting for him to explain why he's stating the perfectly obvious.

Takeshi opens his mouth again and lets it hang open for a moment before he says, "I can make up a bed for you in the spare room."

"There's no need for that," Kyouya says, and pokes at one of the pillows, prodding it into a better shape.

After a moment, his human scrubs a hand over his face and says something that sounds like deal with it tomorrow. "I'm going to brush my teeth," he says when he takes his hand away. "Guess I'll need to get you a toothbrush of your own, won't I?"

Kyouya consults his stock of human knowledge and supposes that Takeshi must be referring to the ritual of cleaning his teeth, one of the human hygiene practices he doesn't quite grasp the purpose of yet. Though he probably will, sooner or later. He doesn't answer, and Takeshi walks away, down the hall to the bathroom.

Kyouya makes himself comfortable and is beginning to drowse by the time his human returns. He opens an eye and watches as Takeshi turns out the light and circles the bed. "You're still dressed," he says as Takeshi peels back the blankets on the other side of the bed.

Takeshi hesitates for a moment. "Yeah," he says as he climbs in.

"You don't normally wear anything to bed," Kyouya points out, which is true. The only time his human has ever worn anything to bed, it was as cold as Kyouya's ever known it. But perhaps his human has forgotten that.

"No, I know, I just… think I want pants on," Takeshi says. It's really too dark to see properly with his sad excuse for eyes, but Kyouya thinks he's smiling again. He gets himself settled and heaves out a deep sigh. "Goodnight, Kyouya."

That much is familiar, at least, echoes of goodnight, cat. This time Kyouya can say, "Goodnight, Takeshi," in return, and he falls asleep, fairly satisfied with his new lot.

Kyouya wakes up warm and contented and curled on his side, tucked into the curve of Takeshi's body and with Takeshi's hand spread against his stomach. Takeshi is still asleep; each soft snore brushes warm, damp breath against Kyouya's shoulder.

It's familiar and not. Kyouya has woken up like this before, with long fingers rubbing the fur on his stomach or simply curled around him, warm and heavy, both pleasurable and intolerable (he permits his human some liberties, but will not allow him to think that he has a right to stroke Kyouya's stomach without paying for it). This is something like that feeling, though Kyouya is less concerned about protecting his vitals now. Perhaps it's the change in their relative sizes, or perhaps humans simply lack the necessary instincts to keep themselves intact.

He drowses in the lazy morning sunlight, pondering how such a ridiculous species has managed to survive and thrive as it has. Perhaps it's the opposable thumb. Or maybe they simply have their own gods to look after them and their interests.

He hasn't reached any conclusions by the time his human starts to wake up. It's a slow process, the way it always is on the days when the small box doesn't shriek at Takeshi to wake up (alarm clock, Kyouya's stock of human lore says, it's an alarm clock). Takeshi stretches in his sleep and makes a familiar set of sounds, sleepy and satisfied, as he burrows deeper into the blankets and his pillows and the curl of Kyouya's body. Kyouya supposes they are his equivalent of a purr. He rubs his cheek against Kyouya's shoulder; that's different, almost like proper behavior, though his chin is scratchy against Kyouya's skin. He rubs something else against Kyouya's rear, and Kyouya blinks at the light against the wall as he catalogues that very specific hardness. It also goes with the mornings Takeshi doesn't need to wake up quickly, of course, and Kyouya can very nearly recall the precise set of scents that goes with it, sleepy arousal and the urge to mate, though his new nose is much less sensitive to such things.

On the other hand, the rest of his new body seems to have a good sense of how to react. (Of course it does; he's fully human now, not anything else, but he supposes it's a relief to know that everything is in working order.) Kyouya presses back against Takeshi, rubbing against him as something twists in the pit of his own stomach, and Takeshi makes a deeper sound, sleepy and pleased. He strokes Kyouya's stomach, which feels unexpectedly good and makes Kyouya's cock tighten, and nuzzles against Kyouya's shoulder.

"Mm," he says as Kyouya presses against him, "that's nice…"

"Yes," Kyouya agrees, because it is, and gets even nicer when Takeshi slides his fingers down and closes them around him. He hums his approval, the closest thing he can manage to a proper purr, and catches the rhythm of it quickly, shifting his hips into Takeshi's fist and rocking them back against Takeshi's own cock. The sensation dances along his nerves, building all too quickly as Takeshi's mouth moves along his shoulder, until Kyouya feels as though he might fly to pieces with it. Then he does as pleasure sweeps through him, narrowing all his world to the feeling of the fingers wrapped around his cock as he comes. Kyouya closes his eyes with it, shaking and panting, and settles afterward, sprawling in a loose curl as lassitude creeps over him again.

Takeshi groans against his shoulder, shaking and jerking his hips against Kyouya's before he relaxes again, breathing hard.

Yes, Kyouya thinks, drowsy and content, just before Takeshi goes very still against him and says, "Oh my god."

Kyouya doesn't even know what that's supposed to mean, human communication being as baffling as it is. Moving when he's feeling this relaxed would be annoying, so he merely makes what ought to be an inquiring sort of sound at Takeshi.

"Oh my god," Takeshi says again. His voice sounds shaky, which is strange. Kyouya seems to recall his sounding a lot more satisfied than that after using his hand on himself. He's tense, too, for at least as long as he stays pressed against Kyouya's back. He rolls away fairly quickly and the mattress bounces beneath them.

Kyouya grumbles at that and rolls onto his back. Takeshi is sitting up and is grinding his palm against his eyes. His shoulders are hunched, and as Kyouya watches, he shakes his head.

It's interesting to discover that the hairs on the back of his neck will still stand up when something is wrong, but Kyouya thinks that perhaps he could have lived without that knowledge.

He stretches himself out, since nothing is so bad that a stretch isn't enjoyable, watches his human for a moment longer, and finally says, "What?"

The way Takeshi jumps doesn't seem right, like he's forgotten that Kyouya is right here. Kyouya frowns and sets that aside to deal with later, because Takeshi looks at him. His eyes are wide and the corners of his mouth are turned down and Kyouya suspects that if he had been graced with a proper shape, all of his fur would have been standing up and his ears would be laid flat against his head. "We just had sex," Takeshi says.

He looks and sounds alarmed, though Kyouya doesn't know why. Nothing he knows about humans suggests that this is appropriate behavior for after mating. "Yes," he says, since that much is obvious.

Takeshi makes a little whining sound and covers his eyes. "Oh my god," he says yet again. Kyouya raises his eyebrows, wondering if his human means to summon one. Then his human opens his mouth again and Kyouya feels himself go cold. "You're a cat."

He wants his claws, he wants his teeth, he wants blood for that. "I'm not." Kyouya thinks about trying out his blunt human nails and teeth on Takeshi, but settles for getting out of bed. Takeshi looks up at him, flicking his eyes up and down and then to the side like he doesn't know where to look. "I'm human now."

"I know, but—" Takeshi looks and sounds wretched; it just makes the cold knot of anger sitting beneath Kyouya's breastbone twist tighter. "You were a cat."

Kyouya can't think of anything to say to him that would be suitable enough, so he hisses instead, spitting the air between his useless human teeth, and stalks out of the bedroom, stiff-legged and furious, to go lock himself into the bathroom, which seems like the best possible refuge from human idiocy he has available.

Stupid, stupid, stupid, he thinks, staring at his reflection in the mirror over the sink, the pale pointed features and the unfamiliar round pupils of his eyes. Takeshi was supposed to understand, the way he always had.

It isn't supposed to go like this at all.

After a while, he gets tired of looking at his new face and sets about cleaning himself up instead. It seems wrong and unnatural to step under the spray of the shower; he spends a few minutes and a lot of hot water nerving himself for the ordeal before he can bring himself to do it. He spends the rest of the hot water scrubbing himself clean and takes a certain amount of satisfaction from rinsing the scent of Takeshi's bed off his skin.

He dries himself off after the water runs cold and the bathroom has filled with steam and rakes his hair into order. That's as ready as he can make himself to deal with the idiot human, so he lifts his chin higher and opens the bathroom door.

The steam billows out into the hall ahead of him, little curls of it that thin and disappear in the cooler air. Takeshi is sitting at the top of the staircase, his back to the wall and one knee draw up to his chest. His head jerks up when Kyouya steps into the hall.

Kyouya doesn't know what the expression on his face means at all. He hesitates in spite of himself, catches himself doing it, and scowls.

Before he can decide what to do about this, Takeshi clears his throat. "Sorry," he says. "I—that wasn't, um. I didn't handle that very well. I'm sorry."

Kyouya stares at him. "Sorry," he echoes, not sure what else he's supposed to say or what that even means.

Takeshi makes a face. "Yeah, um. I'm not really that fast, first thing in the morning." He smiles at Kyouya; it looks tentative. "And sex kind of makes me stupid."

"Apparently so," Kyouya says, since it's clearly the truth. Takeshi winces, but it's not particularly appeasing.

He'd be lashing his tail, if he still had it, and Takeshi seems to pick up on that, at least a little. The smile falls off his face and he takes a deep breath. "I really am sorry," he says. "It came out all wrong. I was surprised. And confused." He bites his lip. "Really surprised. I mean." He waves a hand that Kyouya guesses is supposed to indicate something. "You're obviously not a cat anymore, but… you were a cat. Just the other day, and you still haven't explained that, and anyway, it's kind of hard to wrap my head around that. I didn't mean to freak out on you, I was just—sorry. I was a jerk and I'm sorry."

Kyouya doesn't know what there is to explain, still, since it ought to be obvious. Humans are evidently even stupider than they'd thought. "At least you know," he says, for lack of anything better to say.

It's a substantive hit; Takeshi makes another face and hangs his head. "Yeah, no, I know. I suck and I'm sorry. It won't happen again."

Kyouya thinks about telling him he's right about that much, but doesn't. The moment passes, and Takeshi looks up at him. He clears his throat. "So, uh. You hungry? I was thinking about making some breakfast."

"Yes," Kyouya says. When Takeshi begins to smile, he adds, "That doesn't mean I forgive you." Best to be clear on that.

Takeshi just nods. "Didn't figure you had," he says. He stands and adds, "So, uh, let me just find you some pants, okay? And then we can eat."

Takeshi's obsession with whether he is wearing pants or not doesn't make much sense to Kyouya (he has witnessed Takeshi wandering around in nothing but his skin enough times that he'd assumed that his human wouldn't have the strange qualms other humans do). He suffers Takeshi to foist a robe on him nonetheless, and Takeshi seems to relax once Kyouya's tied it around himself.

Humans are very strange about some things.

Kyouya thinks he ought to find something else to do with himself, something that is well away from Takeshi, something that will show him that he's definitely not in Kyouya's favor anymore—figuring out how he might shred something of Takeshi's, perhaps, though he might have to supplement his nails and teeth somehow. But he finds himself trailing downstairs after Takeshi and sitting at the kitchen table with his feet tucked under the chair and watching him move around from cabinet to dish rack to refrigerator to stove. It's a familiar feeling, though the angle's wrong.

(The top of the refrigerator is still bare and clean; there's still a plate on the floor in the corner of the kitchen.)

Takeshi compounds that feeling by talking, rattling on at the mouth tentatively at first and then with increasing assurance. It doesn't seem to bother him very much that Kyouya isn't responding. But then, it never has.

"Do you have any idea what sorts of things you like to eat?" he asks as he starts a pot of coffee. It smells better now than it ever has before, but when Takeshi pours a cup and sets it in front of Kyouya, the flavor is disappointing. It stays disappointing even after he adds milk from the carton, and sugar too, and ultimately he pushes it away while Takeshi discusses the omelet he's making, narrating each step like he thinks that Kyouya is in the mood to enjoy listening to him talk. Takeshi doesn't say anything about the coffee, but he puts a kettle on as well and pours the water over a teabag and sets that down in front of Kyouya. Whatever it is has a grassy, green taste and is more satisfying than the coffee.

Takeshi doesn't say anything about it, but makes him a second cup before he serves the omelet, which is another new experience, not unacceptable, though Kyouya doesn't know why there have to be vegetables in it too, and picks most of them out.

"Vegetables will keep you from getting scurvy," Takeshi observes as Kyouya scrapes the peppers and onions into a tidy pile.

Kyouya ignores him and concentrates on the eggs and cheese and ham.

Takeshi just sighs and resumes his story about his coworker friend's run-in with the clients from hell, which is the latest installment in a series that Takeshi refers to as 101 Reasons Dealing With SimonCorp Sucks. Kyouya has no idea why Takeshi is telling him this now, but it keeps the meal from being utterly silent.

Finally Takeshi pushes his plate back and drains the last of the coffee from his cup and says, "I know you don't want to talk about why or how or anything like that, but… is this—" He waves his hand, Kyouya doesn't know at what, but he guesses it's supposed to mean his change of forms. "—a permanent thing or a temporary one or what?"

Kyouya wants to say Of course it's permanent, do you think this was done lightly or easily? or maybe Why are you asking? or maybe he just wants to say Does it really matter? Instead he shrugs and looks away, studying the pattern of the linoleum. "It lasts as long as this life does."

"Oh." Takeshi's voice is very quiet. "I… see. That could be, um. Complicated. Couldn't it?"

It wasn't supposed to be, but it's not worth saying that, so Kyouya doesn't say anything at all.

He listens to Takeshi drawing a breath before he says, "I know things this morning were, um, weird, but. If you want to stay here, I'd like that. If you don't have somewhere else you want to go, I mean."

Kyouya twists his fingers in the worn cloth of Takeshi's robe and doesn't look at him. "I don't," he says, watching Takeshi's face from the corner of his eye.

He thinks that Takeshi looks like he's glad. He smiles, anyway, and slouches in his chair. "Okay," he says. "Okay, that's good." He runs his fingers through his hair until it stands up in all directions. "So, uh. You want any help getting set up in the human business?"

Kyouya isn't entirely sure that he does, but he says yes anyway.

"No, but seriously," Takeshi says a while later, sitting in front of his laptop and staring at the screen like he doesn't believe what he's seeing. "How does this even work?"

Kyouya doesn't know how he's supposed to answer that, given that things like money and banking and identity are all human concepts, ringed around with human language, and all he really possesses is the vaguest theoretical knowledge of these things. He frowns at Takeshi, even though the roundness of his eyes is somewhat gratifying. "Did you think I wouldn't be able to support myself?"

"I don't think I thought that far ahead." Takeshi shakes his head, rather like a dog, and grins up at him. "I don't think I've ever seen this many zeroes in a row in my life."

"There's no point in doing a thing if you're not going to do it properly." Not the only reason they had provided such means for him, but the only one worth mentioning.

"I guess so, geez. Man, too bad I can't get myself set up like this."

Kyouya wishes he could lay his ears back but settles for narrowing his eyes at Takeshi. "You wouldn't like what it took."

Takeshi gives him a startled kind of look, but doesn't pursue that. "Well, I guess it solves one problem," he says. "I was having a hard time picturing you looking for a job, much less working one." He grins. "At least not for very long."

One thing Kyouya can do with his new form that he couldn't before is roll his eyes, which he does at that.

"Well, I really can't," Takeshi says as he closes his laptop. He rolls his shoulders and adds, "So, ready to go spend some of that money?"

Whether he is or not, Kyouya suspects he's going to very shortly.

It is not a pleasant or enjoyable experience. Riding in Takeshi's car is somewhat less unpleasant when Kyouya is not restrained in a blanket or a cage that smells of another cat's irritation and can actually see what is happening, but only somewhat. Now he can see how they are hurtling along among other vehicles, and no matter how comfortable Takeshi seems to be with this, Kyouya does not trust the other drivers in the slightest.

(Their rush to get from one place to another as swiftly as possible is yet another human mystery, as is their willingness to embrace noisy, dangerous measures of doing so.)

Takeshi takes him shopping for clothes, which means going to a shopping mall—a human institution devoted to cramming entirely too many people into a confined space full of noise and clamor and then attempting to overwhelm them with ostentatious displays. Kyouya doesn't precisely have hackles anymore, but he feels them go up anyway with ten steps of the mall's entrance, and they stay that way for the duration of the excursion.

At least it's mercifully short. Takeshi glances at him once and puts himself ahead of Kyouya, striding through the crowds of people and letting Kyouya follow after him in the little space that opens behind him, and gets them in and out of the store quickly. "We'll just get the basics and your sizes," he says, "and we can get the rest online, yeah?"

That still requires Kyouya to let someone, a complete stranger, put her hands all over him—taking his measurements, she and Takeshi call it. Kyouya calls it something else altogether and glares at Takeshi while she makes free with his person. Takeshi just shrugs at him and stays close by, and then helps pick out more clothes, shirts and underwear and pants and socks, an array of clothing. It makes sense that humans need protection from the elements, since their own are so puny, but they seem inordinately fond of the variety.

Of course, when he says as much, Takeshi just says, "Yeah, well. It's something to do." He rubs his chin and adds, "Besides, you should get a bunch of different things and see what you like."

Kyouya isn't sure that he's going to like any of it, but doesn't bother saying so. He just tries on the stacks of clothes the woman brings them until he's sick of the feeling of strange cloth that smells like the recycled, dead air of the store moving against his skin, and wants to scratch and bite and hiss at Takeshi or the woman and escape. He's giving serious consideration to it, wondering whether he'll be able to find his way out of this windowless maze, when Takeshi forestalls the woman and says, "This ought to do, right?"

She looks disappointed, but Kyouya dresses again with a sense of relief and pays for the things he hasn't rejected out of hand. The woman folds and bags them, and Takeshi takes one of the bags. "So I was thinking about going grocery shopping after this," he says over his shoulder as he navigates his way back out of the crowd, and Kyouya's heart sinks. "But maybe I could drop you back off at home before I do?"

"Yes," Kyouya says, feeling his hackles coming down a bit.

Takeshi just nods. "Yeah, I figured."

He turns on the radio when they get in the car, more music spilling out into the quiet between them, and Kyouya tries to think about that instead of the motion of the car or the speed of the vehicles around them. Takeshi doesn't like silences much, he thinks, and fills them up whenever he can, whether it's with his own voice or music or the television.

He wonders why that is, but doesn't ask.

"Let me show you something," Takeshi says after he turns the key in the ignition and the noise of the engine dies.

Kyouya glances at him, but Takeshi is already getting out of the car and pulling the shopping bags out of the back seat, so Kyouya follows him inside the house. Takeshi goes straight upstairs, for the spare bedroom, and leaves the bags on the bed as he maneuvers around it. "Here," he says, standing at the window and lifting the sash.

Kyouya watches as Takeshi lifts the screen out of the frame and feels his eyebrows rising as he then swings a leg over the sash. "What are you doing?"

Takeshi just ducks the rest of the way out the window without answering, which forces Kyouya to follow him.

The house's garage extends out beneath this window, and the roof slopes gently over it. Takeshi is standing on it—stooping, really, underneath the branches of the tree that shadow this little section of roof. Takeshi gestures and Kyouya follows him outside, wondering what strange human behavior this is.

"I guess you can't really jump up on top of the refrigerator or the bookshelf anymore," Takeshi says as Kyouya looks around him, "but if you still like high places, this is someplace you could go."

Kyouya blinks and looks around himself again, considering that. It's quiet here, except for the rustling of the leaves, and not easily reached.

"I suppose," he says, finally, and pretends not to notice the way Takeshi smiles.

Takeshi excuses himself and squirms back through the window; it's not long before Kyouya hears the car start up and pull away again. The sound of the motor dies away again, leaving him alone with the wind and the leaves and the shade. He stands there for a long time, thinking, before he settles himself against the shallow slope of the roof and lets the residue of the morning's tension ease out of him again.

The place Takeshi has shown him is a good one, quiet and private, shaded in part by the branches of a tree, yes, but sunny too. Kyouya chooses to sit in the sun, crossing his legs and spreading his hands against the grittiness of the shingles. It's not as easy to make himself comfortable in his new form; humans are far less flexible than they ought to be. But the warmth of the sunlight is no less soothing in his human form than it was previously, and Kyouya relaxes in it, turning his face up to the endless arch of the sky overhead as some of his frustration begins to melt away.

After a while, he stretches out. Folding his hands behind his head comes automatically and seems to be the most comfortable position for his new form. He closes his eyes against the sunlight, and decides that this is not bad at all—for once, Takeshi's instincts have been good. But then, Kyouya muses drowsily, Takeshi's instincts are generally good. It's only when he doesn't listen to them that things go awry.

There's something important in that thought, but warmth of the sunlight has made him sleepy and he dozes off before he can tease it out.

The angle of the sunlight has changed when Kyouya wakes again, feeling hot and sticky inside his clothes, but that discomfort is far less important than the fact that when he opens his eyes, he is nose to nose with the one called Mukuro. The clash between two sets of instincts—hiss and flee, jump and yell—paralyzes Kyouya for that first moment.

It's long enough for Mukuro to flick his ears and tail, bi-colored eyes slanted and obviously amused beyond the telling of it. Kyouya can read his amusement all too clearly, as if Mukuro has purred How the mighty have fallen or maybe Look at what you've done to yourself.

Kyouya hisses in utter, utter fury and lunges for him, ready to claw and bite and forgetting for a moment that things have changed. His fingers close on thick fur; the shock of that sensation nearly undoes him, but not quite. He doesn't let go, and it is sweet—oh, so sweet—to catch his loathsome enemy up like a kitten and dangle him at arm's length.

Mukuro hisses and spits, all his smugness vanished, and Kyouya tastes the air on his fangs as he hisses back, reveling in this moment of triumph. This is not the reason he sought his new form, but whatever other disappointments it has been, this result is already everything he hoped it would be (and maybe more).

Mukuro tries to scratch him, but Kyouya has his own experience and knows better than to permit that. He shakes Mukuro, who yowls his fury and discomfort in one miserable sound. Kyouya growls in triumph and says, "Get out of my territory and never come back."

Mukuro yowls again, but Kyouya holds tight until he flattens his ears in grudging acceptance of those terms. Kyouya holds him a moment longer to be sure of him, then lets him go. Mukuro hisses at him, ears flat against his head and all his fur bristling, but slinks away hastily when Kyouya moves to scruff him again.

There, Kyouya thinks, right before Takeshi says, "Well, that was interesting," somewhere behind him.

When he looks around, he sees that Takeshi is leaning in the window, arms folded across the sash. He is smiling. "Sorry," he says, "didn't mean to startle you."

Kyouya finds that apology suspect at best and frowns at him, but it doesn't seem to deter Takeshi in the slightest. Kyouya supposes this isn't surprising; hasn't one of the things he's always appreciated about Takeshi been how difficult it is to faze him? (Why, why, why was this morning so different?) He just smiles even wider as Kyouya glares at him now. "Guess you got him sorted, didn't you? About time, really."

That isn't worth dignifying with a response, so Kyouya sniffs and busies himself with brushing the grit off his clothes and setting his hair in order.

Takeshi watches him do it and carries on after a moment, as if Kyouya had answered. "Did you have a nice nap? You slept most of the afternoon."

Kyouya glances at the angle of the sun. So he has. "Mm."

"You're still more cat than not, huh?" Takeshi's smile changes somehow, looks different, though Kyouya doesn't know what that means. "Thought you might be getting hungry. You interested in having an early dinner?"

Kyouya's stomach growls at the first mention of eating, which settles that for him. "I suppose." He rises and Takeshi moves out of his way so he can climb back inside the house. He sniffs the air when he gets inside; his puny new nose can't make much of the savory odors hanging in the air, but he can tell that Takeshi has been cooking. He follows that scent downstairs while Takeshi wrestles the window screen back into place.

There are plates and utensils on the table, which has been cleared of the detritus that normally covers it—magazines and catalogs and other mail, sometimes boxes that had smelled of food, Takeshi's laptop, and the various small objects that had been good for knocking to the floor and hunting until they took refuge beneath the stove or refrigerator. The table looks strangely empty with only the plates and glasses and dishes of food; Kyouya wonders at that, and why Takeshi doesn't seem to plan to eat in front of the television like normal.

"There was a nice deal on steaks today," Takeshi informs him, coming up behind Kyouya while he is investigating the dishes (there are greens and sliced vegetables in one bowl, different vegetables that smell of herbs and have been cut into chunks and roasted in another, long wedges of potatoes on the plates). He moves around Kyouya and retrieves a pan from the stove, uncovers it, and transfers the two pieces of meat to the plates, along with a quantity of red-brown sauce. He pours them each a glass of wine and takes a seat.

After a moment, Kyouya follows his example and sits, and even suffers Takeshi to serve out some of the salad and the roasted vegetables, though he's not sure he wants to try them. He's not sure why Takeshi felt the need to cook a perfectly good piece of meat, either, though when he cuts into it he finds that it's not cooked all the way through (clever humans, he notes, examining his knife, which is not a bad way of mimicking a proper set of claws at all).

Takeshi grins at him. "I figured you wouldn't be the kind of guy who likes his steak well-done."

Whatever that means. The sauce is rich and velvety on his tongue, tasting of things Kyouya cannot name—earth and meat and brown and red—and the meat tastes different, too. At least he thinks it does; all of a sudden he can't recall what it should taste like. He covers that instant of panic by reaching for something else, one of the potato sticks, something he's never had before. It's mealy on his tongue, almost too hot, and bland compared to the meat.

Takeshi watches him. At first he looks eager, like he's—the closest thing Kyouya can think of is that he looks like he's hunting something, who knows what—but his expression changes when Kyouya reaches for the potato, and then one of the roasted things (sweet and soft, an odd texture to go with the orange color; a carrot, he thinks). "What's wrong?"

Kyouya doesn't want to answer; his throat feels tight and so does his chest, but Takeshi keeps looking at him like that. Kyouya is sure that his scent would be worried, if only his nose weren't so useless. "I can't remember how it's supposed to taste."

"How it's—" Takeshi stops and looks down at his plate and his own untouched steak. When he looks up, his eyes are as wide as a kitten's. "I didn't even think of that. God."

Of course he didn't, Kyouya thinks, morose. Then Takeshi reaches across the table and touches his hand as Kyouya stabs at the meat. "I'm sorry," he says. "You don't have to, if you'd rather not. You want to try something else instead? Something you haven't had before?"

Kyouya nods, relieved, so Takeshi digs something out of the freezer—pizza, he calls it—and heats that up instead. If Kyouya isn't sure whether he likes it (cheese and bread and spice and tomatoes, eh, but the sausage is acceptable), at least it fills up the hollow space inside his gut. What else is he going to lose? he wonders as Takeshi fills up the quiet with a stream of inconsequential chatter that he clearly doesn't expect Kyouya to respond to. What else has he given up without thinking, in his assumption that the trade-off would be worth it?

Eventually he realizes that Takeshi has stopped talking and is just watching him. There's a worried line drawn between his eyes, and he says, simply, "Is there anything I can do?"

Kyouya doesn't know how to begin to answer that, wants desperately to lay his ears back and retreat from the way Takeshi looks at him, to find a small dark place to curl up in until the panicky feeling in his chest goes away. He shakes his head, no.

Takeshi bites his lip and nods and begins cleaning up the meal. He packs away the uneaten leftovers and is stacking the dishes in the sink when he stops, holding their glasses and staring at them. (Kyouya tried the wine, once, and left it alone after that; he's not yet human enough to voluntarily consume something that has spoiled.) "I have an idea."

Kyouya doesn't much care about Takeshi's ideas at this point, but he watches Takeshi carry the glasses to the sink and then retrieve a box from the cupboard above the stove. He remembers that box, vaguely. Sometimes Takeshi would get it out when his talk had been full of complaints and his scent was angry and stressed. Takeshi nods his head at the other room. "So let's see if this is any help."

He doesn't have it in him to be curious right now, but he gets up and follows Takeshi into the living room anyway. Maybe Takeshi can tell how he's feeling, because he takes his normal spot on the couch and says, "This is sort of like catnip, only for humans." He works as he talks, taking things out of the box: a book of papers, a tin half-full of dried leaves, a lighter, a small dish. Kyouya watches him roll some of the leaves up in one of the papers, quick and deft. "Doesn't come in fuzzy mice, obviously, and it's maybe not strictly legal, but I figure, if there was ever anyone who needed to get stoned, it must be you."

"What?" Kyouya asks, finally, when Takeshi finally sets fire to the rolled-up leaves. The smoke doesn't smell as acrid to him in this form, but he still stares at Takeshi when he takes a long breath of it. "You must be joking."

"Not really." Takeshi looks up at him, serious. "It might relax you. Take some of the edge off things." 

Kyouya doesn't know that anything can do that, but he takes a seat anyway, sinking into the couch's cushions next to Takeshi, who holds out the little roll of paper and leaves. The end glows where it burns and Kyouya takes it gingerly, sets it to his lips and tries to mimic what he has seen Takeshi do when he inhales.

Humans are absolutely crazy; the smoke and heat make him cough as his eyes water, reacting to this unnatural act. He glares at Takeshi, but Takeshi just nods and says, "Yeah. Like that." He takes the thing out of Kyouya's fingers and takes another draw on it himself, taps the ash off the end, and passes it back.

The second attempt leaves him feeling light-headed, probably because no one's supposed to try to breathe smoke. "What is this supposed to do?" he asks when he hands it off to Takeshi again.

"Relax you, I hope." Takeshi settles back against the couch, beginning to sprawl out. "It works differently for everyone, but if we're lucky, it'll just loosen you up." He pauses, taking a thoughtful drag and exhaling a slow stream of smoke. "Or you could end up being the angry sort. Would figure, I guess."

Kyouya isn't sure either would help, but as it's become clear, he has no idea what he's done to himself or how to get the things he wanted in the first place, so he decides he might as well go along with it.

The light-headed feeling lingers, even when he's breathing nothing but (mostly) pure air, and begins to expand outward, running down his spine and through his muscles. It feels like coming unstrung by increments, or maybe like something else (Takeshi's fingers in his fur, Takeshi's fingers on his skin). They've smoked half the thing—the joint, Takeshi calls it—when Kyouya begins to sink into that light feeling, subsiding against the couch next to Takeshi because sitting upright is too much bother.

Takeshi glances at him and smiles, just a small upturning of his lips. "Looks like it's working." He passes the joint back to Kyouya, who finds that it's getting easier to take unnatural breaths of smoke and hold them the way Takeshi does.

The loose feeling continues to unspool through him, easy and warm like a sunbeam. Kyouya sighs and slouches deeper into the couch. The cushions are deeper and more comfortable than he'd realized they were, in his other form, and the tight feeling in his chest is easing, or receding. Kyouya isn't sure which it is, but either way, the effect is a welcome one.

Takeshi doesn't say anything else, not until they've smoked the last tiny fragment of the joint and Kyouya has burrowed himself deep into the cushions and is watching the curling wisps of smoke that crawl along the ceiling above their heads. Takeshi glances at him and smiles again. He stretches out, lacing his fingers over his head and kicking out his feet, making ridiculous faces as his joints pop. Kyouya almost smiles at that, until Takeshi settles and says, "Is it helping?"

"For now." It's surely only temporary, but it's easier not to think about it now. Kyouya holds to that and the lazy, loose feeling of his muscles. It's better than the alternative.

"So it is like catnip?" Takeshi doesn't sound anything but honestly curious.

The question still aches. Kyouya glances aside and shrugs. Maybe it is, but he doesn't feel the urge to move-explore-fight that he remembers feeling with the fake mouse toys that smelled so delicious, even if the dizzy feeling is similar.

Takeshi hums quietly, but doesn't say anything else, all his usual chatter dried up. After a while, he stirs himself again, pushing out of his sprawl. He moves languidly, his spine curving as liquidly as another cat's might, and he bends his head over the task of rolling up another joint. Kyouya watches him and tries not to think about how strange it is that Takeshi was born in this form and not another, more suitable one.

Takeshi glances up and catches him watching. His eyes crinkle at the corners when he smiles, but he doesn't say anything—just licks the edge of the paper to seal it, tongue pink against white, and lets Kyouya have the first hit from the fresh joint.

Something about that seems strange. Kyouya ponders that as they pass the joint back and forth. Eventually he says, "You aren't talking as much."

"Mm?" Takeshi slouches low against the arm of the couch and holds the joint loosely. He looks like his thoughts are far away, and it takes a while before he forms an answer. "I guess?" He glances down at his fingers. "It's easier to be quiet this way. Don't mind it as much."

Kyouya puzzles through that. He likes quiet and the peace that comes with it, but perhaps Takeshi doesn't. Takeshi talks nearly incessantly or turns on the television or the radio. Kyouya has listened to Takeshi talking to him or the thin air for a year, in fact, and the curiousness of that loosens his tongue enough that he asks, "What's wrong with the quiet?"

Takeshi takes another drag off the joint and exhales the smoke at the ceiling, a long slow plume of it. Kyouya thinks that he's looking at something very far away. "It's lonely."

That's more confusing than not; maybe it shows, because Takeshi laughs when he looks over at Kyouya. "We're social animals," he says, like that's an explanation. "With packs and tribes and stuff."

Kyouya plucks the joint from his fingers and thinks about that. Packs he understands, and crowds he understands (and dislikes). If what Takeshi says is correct, then… "Where's your pack?"

"Gone." That's all Takeshi says. He returns his gaze to the ceiling and sighs heavily enough that Kyouya sees his chest rise and fall with it.

He doesn't know what he ought to say about that, so he stays quiet and watches Takeshi, the rise and fall of his chest and the flicker of his eyelids as they open and close, and the unusual, relaxed sprawl of his limbs. He's still watching when Takeshi lowers his gaze again. They look at each other silently, at least until Takeshi smiles faintly and reaches for the joint again. Their fingers brush when Kyouya hands it off; he can't quite tell whether it's because Takeshi lets his fingers linger deliberately or because all their movements are slowed down.

Or maybe it's just Kyouya's perception that's slowed down. He looks away, discomfited, and straightens his clothes, twitching his shirt down where it wants to ride up his back.

"This is their house." Takeshi's voice is hushed. "My parents, I mean. I got it after they died." He's slouched in his corner of the couch; the joint dangles from his fingers, apparently forgotten until he takes another drag off it. "I grew up in this house, you know? But it's too big for just one guy, really. Was thinking about selling it or something when you first showed up."

He talks like he doesn't expect Kyouya to say anything, or has forgotten that Kyouya can respond. Kyouya listens and watches and waits for him to come to his point—he nearly always does, sooner or later. Takeshi's reliable, in that sense.

It doesn't take long. "Don't think I realized how glad I was to have someone around again, at first." He smiles at Kyouya, a little crooked. "Even if I wasn't sure why you were there. Or were putting up with me."

Kyouya finds that he recognizes the textures of that, the quiet request for an answer and the tacit knowledge that it might not be forthcoming. He looks away, missing the ability to be able to flick his ears and his tail. "You were suitable."

Takeshi laughs softly. "Suitable, huh? Worse things to be in life, I guess." He lapses into silence again. This time Kyouya leaves it alone, finishes the joint with him and lets the quiet and the warm, indolent sense of well-being wrap around him again. The day's distresses recede further; staying like this might not be so bad, he thinks, even if it's not quite perfect.

He meditates on that for a while, until the comfortable embrace of the couch gets the better of him and he closes his eyes, meaning to open them again and then somehow not doing so.

When Kyouya wakes up, the television is on but the sound is turned low, just a quiet murmur of noise to go with the flicker and glow of the picture, and he finds that he has migrated in his sleep. Takeshi has an arm wrapped around him, and Kyouya fits neatly in the curve of his side. Takeshi is stroking his hair, running his fingers through the strands of it as gently and as absently as he ever petted Kyouya before. It feels so natural that Kyouya blinks sleepily at the television and doesn't remember that this isn't quite right for the space of several drowsy minutes.

When he does remember, he nearly recoils.

Before he can, Takeshi says, "Sometimes I'm not very fast on the uptake, you know? So it takes me a while to put things together." He doesn't stop moving his fingers through Kyouya's hair, and even though part of Kyouya wants to pull away, wants blood in his claws and on his fangs, wants a place to hide himself away, part of him also wants to purr. "Especially if they're not spelled out for me." He sighs; the gust of it is warm against the top of Kyouya's head. "And sometimes even when it is spelled out for me."

Kyouya shifts, uneasy with this and not sure where Takeshi is going. Takeshi makes a quiet sound and rubs his fingertips against Kyouya's scalp. Kyouya settles almost against his will when it feels like all his bones melt.

He can listen for a little while longer. A very little while longer.

"Right, sorry, I'll get to the point." Takeshi rubs his fingers back and forth, kneading Kyouya's scalp steadily. "You can tell me whether I'm right or not." He slides his hand down and settles his thumb against the spot just behind Kyouya's ear, rubbing slowly. It doesn't feel quite as wonderful as Kyouya recalls it being, but it's still pleasant to have Takeshi's thumb rubbing along that tendon. "You did this for me, didn't you?" Takeshi's voice is hesitant. "Because, um. You didn't want to share or something. Not with Dino."

Kyouya can't stop himself from hissing at the interloper's name. Not that he particularly cares to.

Takeshi makes a startled sound, as though he hadn't expected that. Kyouya doesn't know why he would have said it then, except that being human seems to mean that what one does and what one says and what one thinks never have to line up. (Humans must be particularly good at lying to themselves and to others.) "Really?" he says, voice gone soft and strange. "You did? For me?"

Kyouya growls as best as he can, frustrated that Takeshi is surprised by this. "Why else would I have done it?" he demands. "What other reason could I possibly have had to take such an inadequate form?"

He expects Takeshi to laugh and make a joke—the past twenty-four hours have done a lot to lower his expectations on that score—but Takeshi says, "God, I'm an idiot."

Kyouya isn't about to argue with him when he agrees completely, so he stays silent, tensing up again even though Takeshi hasn't moved his hand.

"You told me I was your, um, territory, right before you left, didn't you?" Takeshi says, stating what should have been perfectly obvious from the start. "And it wasn't like I said anything when you came back, so it looked like I knew what was going on and was okay with it."

Kyouya flinches; it's time to leave, now, but before he can do more than flail his way towards the vertical, Takeshi catches his hand and hangs onto it. "No, wait, that came out all wrong," he says, fast. "I don't mean that I'm not okay with it, I just, I'm talking myself through what happened. Okay?" He peers at Kyouya, face lit in the blue light from the television, and he looks worried. He grips Kyouya's hand like he's afraid that Kyouya will vanish right in front of him.

Kyouya should claw him for being grabby, but doesn't. After a moment he settles back, just enough to indicate that he's listening. He keeps a wary eye on Takeshi, even so, and eyes the distance to the door. Just in case.

Takeshi doesn't let go, and rubs his face with his other hand. "So as far as you knew, I knew exactly what was going on the whole time. Only I didn't. So then this morning happened and…" The light shows the way he peeks at Kyouya through his fingers. "And maybe you've been wondering ever since just what you're doing with such a stupid, ungrateful bald ape," he finishes, tone lilting up like a question. "Did I get it?"

Kyouya looks away from him, but Takeshi just waits for an answer. His fingers are warm where he's wrapped them around Kyouya's, steadier than his voice, and finally Kyouya nods, still not looking at him. "Close enough."

"You…" Words seem to fail Takeshi, possibly for the first time in their acquaintance. "You… did that—you don't even seem to like being human, and you… Are you human now for good, or—no, you said that it lasts as long as—" He stops on that, for some reason. When Kyouya chances a glance at him, it looks as though all the color has leeched out of his face. "Kyouya. How did you change from cat to human?"

The question makes him testy. "How do you think?" Honestly. Why ask something that he clearly already knows the answer to? "I traded a life for it." And the less they talk about that, the happier Kyouya will be.

Takeshi apparently loses his capacity for speech altogether and just looks at him, his eyes wide and his face the color of old bone. He tightens his grip on Kyouya's hand until Kyouya grunts a protest. That shakes him out of his stupor. "Oh," Takeshi says. His voice is small, like a kitten's. "Kyouya."

Kyouya desperately wants to flick his ears and groom his fur and ignore Takeshi's distressingly open reaction. Before he can settle on an appropriate human substitute for that, Takeshi scoops him up—just lunges forward and wraps his arms around Kyouya, squeezing him against his chest. Pawing at his shoulders doesn't deter him, nor does wriggling or hissing. Kyouya growls at him and struggles harder, wondering what kind of damage his blunt human teeth can actually do.

"I'm sorry." Takeshi sounds shaken. "I'm sorry, I didn't get it before. I do now."

Kyouya pauses his efforts to break free of that smothering hold. "Do you?" Every ounce of the suspicion he puts in that is fully warranted at this point.

"Probably not everything," Takeshi admits. "Not yet." He raises a hand and strokes Kyouya's hair, clumsy when his fingers were so deft before. It still feels nice. "But I want to try, if you'll tell me." He hesitates and adds, "With actual words, I mean. So I don't make the same kind of stupid assumptions that I did before. Okay?"

Humans are entirely too fond of talking, but then, Kyouya supposes they have to make up for their deficiencies as best as they know how. "I'm still annoyed with you."

Takeshi's laughter stirs the hair at his temple, warm. "Can't really blame you for that. But I can try to make it up to you."

Kyouya gives that the consideration it's due. "How?"

Takeshi hums between his teeth and goes back to petting his hair, even though Kyouya refuses to relax into it. "Dunno. Think you would like sushi?"

Kyouya doesn't have a frame of reference for that. "What is it?"

"You might like it," Takeshi says, taking on the wheedling tone he only uses when he's trying to drive a bargain. "There's usually fish involved. Raw fish, a lot of the time. Tuna. Salmon."

That does sound promising, though there's no need to tell him so. "I'll think about it."

"Yeah, do that," Takeshi says, setting his fingers at the base of Kyouya's neck and rubbing, and oh, that does feel nice. Kyouya catches himself beginning to relax in spite of himself, even as Takeshi adds, "Okay?"

Kyouya just sighs and twitches until Takeshi adjusts the set of his arms to something less confining and more comfortable. "Yes," he says, settling against his human, because it's beginning to look like it's going to be okay after all.

end

Because no slightly warped re-imagining of The Little Mermaid is complete without a peek into what happens after the erstwhile mermaid and the human wander off into the sunset. Ahem.

Possibly still to come, plot bunnies willing: the Cavallone coda, since no one likes a dangling plot thread.


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