Chapter Text
Flame sat in the dark corner of the shop, swiping on his phone.
Lomedy asked him to look after the pet shop for a day, 'cus something happened on his family farm. Something about strong rain and wind, and having to move the cattle. Flame wasn't interested in all this, outside of Lomedys shift not being on a date of his tournament.
Lomedy explained what he had to do in the shop, so after he gone thru all the motions, he just sat in a corner, looking thru his opponents profiles and previous tournaments.
Being a top member of a swordplay guild he quite often finds himself going to different events and knowing what backgrounds your opponents come from can greatly improve your chances at winning. Right now he tries to find some info at a new guy, but he isn't listed as a part of any school or guild and his teacher is some serbian guy under the name "Conexion". So there is no leads in his search.
Looking at the time he groans and gets up to feed the animals. He doesn't really love all those small critters. Cats, rats, reptiles, birds, amd so on. He just doesn't know how to get on their good side and they seem to have a personal vendetta against him. Since his childhood one and only animal that he could interact "normally" with was a dog. He has two dogs at home right now, but he will have to find a sitter for when he will go to Europe for a championship.
As he feeds the hissing cats, he hears a door bell ring, as someone comes into the shop. It's some guy with purple hair, so deciding that his job is done he sits behind a counter and starts waiting for something to happen.
The guy looks at him for a few seconds, before seemingly deciding that Flame won't do anything and going to cats. Immediately the cats are on their best behavior, so for a second Flame thinks that he may be a druid or something. They let the guy into enclosure (!), let him pet them (!!) and some of them start climbing on him, 'cus he can't pet all of them (!?). Wtf?! When Flame got into enclosure to give them their food they tried to rip his legs off!
"Maybe it's because you look like you eat babies for breakfast?"
Oops... he said it outloud... sighing, Flame answers.
"It's just that animals don't really like me. My brother says that I'm losing a lot because of this, but I dunno. I prefer dogs."
"Well... you do seem like a dog person. You know, like those critics at dog shows. About the same level of energy and love for life." Turning back to cats the guy lays down and starts petting them even more vigorously.
Not wanting to take blows laying down, Flame gets up and goes to the enclosure. The cat become quiet seeing his approach. Sitting up, the guy turns to him.
"You know, Lomedy did tell me that a guy like you could come today." Flame looked at the guy swarmed by cats and kittens.
"Oh, I did not expect that guy to talk about me. Maybe I am a celebrity." The guy had a smug smirk on his face, before continuing, "I'm Wemmbu by the way, it would be nice if you introduced yourself."
"Flame Frags. You can call me Flame though."
"Well, Flame maybe you will have better luck with cats if you waited for them to become interested in you."
With Wemmbus intructions Flame got to pet a cat. It only took an hour and a half, a record in Flames book.
"So, why did you come here today?" The cat was an interesting one. A calico mail. Lomedy said that it was rare, but Flame didn't really understand his explanation.
"I'm moving to my teachers place for a few months. We were using discord, don't you dare laugh, before, but since there will be a tournament in a few months Sharp wants to see my progress for himself. It's such a bother..."
"Damn, good luck to you then. I also will be going to a tournament in a few months, so I know how it feels."
Wemmbu looked at his phone before slowly extracting himself from the cat pile, "I better go, still need to say my goodbyes to everyone. Bye!"
Left in the cat enclosure, Flame was thinking. Something wasn't right.
Next time that they met, Wemmbu was putting on his gear for the duel against Flame.