Chapter Text
Goro hears the thud of paws and a yowl as soon as the stairwell door slams and they turn the corner toward their unit.
“You’ll ruin the door,” he says to the scratching at his feet, turning the key in the lock.
“Do you have any idea what time it is?!” Morgana leaps to the kitchen counter to scold the two of them at eye level, ears pressed flat against his head, whiskers and tail straight and puffed. His tail swishes back and forth. “It’s the middle of the night! I was so worried, and in case you’ve forgotten, I don’t have thumbs so I couldn’t even text to ask where you were! I was forced to beg Sophia like some sort of helpless—”
“It’s true!” chimes a voice from the laptop on the dining table. “He did!” On screen, Sophia tilts her head, her heart-shaped pigtails bouncing with the motion. “Morgana yelled at me for exactly forty-five minutes before I distracted him with new episodes of Sushi Cat: Ultimate!”
Goro glances at the television screen and sees a panel of human contestants, dressed in cat ears and fluffy paws, fumbling through a platter of sushi.
“I thought the episode with Risette wasn’t supposed to air until next week,” Ren says.
“Oh?” Sophia chirps, as Risette drops a piece of silken tofu in her lap and curses under her breath. “It was easy to find! Right here,” she gestures to a terminal filled with binary code, “on NHK’s internal servers.”
Goro leans to whisper in Ren’s ear, “Perhaps it was a mistake to let Futaba gift her those cracking abilities.”
Ren shrugs. “Eh,” he whispers back. “Cat’s happy.”
“I am not happy,” Morgana shouts, tail bristling, “I am temporarily assuaged. And you owe me way more than that if you want me to let this go so easily.”
Ren strolls up to the counter, setting his bag down to give Morgana a scratch on the chin and retrieve the present from Sojiro. Morgana’s eyes light up, so predictable.
“Is that… mackerel?! The one with the gold label? And fatty tuna?” A blob of drool drips onto the counter and Morgana quickly covers it with his paw. Goro makes a mental note to clean the spot later.
“We even?” Ren asks, hand on the tin, looking his cat in the eye, almost painfully sincere.
“Yeah! Yeah, we’re good, just let me have the fish.” The lid peels open with a metallic snick and Morgana digs in immediately, tail curved like a cane in gustatory bliss.
“So,” he says, muffled through a mouthful of mackerel, “what were you doing all day, anyway?”
Goro glances sideways at Ren, and Ren smirks back. Perhaps eventually, Ren will inform Morgana and the rest of his friends of their little jaunt back into the Metaverse; perhaps Goro himself will be the one to share the story, maybe at one of the biannual Thieves gatherings to savor the shock on everyone’s faces at once, or maybe with Ann over crepes. A “juicy dish,” as she likes to put it.
But for now, Ren says, “Eh, played some games, got some drinks, heard some jazz. Regular date stuff.”
Morgana makes a scrunchy face and calls them weird, but doesn’t press the issue, licking his chops before shoving his face back into the mackerel tin.
For now, this adventure and its secrets belong only to a pair of tricksters, who were forced to mend the fabric of reality twice before they managed to go on a damn Christmas date.
---
“You never told me the final score,” Ren says a few weeks later as he hands Goro his coffee.
Goro sighs. He knew this would come up.
It wasn’t even close. Admittedly, Goro was operating with several handicaps—years’ worth of painful memories to retrace; an unwillingness to rely on others. When he catches a glimpse of the tiny raygun on his keyring, or the Neko Shogun bumping shoulders with Jack Frost, or the new books on his shelf, the magic of that day floods his memories and a damning, giddy feeling of warmth washes over him. He lost.
“Your silence is telling,” Ren smirks, but his eyes still betray a doubt—a need for acknowledgement. Goro almost wants to dig in his heels at his lack of conviction. “I get a prize, right?” he asks, searching.
Goro pulls him by the collar to his lips; he tastes like coffee and stolen treasure, feels like the home Goro never knew he wanted.
Ren hums in satisfaction. “Good prize,” he murmurs.
Goro pulls away, just enough to say, “You may have won this time, but don’t become complacent. The standard has been set and next year I’ll hold nothing back. I will be victorious.”
“You’re on,” Ren whispers into his ear.