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Fights with Adonis are becoming common now. They happen often enough that Tragedy is starting to work out a pattern to Adonis’s moves, working out how to counter him, how their powers combat one another’s. It’s starting to feel familiar at this point, and sometimes the tone shifts more into sparring than a battle between good and evil. Although in this case, there is considerably more flirting than Tragedy is used to seeing in spars
And thanks to a certain interview Adonis gave a few days earlier, Tragedy is now aware that the flirting may actually be serious, so there’s a lot to dissect there. Adonis is potentially interested in him, and Tragedy is potentially interested in him being interested. It’s all very complicated.
So he’s not able to brush off the flirting today. Sue him.
Tragedy has his mask on for now, but is ready to pull it off the second Adonis goes for his blindfold, so for now they’re just essentially having a fistfight in a back alley. Not very glamorous, but that’s just how it goes sometimes.
And then Tragedy overreaches on a punch, narrowly avoids Adonis’s counter, which causes him to lose balance, meaning he needs to do a tight roll to carry the momentum and get back on his feet, as well as put some distance between them. Adonis doesn’t press forward, instead just giving a flirty grin.
“Have I mentioned I love how flexible you are?”
“Have I mentioned I’m bisexual?” Tragedy blurts out, the words kind of just happening. Though in all fairness, it was the sort of detail he’d been considering mentioning, considering Adonis had made his own orientation very clear. On national television. Before immediately running away.
Jeremy had been watching the news with his dad when that happened. His powers had been very convenient, as he’d needed to immediately vanish to have a good long blue screen of death and try to process what the fuck. All around an exciting night.
Adonis freezes, the expression on his face hilariously baffled. He looks like he’s having his own blue screen of death in response to that news. Tragedy has no regrets. Turnabout is fair play.
Adonis snaps out of it, shaking his head a bit, and then plastering the smile back on, though it’s a little less confident and a little more stunned than before.
“Well that’s a relief, because otherwise all my wedding planning would be for nothing. I’m thinking a spring wedding, what’s your opinion honeybunches?”
Tragedy makes a strangled sound in the back of his throat, and effectively re-enters the blue screen of death. He’s panicking, and needs to end the conversation right now.
There’s something beside him, and he’s flinging it at Adonis’s face before he realizes what it is. It was orange. And furry. And making some very angry noises. Oh dear.
…Well, if that stray cat hadn’t given a fuck about the fight before, it certainly did now. It gives many fucks, and it gives them very angrily all over Adonis’s face. There’s a lot of yowling from the cat, and furious swearing from Adonis, and Tragedy thinks that this would be the time to make a graceful exit. If it’s possible to do anything gracefully after tossing a cat at someone’s head.
He takes his mask off, and gets the fuck out of dodge.
~
“I will literally kill you in your sleep.” Jeremy says, about halfway towards actually meaning it.
Rich does not care, and is still laughing.
Fucker.
“YOU THREW A CAT AT HIS HEAD! HE HIT ON YOU, SO YOU THREW A CAT AT HIM!” Rich yells, before cracking up again.
“I DIDN’T KNOW IT WAS A CAT! I PANICKED, THE CAT WAS THE CLOSEST OBJECT! IT JUST KIND OF HAPPENED!”
“It is pretty funny.” The Squip adds, tone mild from where he’s leaning against the door frame.
Jeremy buries his face in his hands and wishes for the sweet release of death.
“Oh my god, do you think Adonis is gonna have scars from that? Just imagine that, being like, covered in facial scars, and someone’s like ‘oh no, what happened?’ and you have to tell them that your tragic backstory is you hit on your arch-nemesis so well they panicked and threw a cat at you. God I hope it scars, that would be amazing. I mean, shame to ruin those good looks, but still.” Rich adds, laughter still in his voice.
“I’m moving to Canada. I’m going to change my name and move to Canada, and start my new life as an insurance salesman, and then during lunch my coworkers are going to talk about superheroes, and someone will bring up Adonis’s mysterious sexy facial scars, and I will die of embarrassment. As a Canadian insurance salesman. Probably named Heremy Jeere.” Jeremy says, head still firmly lodged inside of his hands.
Rich dissolves into laughter again, and the Squip pats Jeremy on the shoulder.
“At least Canada has free health care.” He says consolingly, although amusement is running through the words.
“I’ll need it, because I’m going to have a goddam aneurysm.”
~
When Jeremy changes back into his street clothes and leaves the base, he manages to push down the embarrassment. It is promptly replaced by guilt, which is a little inconvenient, and also weird. He starts the drive home musing over why exactly he feels guilty, before it suddenly hits him.
That poor cat might have been hurt. Was definitely terrified. Hurting people is one thing, but animals?
“Son of a bitch.” He mutters to himself, before making a very illegal U-turn back towards the main city.
~
A bit of reckless driving and a stop at a pet store later, Jeremy is wandering through back alleys of the downtown, and questioning his life choices. He’s also holding a kitty carrier, and a bag of treats.
This is his life now.
It’s also midnight, so that’s fun. At least there’s no chance of him being mugged. And even if a mugger is somehow able to notice him to try it, they’d be very much out of their depth, so Jeremy is safe.
It takes a while to find the alleyway where the fight with Adonis had ended, and he’s a bit morbidly amused by the tiny splatter of rust brown he finds on the ground there. Clearly, the cat did a number on poor Adonis.
He spends another while calling out for the kitty, and shaking the treat bag, before it shows itself.
It’s definitely the same cat, mostly orange with splotches of white on the stomach, paws and chest. It’s actually pretty damn cute. Jeremy feels twice as guilty for throwing it at someone.
It’s not wearing a collar, so he spends a while coaxing it over with treats, petting it, and then a terrifyingly violent minute wrestling it into the crate. When he’s done, he has a very displeased cat sitting inside a carrier, and no idea where to go after that.
He takes the cat back to his car, and starts googling twenty four hour vet clinics.
This is definitely the best thing he can be doing with his insomnia right now.
~
It’s a strain to make the vet able to notice him, but it’s worth it for the cat. It’s probably also helped by him calling in advance and telling them he was coming. It’s a lot easier to make people see him if they know someone is supposed to be there.
The vet is understandably not booked with appointments in the middle of the goddamn night, so he’s able to get a walk in, and very quickly the cat is being examined by the vet. It’s a boy, about six months, doesn’t have a microchip, and isn’t fixed. He’s also not injured or sick, which is a relief, and seems to be incredibly friendly when not being thrown at people’s faces or forced into a crate. And he’s a polydactyl, with a tiny little thumb, which is just the cutest goddamn thing.
Jeremy is asked if he’s intending on adopting the cat, or if he wants them to send him along to a rescue group. Jeremy thinks it over for a moment, realizes that he’s already in too deep, and informs the vet that he’s keeping the cat, yes.
At about one in the morning, he’s leaving the vet clinic with several appointments to get the cat vaccinated over the next few months, and one next week to get him neutered. Thank god the Squip pays him well, or Jeremy would not be able to get into spontaneous cat ownership.
The cat, due to being orange and apparently good at flying at people, is named Tigger.
Jeremy is not looking forwards to explaining this to his dad.
~
He wakes up in the morning to a happily purring Tigger sleeping on top of his head. It’s the best start to the day Jeremy’s had in a long time. The scene gets a little less charming upon discovering that Tigger has peed in his laundry basket, but it was dirty laundry anyways, so whatever. Good motivation to get off his ass and actually throw it in the washing machine.
As it turns out, explaining the cat to his dad is actually very simple. Tigger follows him into the kitchen for breakfast, and both teenager and cat are eating their respective meals of ramen and kibble when Jeremy’s dad comes down.
“Pants.” Jeremy mutters automatically, well aware that regardless of how much he complains, no pants are going to be put on by his father today.
“There’s a cat in our kitchen. Son, why is there a cat in our kitchen?” His dad asks, in the tone of someone who has just woken up and is not prepared to handle these surprises.
“His name is Tigger. He’s orange and I love him.” Jeremy says, not entirely sure how to begin explaining beyond that.
His father nods as if that makes perfect sense.
“He’s adorable. I approve.”
And that’s the end of that.
~
Me
hey look what i got
[cat.png]
felt bad for throwing him @ adonis’s face so i have a cat now apparently
Rich
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I Love Him
name suggestion: Baron Von Snugglesworth
alternative name suggestion: Rich II
or Rich Jr either works tbh
Me
nope not doing that his name is tigger
Rich
that works too
if ur a coward
this is our son now i demand daily pics
Me
check this out
[thumb.png]
HE HAS THUMBS
MUTANT KITTY
Rich
oh my god im in love
please inform tigger that i love him
Me
tigger says Meow
Rich
:O
~
Michael rang Jeremy’s doorbell, and self-consciously ran a finger over the claw marks on his face.
Goddamn Tragedy throwing a goddamn cat at him. That had hurt, damn it. Plus, once he’d explained what had happened to his moms, they’d laughed at him for a solid five minutes, and still giggled when they caught sight of his battle wounds.
Eventually he’ll think of a good way to get revenge on Tragedy, but that day is not today. Today, he’s going to hang out and play video games with his best friend, and not think about obnoxiously attractive supervillains who seem very sad and get extremely creative with projectile weapons when distracted.
Jeremy answers the door, and reacts pretty much the way Michael was expecting him to.
“Holy shit dude, are you okay? What happened to your face?”
“A cat got into my house and I don’t want to talk about it.” Michael says, with about as much dignity as he can manage.
Jeremy snickers, but is nice enough to leave it at that. This is why Jeremy is his favourite person. Because unlike Tragedy, Jeremy doesn’t throw cats at him, and doesn’t press the subject of why Michael looks like someone threw a cat at him.
They game for a while, before Michael inevitably needs a bathroom break, and pauses the game to go. Upon entering the bathroom however, Michael suddenly has many more concerns.
“Jeremy?” He calls, pitching his voice loud enough to carry down to the bedroom.
“Yeah?”
“Why is there a cat on your bathroom counter?”
“He likes to feel tall!”
“Why is there a cat at all!?”
“He’s adorable and I love him, that’s why!”
Michael accepts that that’s probably all the explanation he’s getting.
He looks at the cat.
The cat looks at him.
The cat narrows his eyes, and honest to god growls.
Michael makes an executive decision to use the downstairs bathroom.
