Chapter Text
Izuku always knew that his familiar would find him.
It was the way of the magical world. Everything of importance comes to you, having chosen you to help unlock their magical potential and to help you wield your own magic. It was how Izuku’s wand had found him, a perfectly formed rowan branch falling into his path as he passed under the old tree while he was still a fledgling witch, small enough to be used for spells and sturdy enough to be used as a magical conduit. His affinity for herbology was much of the same; herbs, medicinal plants and flowers all appeared in his garden without him planting a single seed. He was always discovering plants he didn’t know were growing in his garden until he realised he needed some for a specific spell, his garden was always prepared for his needs.
It was just the way of the magical world.
So, when Izuku stumbled across a pair of piercing blue eyes shining ethereally at him from within his patch of patchouli he knew his familiar had found him. Izuku moves to sit on the two steps that lead up to his porch and into the house, watching the eyes that had taken up residence within the plant that he used to ward his house against evil.
As Izuku watched them, a dark tail shot out from the top of the bush, swaying gently through the leaves, almost as if it was attempting to emulate the tall flowers that blossomed high above the dense shrubbery the creature was still hidden in.
They were still sizing him up.
Seemingly happy with their choice in magical practitioner the creature began to emerge from the patchouli, a dark face to match the dark tail, sharp pointed ears upon its head swivelling this way and that as they take in their surroundings. It wasn’t long before the rest of them emerged. They had a long, sleek body covered in cream fur, their face, ears, tail and the socks they wore only dark fur patches on them.
His friends had always joked that his familiar would be a rabbit, his penchant for plants and the fact he was always digging in the dirt led them to believe it would be a good fit for him. That and the fact that he was constantly scrunching his nose up in concentration while performing magic, the action akin to a rabbit’s nose twitch. Another one of his friends even suggested his familiar would be something as outrageous as a woolly sheep, saying the unruly green curls atop Izuku’s head remind them of the creature. How surprised would they be when Izuku told them that his familiar was a cat.
“A Siamese cat,” Izuku breathed out, “Aren’t you just beautiful?”
The cat looked over to Izuku knowingly, as if they were letting him know that yes, they did in fact know they were beautiful and were very smug about it.
“A pretty little prince?”
The cat squawked indignantly, its face scrunching up into what Izuku would consider an angry scowl.
“Ohh, a pretty little princess, of course! How could I be so silly.”
Izuku continued to watch as the cat turned with an almost human-like huff, wandering off to become familiar with his garden, weaving themselves in between all of his plants. Izuku could feel the change in his garden’s aura as she brushed against the horehound in his garden, then the yarrow, the heather and the angelica. The wards around his house had strengthened, his new familiar working as a conduit of his magic and allowing all of the plants with protective properties to work at their full potential, unlocking the entirety of their magical powers.
She made her way back to Izuku, rubbing against his legs before hopping in his lap, sitting with her back against his chest as she cast a protective eye across his garden, settling into her role as his familiar with ease.
He wraps an arm around her and leans down, leaving a kiss on the back of her fuzzy little head and nuzzling her head gently, already head over heels for her.
“What should I name you, my beautiful little protector? Hmm?” Izuku asked her, “Rose?”
The name was met with silent indifference, the cat continuing to stare at the plants growing within the garden she would now protect.
“So that’s a no on that one. Hmm… what about, Daisy? It brings luck, and I feel so lucky to have you!”
Izuku got a tail to the face for that suggestion, his familiar not a fan. She wasn’t the sappy type it seemed.
“Okay, okay! I get it, you don’t like it,” he exclaimed, batting away the appendage that swayed under his nose, tickling it with every swipe.
Izuku sighed, racking his brain to find a name that would completely encompass the relationship the two of them would have. True names within the magical world held great power and Izuku wanted to ensure the bond between him and his familiar was imbued with great strength.
“Okay then, my little protector, how about Sage? To banish all the evil in my life and purify my spirit?”
It was almost instantaneous, a bond snapped into place between them as Sage started to purr within the confines of his arms. The hairs on his arms stood on end, as if electrified, magic coursing through him and Sage. He felt his senses sharpening and a new awareness in the back of his mind. Izuku tapped into it, feeling the warmth and love Sage was feeling between his arms, witnessing the phenomenon that is magic through her eyes. He can see the rainbow streaks through the sky where the wards around his house were, the green energy that surrounds each plant like an aura; the invisible workings of magic in the world around him suddenly visible. It was some of the most beautiful things he had ever witnessed.
He released Sage’s awareness, letting it rest at the back of his mind like a warm glow, the magical bonding between practitioner and familiar complete.
“I guess you like Sage, huh?” Izuku giggled, letting Sage climb off his lap and wander back into his garden.
Izuku headed back inside to get some food and water ready for her for whenever wanted to wander through his house. Witches let their cats roam freely, not tethering them to one place or collaring them. Their familiars were magical extensions of themselves, allowed to wander the world freely and lending the practitioner strength from a distance.
Izuku watched from his kitchen window as Sage hops onto the cobblestone fence that surrounds his house before trotting off into the busy parts of his neighbourhood. Probably on her way to terrorise some local birds.
Sage returned early the next morning, hopping through Izuku’s open kitchen window and onto the floor beneath him, rubbing herself against his legs in greeting.
“Well, good morning to you too Sage,” he said, walking around her and putting the dishes he was holding in the sink, “You here for some breakfast?”
Izuku made his way back over to the fridge, attempting to not step on Sage as he goes by, the cat continuing to wind her way through his legs as he goes. He grabbed her food and set it out with a fresh bowl of water for her, only to find her staring intently at the fridge.
“C’mon now, your food is here. I’m not giving you more, Sage.”
Sage was unperturbed, continuing to stare at the fridge and ignore all of Izuku’s attempts to cajole the cat to eat her breakfast.
“I’m not going to give you more just because I’m proud of you for already learning where the food comes from.”
Still, Sage stared with an eerie indifference at the fridge, a paw rising from the floor to slowly stretch across the distance between herself and the fridge. She gently tapped her paw to the fridge, almost as if batting away a toy, but the short contact was enough to send magical energy shooting through Sage. It travelled from the tip of her paw to the end of her tail, the magical energy manifesting as a wave of colour, the cream of her fur turning to a tawny brown, making her look like a completely different breed of Siamese cat.
“Oh my god, Sage! Are you okay?”
Izuku picked her up to check over her physically and magically, making sure that she wasn’t harmed. It seemed that other than a change to her colour she was unharmed and from the emotions he sensed through their bond, Sage quite enjoyed the experience; so he set her down to eat her breakfast, deciding that nothing was amiss.
Izuku wasn’t entirely surprised that the fridge had that effect on his familiar, a few years ago he had attempted a spell on it to keep it full at all times. It hadn’t worked and now the fridge had a mind of its own, often filling itself with strange foods that didn’t go together or not enough condiments for a meal or sometimes it would just have a whole wheel of cheese in there and Izuku was forced to eat a wedge of gouda for breakfast. It happened more often than Izuku would like to admit, conjuring the wheel of cheese the fridge’s favourite prank to play on him, often not conjuring anything else in the fridge until he finished eating the entire wheel.
He didn’t know how to break it to the fridge that he was lactose intolerant.
“So, you can do other magic, huh fridge? Just not what I ask, right?”
The fridge let out a deep rumble in response, a mixture of ice cubes, frozen peas and corn spitting out of the ice cube dispenser and onto the floor in front of Izuku’s feet in anger.
“Hey! That’s not nice. You wouldn’t be able to do that if I hadn’t magicked you.”
The rain of frozen produce and ice cubes stopped at Izuku’s words, the fridge reluctantly agreeing with Izuku.
Izuku bent over to grab the dustpan and brush he has next to the fridge, used to the temper tantrums that he throws, and collects the mess off the floor. By the time he’s finished and puts the dustpan back Sage has finished her breakfast and is already sunning herself on the kitchen’s windowsill. The rays of light illuminated the brown of her coat beautifully, an orange shimmer visible where the light hits her directly.
She didn't spend long there, just long enough for Izuku to admire her beauty as he finishes washing up her bowl and sets it to the side to dry. She stood and turned over her shoulder to give Izuku a knowing look before hopping off and into the garden, leaving for her daily adventures about town.
“I guess I’ll see you for dinner then, Princess Sage?” Izuku said, shaking his head with a smile at his face at his familiar’s antics.
That night dinner time came around, but Sage doesn’t. Izuku would be worried but he can still feel her at the back of his mind and she’s completely fine. He actually doesn’t see her until the next morning for breakfast when he spies her sitting on the windowsill yet again, staring into the kitchen with a grumpy look on her face.
Izuku opened the window and let her back into the house. Izuku barely had time to step away from the window before Sage bolted in and rubs against the fridge, instantly changing the colour of her coat to a deep, inky black. Izuku shook his head, not wanting to try and understand Sage’s relationship with the fridge, deciding that she probably just enjoys being able to change the colour of her fur on a whim and being close to another source of Izuku’s magic.
He put down her bowl with her breakfast and watches her power through the food before hopping back up onto the windowsill and out into Izuku’s garden. Sage brushed past a few choice plants on the way out, strengthening the wards around his house yet again as if she didn’t trust him enough to look after himself and headed back into town.
That was the routine Sage had set with Izuku, every morning she would come for breakfast and a quick costume change and then she would leave, not to be seen for the rest of the day. Izuku was slightly concerned about her, she wasn’t eating dinner with him and he was worried she was used to patrolling the streets to find either another animal or some leftovers she found in the trash to eat. Sage never seemed unwell though, but Izuku wasn’t sure if that was her magical abilities at play or if she really was healthy.
He felt the need to check on her, follow her with his magic and spend the night in her mind, but his familiar trusted him enough to be his magical partner so he decided to let her be. As long as she was safe it was okay, not that Izuku wasn’t worried about her. The magical world coexisted with those who had no magical potential and remained hidden from them, performing their spells in seclusion. So, he was concerned that perhaps one of the humans would take her to the pound or feed her something she shouldn’t eat on purpose, not realising she wasn’t a stray but a witch’s familiar.
It was almost like the fridge could feel his worry about her because the next time Sage came home for breakfast the fridge turned her coat from the snow white she was sporting to a green so deep it almost matched Izuku’s hair. If anything was going to catch the neighbourhood’s attention it would be a strangely coloured cat walking the streets.
Nothing happened that day, or the next when the fridge made her red or the one after that when the fridge turned her purple.
But that all changed the day the fridge turned Sage blue.
Just like any other day Sage came in for breakfast and then left to spend the rest of her day in the neighbourhood but the next day Sage returned with a thin black collar around her next with a tiny bell on the front. Izuku was incredulous, someone dares to put a collar on his cat? Before she left for the day again, he removed the collar, throwing it in the trash as he watched his neon orange cat walk across the road like a sentient hazard warning.
It was short-lived however, a new collar was around Sage’s neck the next morning, the black a stark contrast to her neon orange fur. There was a bell on the collar yet again but this time there seemed to be something rolled around the other side of the collar and tied to it with an elastic band.
He slipped the collar off her and then unrolled what turned out to be a very aggressive note to Izuku.
Don’t take my cat’s collar off, asshole.
Izuku was taken aback, someone else dared to lay claim to his familiar? He took the little note off the collar and incinerated it in his hand, letting the dust fall into the trash bin, quickly followed by the collar around Sage’s neck. At least that explains where Sage goes in the evenings, being pampered and fed by someone else entirely. What a spoilt cat.
He hoped a bright pink Sage returning without a collar once again would deter the other person and they would rescind their ownership, however when she returned the next morning there was yet another collar around her neck with yet another note.
I mean it you dick. Collars are expensive and I’m not made of money! Kindly fuck off.
Izuku was annoyed, wondering just who this person with such a foul mouth was, thinking of ways to magic Sage’s coat so it was an even more ridiculous colour. Preparing to throw the note in the trash Izuku notices there’s writing on the back, Sage’s other mysterious owner not having enough room on the front to leave his message.
And stop dying her obnoxious colours! It must be bad for her to do it daily!
Oh, this guy had no idea. He was obviously a human; any magical being would be able to sense Sage’s magical potential and the fact she was someone’s bonded familiar. So, he decided to do something a little bit different this time. He put the collar back on Sage, changing the colour to an obnoxiously bright neon pink. If this guy wanted obnoxious, he was going to get it. Izuku decided to leave a note of his own on the collar, excited to see what would come of it.
Make me.
was all the note said. He hoped it got his point across, in the pettiest way possible.
But all it did was start an all-out war, Sage returning with a new note and a name tag on her collar that read DynaKitty on the front with the details for a Katsuki Bakugou on the back. Izuku laughed at the name, he couldn’t believe his elegant Sage was moonlighting as DynaKitty for some weirdo who lived a few streets over. Hopefully, she was keeping the streets safe as a superhero as she travelled between the two houses.
I registered her with the city, she’s mine!
You went to the city and registered her as “DynaKitty” with a straight face? No way. ( ◡‿◡ *)
DynaKitty is a great name!
Says who, Katsuki? (￣▽￣)
Says me! Stop making fun of me you twerp! (And stop dying her!)
Nah, I quite like a fashionable cat. Matches her real name. Sage.
Some hippie bullshit name, gross. DynaKitty is way cooler (ಠ o ಠ)
The last note has Izuku laughing in his kitchen, holding the note tightly as he watches Sage eat her breakfast. He was starting to become fond of this Katsuki Bakugo, wondering what kind of a guy he was. He came across as crass and rude in his notes but he obviously had a good heart seeing Sage was well looked after and he worried about her enough to register her with the city. He obviously had a good sense of humour; the mean notes he was attaching to Sage’s collar devolved into playful banter rather than the outright insults he was hurling at Izuku to begin with, and he’d even started using Kaomojis!
Izuku didn’t mind sharing Sage with Katsuki, happy that his familiar was enjoying herself and that Katsuki treated her well. He just hoped that someday soon he could meet this Katsuki, he just had a feeling that they would get along very well.