Chapter Text
Laptop? Check.
House keys? Check.
Meaw~
Wallet? Check.
Yamato rummaged through the pockets of his jeans to make sure the whereabouts of his most functionally critical possessions weren’t neglected somewhere.
Phone? Check.
Vespa keys? Check.
Meaw!
Right.
Yamato stopped performing a full-on body search on himself, and tried pinpointing the source of the mewling complaints.
He moved the ceramic pot, throwing dirt every which way and flinging the roses – all of which died anyway, so it’s not like he partook in floracide, all right? And there it was: the wee one.
So tiny, it could sleep in Yamato’s palm.
A Ginger, blue-eyed fur ball hissed when Yamato’s big-arse face appeared.
The kitten shook all over like crazy, and it mewled like a baby crying; only because it was so tiny, the mewling was more like a squeaky toy going off.
But the kitten didn’t run away.
Odd.
It'd be better if Yamato didn’t touch it, so he won’t leave traces of his smell on the wee one. If he did, its mum wouldn’t recognize it and reject it.
Yamato took a step back and surveyed the small yard.
No mama or brothers or sisters around.
He checked his phone for the time. 11:45. If he won’t take off in five minutes, he’d be late for his Analytic Mechanics lecture.
Meaw! Meaw!
But it was about to rain.
But his professor said she’d be going over the test material.
Meaw!
Right, sparing five minutes is really a non-issue, in’nit?
Yamato slid against the wall till he was crouching, arms hanging between his legs and his laptop bag weighing him down.
Meaw! Meaw!
So tiny. One gust of wind and Mr. Kitty cat would fly away.
Meaw…
How long has it been here?
Meaw.
12:15.
There were chicken leftovers in the fridge. Yamato could always cook Taichi something else for dinner.
His instinct was to jump to his feet, but Yamato refrained. Instead, he carefully erected so to not stress out the kitten any more than the poor thing already was, and vaulted the stairs back up to the flat.
Dashing to the kitchen, Yamato waved his fingers in front of the open fridge door as if trying to use a level 5 summoning spell on the right box. He moved yesterday’s curry away and the plate of chopped onions.
There it was, a sad little chicken.
Yamato plucked out a few fatty pieces and tucked them into a napkin.
Two minutes after, he sailed down the stairs and carefully placed the meat near the baby-cat – not too far away to force the kitten out of its comfort zone, but not close enough to rub his smell all over its fur.
Before Yamato even backed off all the way, the kitten’s pink nose hovered towards the food and its petit frame shivered in anticipation. However the cat could, it tried reaching for the chicken bits, but the fragile body couldn’t carry the weight and the kitten flopped.
Where’s its mummy?
13:07
Right, well, Yamato’s professor was a wanker anyway.
He ran back up to the flat.
Towel? Check.
Hot water bottle? Check.
Yamato glanced over at the time again: 13:20.
Taichi’s number? Dialing!
After a ring and a half – “Oya, sexy!”
Normally, Yamato’d transform the action of eye-rolling into an audible medium and dump it on bastard Taichi. Today, though – “You free?”
“Just finished. Alright?”
Meaw!
“Do you still have Miko’s carrier somewhere?”
“I reckon? Yamato, what’s-”
“Can you bring it over to my place?”
“I- yeah?”
“When can you get here?”
“Give me ten?”
“Safe.”
“Yamato?”
“Mmm?”
Meaw!
“I love you?”
“… I love you too…”
***
When Taichi poked his head through Yamato’s apartment complex, he found one blonde Yamato slouching on the stairs against the wall, cradling a towel.
A mewling towel.
Miko’s old cage abandoned on the floor, Taichi dived on his knees next to Yamato and peeked at the bundle of fluff making noises – with its carrot tail poking the air and pink little paws!
That’s it. Taichi was gone.
Meaw! Meaw!
Sold.
Meaw!
He made all sorts of incomprehensible baby-talk sounds in between squeaks.
Meaw!
His eyes were this big. Yamato will never cease to be amazed by the sheer amount of “CUTE!” radiating off Taichi. How can he just sit here, with a baby kitten in the room, and compete with it over the “CUTE!”?! What is this even?!
“I wanna take it to the vet.” Because the bloody solar system would supernova before Yamato would show Taichi just how cute he thought he was. He won’t hear the end of it. Well, of course Taichi had figured it out and used this vital information to manipulate the shit out of Yamato, but that doesn’t mean Yamato should encourage it!
“Yeah, I get that much…” Taichi said, keeping his voice hushed so to not startle the wee one, his eyes full of something Yamato couldn’t fully find a name for. “Wanna take my car?”
Somehow, Yamato’s free hand moved without him telling it to and kneaded Taichi’s ear shell. “I can’t really take the Vespa out, now, can I?”
Taichi smiled and went to retrieve the abandoned cat carrier.
Together, they fluffed it up some more with Yamato’s old blanket and inserted the fuzz roll in its midst to the sound of some more soft ‘Meaw’s.
As soon as the car pulled down the driveway, Mr. Fluff became a backseat opera-singer. He – she? – went full out with the song of his people – the extended version. Oh, and it was on “repeat.” Yay.
In the car, Taichi drove slower than usual, being extra cautious doing turns, and every red light he spent peeking at the mewling plastic box in Yamato’s lap.
Someone honked behind.
“Eyes on the road, Chi,” Yamato said at the flashing green.
“I wanna sit on your lap, too…” Taichi mumbled as he pressed the gas pedal and Yamato ignored him.
After a couple of minutes of straightening the rear-view mirror, Yamato asked. “Do you know a veterinarian, by the way?”
“Wait,” Tachi’s head pulled back into the seat rest, “where’ve we been driving?”
“Well-”
“You barmy bastard Yamato.”
“Eat a dick!”
Taichi’s stupid-capacity showed on his too pleased of a mug. “Mmmm… You would, would ya.”
Yamato sat with his hands under his ass to avoid punching Taichi in the ribs. He just didn’t fancy dying yet – but so help Taichi when they park. “Do you know a vet, or not?!”
“I think Miko’s old vet‘s still around.”
Entering the cement island of Tokyo, they made the U-turn into Hikarigaoka, melting from nostalgia. Any conversation died down, leaving a vacuum only days long since gone, flashing lights in the sky, summers, and old cartoons could almost fill – but never really.
Yamato watched his reflection staring back at him from the glass window, layered with tall towers and grey constructs racing by behind it like a transparent sheet paper in an old movie.
“We’re here,” Taichi announced as he parked in front of Daktari Animal Hospital, its red signs and posters greeting them way too happily.
“Fancy.”
Taichi didn’t answer and got out of the car to go help Yamato and the ‘OMG SO CUTE I CAN’T EVEN’ meawing baby.
Meaw…
Case in point.
“Is it a he or a she, by the way?” Taichi asked as the passed the automated door.
“I don’t know, Taichi. I’m not in the habit of checking out cats’ bollocks.”
“Since when are you not in the habit of checking out bollocks?”
If Yamato was about to get smart, he didn’t get the chance. Inside the lobby, they were seated by a pearly-toothed receptionist on one of the pseudo-leather brown couches and were told a doctor would be with them shortly.
Meaw! Meaw!
And she really was with them shortly, so that was brill!
Meaw! Meaw! Meaw!
Dr. Honoda, all smiles and a scrub with Kiki’s Delivery Service’s Jiji prints all over it, admitted them to her heated office – which did not skimp on colourful, animal-shaped magnets with sticky notes peeking under them.
Meaw!
“Yes, please put our cute friend over here,” she said - Meaw! – and gestured with the flick of her wrist towards the steely examination table. “What seems to be the problem?”
Meaw!
“I found it today. Near my house. I tried feeding it, but it didn’t eat and I think it can’t move,” Yamato answered as Taichi helped him hoist the carrier and opened the metal lattice door. The doctor reached inside and with a few tugs at the towel, picked up the snuffulafagus baby. She weighted it in her palm and it didn’t even fill out the full surface of her hand – that’s how tiny the baby was!
Meaw! Meaw!
“What did you try feeding it with?” The vet, and her eccentric scrub, asked.
“Chicken leftovers.”
Dr. Honoda nodded. “He’s a three week old boy,” she said, “he needs milk formula feeding with a syringe. He can’t eat meat yet.” She probed the ginger fur ball and lifted the baby for Yamato and Taichi to have a better view. “And he’s being eaten by nasty little fleas. See these?” She pointed at tiny brown clogs. “That’s blood.”
She ran her finger along the fuzzy spine for any odd textures or abnormalities, and nodded again, as if carrying a conversation all by herself for the lack of an intelligible dialogue partner. “You said he didn’t move?”
Yamato nodded.
“I’ll give him an x-ray now. Then he needs to be de-wormed.” She picked up an 80s-something-looking wired phone – the one with all the buttons – waited till the ring dial subsided in favour of a human voice, and went, “Takashi, I need you in room 14, please.”
Give or take a minute, a small-framed bloke-man-dude, who couldn’t have been much older than Taichi or Yamato themselves, entered the clinic from a door none of them paid attention to, what with all the stickers on it used as camouflage.
“It’ll take a few minutes,” she informed them.
“Where’s the loo?” Yamato asked, almost as if he had been planning the schedule for his bladder.
“Down the hall and to the left,” Takashi answered.
Yamato nodded and exited the room, leaving Taichi staring at his back and not full-on believing him. But it’s not like he can glomp himself to Yamato’s back and make sure he pees, now can he? Not in public, anyway.
So instead he checked out the medical appliances, read all the labels on the bottles from left to right, read the labels on the bottles from right to left, examined the memo, and once in a while snuck a peek at the examinations and preparation the esteemed doctors were performing on the kitty cat.
Yamato doesn’t usually take that long to take a piss. Maybe Taichi should check what’s up? Yes! Yes? … No? Yes…? Yes.
Opening the door and closing it, it took Taichi one wobble of his head to detect, assess, and create a mental enclosure around his target.
Yamato stood in the middle of the hall, close enough to the door but also kinda too far, stared at a fixed coordinate between his feet and wiped his face, over and over, with the back of his dirty denim sleeves.
Taichi approached him. One step. Good. One more step. Yamato didn’t notice him yet. Great progress. One more – so to not scare the Ishida off. Excellent. Almost there-
Taichi slipped his fingers into Yamato’s palm – the one which wasn’t busy scooping snot.
From the pull in his muscles, Taichi interpreted the situation as one where Yamato would have jerked his hand away and given someone a square what-for for touching his private place, but didn’t want to raise a scene.
But then he found Taichi, so he relaxed some.
Taichi squeezed the fingers he was holding.
The auntie sitting across the hall gave them funny looks, but screw her and screw her stupid visor that she’s wearing indoors for some reason and then some.
“You alright, mate?” Taichi asked.
“Brill.”
But there was this tiny, tiny crack in his voice which prevented Taichi from believing him.
He tugged at Yamato’s wrist and Yamato’s obedience – going back inside the Dr.’s room – came accompanied by a fraction of resistance, right there in his All Star clad toes.
The ride home isn’t going to be easy.
In the room, Dr. Honoda and Takashi were examining a tablet and Dr. Honoda pointed or circled stuff on the flat screen with her smart pen, explaining the works to her assistant.
Once acknowledging their newly formed presence in the room, Dr. Honoda leaped and skipped and positioned herself right between Taichi and Yamato with her portable screen held in the air.
“See this?” She asked, pointing at what seemed to be a vertebra.
Yamato hummed; Taichi said, “Yes.”
“Are you familiar with the terms Cerebellar Hypoplasia?”
Their vacant mugs and dead eyes were all the answer she needed.
“Cerebellar Hypoplasia occurs when the cerebellum, which controls motor skills in vertebrates, is not completely mature. That’s why he can’t walk correctly.” She petted the top of the little head and moved her fingers behind the kitty’s ear when her actions were reciprocated with a yet another, soft ‘Meaw.’
“Many of these little guys are being euthanized due to lack of awareness of this condition, and it’s a real shame. He really wants to live – he eats like a champ and is excited about interacting with people. With just a little care, little boys like him can live happy, healthy lives and purr at belly rubs.” She raised her head and looked at the boys expectedly. “Are you perhaps interested in giving him a forever-home?”
Yamato swallowed and looked around the room, his fist clenching on his thigh. “We-“
“Give us a moment?” Taichi told more than asked Dr. Honoda and dragged Yamato a few steps back so they could have their routine round of hush-hush-WE-ARE-NOT-GOING-TO-SCREAM-HERE! argument.
“Tai-“
“Showing it kindness and then throwing it back on the street is just cruelty,” Taichi said before Yamato even got a word squeezed in. No, more like he stated it and all his 11 years of leadership skills were there to back him up.
Shit. If they were home, that look on him would get Yamato to tear Taichi’s stupid One Piece shirt off and throw him on the bed. Since home wasnot where they’re at and too many spectators were present for Yamato to bend Taichi over the table, however – “Taichi! It’s an animal! It’s a commitment! And a responsibility! I don’t know if I’m ready for it yet…”
“We’re ready for it.”
And suddenly Yamato’s heart did the rumba.
“And look how cute he is!”
Somehow, Yamato found himself nodding. God, Taichi!
But the smile pushing Taichi’s dumb face to all different sides of the room was so worth it. Yamato kinda fought off his reflex to punch it off as a self-defense mechanism.
At the same time, though, Taichi clearly struggled with his instinct that so, so wanted him to commit PDA and put Yamato’s wrist between his thumb and index, so they were kinda on equal grounds? Instead, he said what he needed with the flick of his pupils; guided Yamato too.
Containing his full-on-nutter smiler face as much as his facial muscles allowed him, Taichi said, “Yeah, we’ll take the little bugger.”
“Cheers!” Dr. Honoda and Takashi both practically beamed! “That’s wonderful news! All right, so I will now perform laser on therapy him. He needs to be neutered, so come back in a month and a half. Since he’s still young-“
“Wait,” Taichi opened the note app on his phone, “Ooookkk, continue.”
“Since he’s still young, he needs to be stimulated to go to pee and do his poopies.” She lifted the kitten – “Meaw!” – and showed Taichi and Yamato with a paper towel exactly where to rub – Meaw! Meaw! Meeeeaaaw! – till a small yellow stain covered it.
“And as I said, he needs to be fed through a syringe every four hours-“
Yamato glanced at Taichi. Undeterred by the long list of novel responsibilities, Taichi squeezed Yamato’s hand under the table in response without even looking back.
“Kittens his age can’t monitor their own body heat yet, so he has to be kept warm at all times.” She turned towards Takashi, “anything else?”
Takashi contemplated for a moment and stepped forward with a small bow. “He hasn’t yet developed his grooming behaviour, so I encourage you to rub him with a tooth brush and wash his bum with baby shampoo.” He bowed again.
Dr. Honoda showed them what physiotherapy to perform and how frequently, added a to-buy list along with kitty-oriented medicine prescriptions, and sent them on their way.
They exited and made a turn straight to the first pet appliance shop on the street – which was mother-effing huge!
Just as Yamato finished gawking at the three story monument of a store, two girls exited it, towing behind them two pooches who got their summer hair-cut – Oh no! – into a square.
Yamato may not have displayed his sad-emoji face, but Taichi addressed it nonetheless:
“I solemnly swear I will never alter our cat – or any other living being – into ironic commentary about the economic bubble, the ultra-consumeristic modern culture, and Y generation’s thirst for social validation.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome!”
Strengthening the grip on the carrier’s handle, the two proud new fathers walked into the store and it didn’t take more than 10 minutes before Taichi ripped a little bit of everything from the shelves – his excitement accompanied by booming “OOOOH!”s and “THIS!”s.
Yamato was already saying his bye-byes to his savings. It’s not like he can stop Taichi when he’s regressing into his 11 year-old soul again.
Five more minutes, and their shopping basket brimmed with kitty formula, feeding bottles, feeding syringes, raised cat feeder, de-fleaing comb, micro-fleece baby blankets, a scratching board, a stick with a feather on one end, sand, deodorized and shallow litter box, scent free and clump free litter, new cotton towels, a microwave-able heating pad for all snuggle-safe needs, and at some point Taichi threw a hoodie with cat paws at Yamato for whatever reason.
“Yamato…” Taichi started and tugged Yamato’s sleeve. Yamato followed his line of sight into the next thing Taichi was drooling over – a cat plush with a triple-A battery induced heart-beat.
Taichi looked at the stuffed toy and then at Yamato, the most dumb-arsed pout plastered on his face. His lip was all the way over there, at Osaka.
“Taichi, if you think I am going to spend money on a stuffed animal with a vibrating heartbeat, you are absolutely right. Let’s go get it!”
They raced to the cash register and while Yamato was signing the very long check, he also kinda figured they didn’t take the physics of matter density into account.
So let’s just say the ride home was funny, impressive, and uncomfortable in a gymnastic sort of way.
Also, taking all these stuffy-stuff upstairs required 7 back-and-forths to the car, which made Taichi feel entitled to do his euphonious puppy eyes and the wiggle of his pseudo-somatic tail when Yamato gave in and promised to make burgers for dinner.
“Now you’re not the only kitten in the house…” Taichi said to Yamato while giving said novelty his first dinner as Yamato flipped meat over the stove. The process involved wrapping up the fuzz ball in a blanket into what Taichi nicknamed ‘purrito’, laying him on his belly, and trying to slip the syringe nipple into his mouth. The purring levels! Oh god, the purring was outta whack that day! And the rippling little-wittle ears!
Meaw!
“Shut up – how should we call it?” Yamato put his pinky under the paws the baby extended in a happy search for support, helping Taichi be a proper daddy.
Taichi squinted and sort of tilted his head – kinda looking like a flying broom in the process – as if the whole ceremony would allow him to perform a Jedi mind trick on the cat.
“I donno. What’s your name little guy?”
Meaw?
Before the cat chanced to answer this inquiry, Taichi’s egg clock went off – which signaled the beginning of their first cat-therapy session.
Yamato fetched two beach towels which he rolled into cylinders while Taichi hauled over a small bench from the storage room. They put the towels on opposite sides across the length of the bench, creating a narrow passage between them. Kinda like the feline version of Moses and the Red Sea crossing which is also hella cuter.
So Yamato put Mr. Baby at the beginning of the course and Taichi waited on the other side, tempting him with cat snacks and yummies.
And there he goes!
Naturally, Taichi and Yamato were the best cheerleaders!
“Go, Sir. Pounce-a-lot, go!”
Yamato looked up at Taichi mid his gormless dance. “Really? Sir. Pounce-a-lot? really?”
Taichi stuck out his tongue. “Just throwing it out there, a‘right, you sour cabbage?”
Yamato decided to just not, and clapped at every step the kitty made on his hind legs. “I feel like a football mum.”
“Nah, your facial muscles’ll get jammed if you smile so much.”
“Put a di-” Yamato glanced down at the kitty under his nose, throwing its hind legs wherever, “shove it!”
Had a kitty not leaped into his waiting hands then and there, Taichi would have laughed his stupid arse off at Yamato’s face, but a kitty did leap into his hands then and there, so both of them were too busy transforming into gooey piles. Ain’t no one here have time to be little shits to each other.
“You’re so brave! You’re a courageous little nugget!” Taichi booped his nose against the kitty’s pink one.
Meaw~ the cat went and squished his face.
So Yamato now had this idea.
“How about Yuuki?”
Another boop and Taichi hummed into the soft fur, damn pleased with himself. He also added some hums which had dramatic undertones to demonstrate his thinking process.
One last boop and he pulled his head, like, two CM away – barely – and squinted, taking in the orange stripes and the blue globes which were way too big for its head, though proportionally spherical.
“Yeah, I think he’s a Yuuki.”
He placed Yuuki in the cat bed, which was huge and fluffed up with shearling wool. Bending his knees, Taichi sat next to him and pet his tiny orange head.
“You like Yuuki?”
The cat flipped on his back and grabbed Taichi’s arm with all his fuzzy limbs wrapping around it, trying to bite off his fingers.
“Yeah, I think he likes it.”