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When Huang Shaotian found himself at Blue Rain’s training camp, scouted by the team captain himself, all he wanted was to prove himself worthy of Wei Chen’s faith in him. He told himself that he would work harder than he ever had before to make sure that Wei Chen never regretted choosing to bring him into the training camp.
“ No distractions,” Huang Shaotian told himself firmly, fingers trailing over his account card. It was strange to think that he could have Troubling Rain with him on Glory’s stage someday. But that would only happen if he kept his focus now.
Huang Shaotian walked into the training room, repeating his mantra over and over again, no distractions, no distractions- wait who’s that?
Huang Shaotian found his gaze drawn to the two fluffy ears poking out of equally dark hair, soft looking tail curled around the other trainee’s waist. His hands twitched with the desire to reach out and find out if the fur was as soft as it looked.
A jeer from the crowd broke him out of his trance and he shoved his hands into his pockets, a physical reminder to keep his hands to himself. It wasn’t like he’d never seen a cat hybrid before, he’d had a few in his class, his sister had quite a few friends with ears and tails, it was just that he’d never been struck with the overwhelming urge to touch before.
Once he had himself under control once more, he turned his attention over to the screen where the cute eared trainee was getting pummelled by his opponent’s Striker. His Launcher made a few feeble attempts at a counterattack but he wasn’t inputting the commands fast enough, fingers fumbling over the keys while his opponent had the hand speed expected of someone looking to go pro.
The other trainees huddled around the boy who’d just won and Huang Shaotian suspected he was the only one who noticed the way the other boy’s ears looked like they flattened for a moment. He could feel the shape of a taunt on his lips, after all, it was just another one of his weapons, Troubling Rain had his sword, Huang Shaotian had his seemingly endless barrage of taunts.
Except.
Except the boy already looked so defeated, not that his expression changed but his tail was curling more firmly around himself as he reclaimed his Launcher card, slipping it in his pocket, looking to re-join the crowd without a fuss. The boy who’d played the Striker glanced up from his circle of admirers, gaze homing in on his defeated opponent, mouth shaping into a jeer, even as his opponent tried to fade into the background once more. And people said a lot of things about Huang Shaotian, complained about his perceived faults a lot, but one thing no one had ever said was that he was slow.
The same couldn’t be said for the other boy, but that didn’t mean that Huang Shaotian couldn’t help him out a little.
And it would give Troubling Rain the chance to show off a little.
“Hey you, yes you, you play a Striker and you played well but I bet you can’t beat me, I bet you can’t beat me and my Troubling Rain, we’ll send you running back to the beginner’s villages so you can play with all the little baby noobs, you can trade tips on the best level one dungeons.” Huang Shaotian watched with satisfaction as the boy’s attention snapped to him, letting the other boy slip into the crowd once more. He didn’t see how he thought he could blend in considering how obvious his ears and tail made him, but that wasn’t something Huang Shaotian could fix.
Besides, he had his own match to focus on now, and after his opening taunts, he had to win.
Which he did. (maybe write match if brain says oki)
The admiring crowd soon gathered around him, excited voices shouting over each other, asking him how he did that dodge so quickly, how he pulled off the lightning-fast attacks in between his blocking.
“I told you, told you told you told you, did you really think you could beat me, you only beat that other guy because he’s slow, you got too confident, you thought you were the fastest but anyone’s the fastest when they’re playing against a slow old turtle-“ Huang Shaotian was cut off by one of the instructors walking into the room and he snapped his mouth shut, pulling out his account card and darting back to the seats.
“Thank you.” Huang Shaotian startled in his seat, glancing over out of the corner of his eye and spotting a fluffy tail.
“What are you thanking me for, for calling you slow? You know that isn’t a compliment? You know that Glory is fast right-?”
“Not for that, for challenging Li Chen and taking the attention off my loss.” Huang Shaotian chanced a proper look to his left and wasn’t sure how to respond to the earnest sincerity lacing the other boy’s words.
“I’m Huang Shaotian.” Internally, he cursed himself for answering like this, but he didn’t have anything else to say.
“Yu Wenzhou.” With that their exchange seemed to come to an end and the cute eared boy- no, Yu Wenzhou, turned back to the notes he was making as an old match was being played on the screen.
Huang Shaotian now wished that he’d never offered his name to Yu Wenzhou, not only because it was a ridiculous response to the other boy’s gratitude, but now he had a name to put to the appendages he so desperately wanted to touch.
Even if Yu Wenzhou seemed far too slow to ever make it onto the professional team, he remained there week after week, even as they went through eliminations, continually at the back of the pack, but he didn’t seem to mind, content with his place, keeping to himself, fading into the background as another unremarkable trainee that no one had to notice.
At least, that’s what he should have been.
Except Huang Shaotian found that he couldn’t keep his attention off Yu Wenzhou. Even when he was trying to keep his focus on what he was being told, the drills they ran, something, anything else, his gaze kept wandering over to Yu Wenzhou, taking in the way his pointed ears twitched, the way his tail would lie against his thigh, occasionally flicking out.
And it wasn’t just because Huang Shaotian was still desperate to find out if Yu Wenzhou’s ears and tail were as soft and fluffy as they looked. No, because he was also noticing other things now. Like the way Yu Wenzhou would chew on his pen if he was thinking something over. Or the way he doodled little fish in the margins of his notebooks. And the fact that he ran his hands over his own tail a lot, seemingly smoothing his fur down.
It was cute.
He was cute.
Huang Shaotian let his head collide with the keyboard, making a soft clack as he tried to drag his thoughts away from Yu Wenzhou. When that failed, he pulled his card from the reader, resolving to go to bed, hoping to escape all thoughts of Yu Wenzhou if he just went to sleep.
On his way back to his room, he spotted a faint light radiating out from under one of the individual training rooms. He frowned, sure that he’d been the only one sneaking around that night, pushing the door open, hoping that it wasn’t one of the creaky ones. Luck was on his side and he got the door open without disturbing whoever was inside.
Apparently, opening the door quietly was all the luck he had for the night as the person in the room was none other than Yu Wenzhou. The very person Huang Shaotian was going to bed in an attempt to escape. The other trainee had his head pillowed on his arms, glasses askew on his face and his ears were moving while he slept. It was cute.
He took a moment to curse the universe, before he focused and realised that there was another noise in the room besides the low hum of Yu Wenzhou’s computer. Huang Shaotian was certain that the quiet rumbling sounded familiar, but he couldn’t pinpoint why it was.
Willing to press his luck a little further, he crept a little closer, the noise getting louder the closer he got to Yu Wenzhou-
Huang Shaotian froze as he realised three things all at once.
Firstly, Yu Wenzhou was the one making the low rumbling sound.
Secondly, the noise was familiar because it was purring.
Thirdly, Yu Wenzhou could purr .
Huang Shaotian was certain that the universe was punishing him for something, perhaps something he’d done in a past life because even as he crept out of the room, shutting the door silently behind him, he couldn’t get the sound of Yu Wenzhou purring out of his head. He knew, knew right then, that he’d be wondering about what else made Yu Wenzhou purr until he fell asleep, knew that he’d be wondering is he could get Yu Wenzhou to purr like that if he scratched his ears or pet his tail-
Huang Shaotian rolled over to muffle his scream into his pillow.
It didn’t get the noise or the thoughts out of his head, but it did make him feel better and Huang Shaotian was willing to take his victories where he could get them.
Yu Wenzhou knew that although he’d always been good at keeping his emotions off his face, he found it much harder to keep his ears and tail from revealing his mood to everyone around him. His mother would smooth down his ruffled fur, touch cool and gentle, his father would ruffle his hair when his ears flattened against his skull and his siblings liked to bat at his tail to catch his attention when he drifted off.
As he’d grown up, he’d fought to keep his appendages still, not liking the thought of his classmates reading his emotions, but he’d never been able to achieve the same control as his parents had. His failure only agitated him further, tail thrashing in the privacy of his room and Yu Wenzhou reached up one hand to tweak at his own ears, just as his parents did, wishing it soothed away his annoyance like it always did at home.
Yu Wenzhou had never imagined that joining Blue Rain’s training camp would shred what little control he had over his ears and tail completely.
Huang Shaotian wasn’t easy to miss, even if he hadn’t been personally recruited by Wei Chen, by Blue Rain’s captain, his shock of blond hair and loud taunts drew everyone’s eyes to him. And he seemed to thrive under the attention, always calling out to someone else, pulling them into his orbit, accepting challengers eagerly, a crowd of people around him at all times, seeking out his light.
And it wasn’t like Yu Wenzhou expected Huang Shaotian to pay attention to him, after his loss to Li Chen was swept aside when Huang Shaotian threw himself into the fray and crushed Li Chen with his account, Huang Shaotian hadn’t bothered with him again, his gaze always skipping over him, focusing on someone who would actually pose a challenge to him.
Yu Wenzhou didn’t really want Huang Shaotian to challenge him to a PVP, losing publicly was a spectacle that he’d been trying to avoid. Not that it stopped the wealth of whispers that he was barely holding onto his place in the camp, that in the next round of eliminations he’d surely be cut, but at the very least he was spared Huang Shaotian’s rapid fire taunts.
And yet Huang Shaotian’s utter disinterest in him didn’t stop Yu Wenzhou’s ears and tail from signalling to the entire camp that he was interested.
Yu Wenzhou ducked his head to hide the blush when Huang Shaotian grinned at their little group, watching the match. He’d won, of course, at this point Huang Shaotian was winning more matches than he lost, with only the professional team still beating him. Yu Wenzhou could hide his blush, but his ears still twitched towards Huang Shaotian, demonstrating to everyone that he was hoping to catch his attention.
He forced his attention back to his notebook, bearing the discomfort of sitting firmly on his tail so long as it kept it from betraying him and trying to curl around Huang Shaotian’s wrist.
The first time Yu Wenzhou felt it happening, he panicked and grabbed his tail, flush already crawling up his neck and he refused to meet the curious eyes he could feel on him. He’d kept his gaze on his notebook once he’d wrangled his tail into remaining still and even though he knew Huang Shaotian was watching him, Yu Wenzhou was content to pretend he was oblivious.
Huang Shaotian was just so bright and eye-catching, Yu Wenzhou couldn’t be that surprised that he’d caught his attention, but that didn’t mean he was content with his ears and tail signalling his interest to the entire training camp. The fact that Huang Shaotian hadn’t reacted to his signals outside of mild confusion meant that he was rejecting him as politely as he could, meaning Yu Wenzhou had to get his ears and tail under control before he made Huang Shaotian uncomfortable.
His older brother had very few tips to help him with his problem, suggesting that it was a good thing for him to be signalling to Huang Shaotian that he was interested, letting the other trainee decide if he was interested in return and have him approach him. Yu Wenzhou decided that his older brother was far too shameless if he thought that signalling to the entire training camp that he liked Huang Shaotian was a good idea. His younger sister was even less help, sighing over the romance of it all. He reminded her that his life was not a romance novel, huffing out a breath when she replied that having that attitude would only cement him as a poor alone pro gamer.
“I’m not a pro gamer Xiao Tang.”
“Not yet .” He wondered if he should tell her that it was possible that he’d be cut from the training program soon, but his sister had already become distracted by all the ways he could seduce Huang Shaotian and he resigned himself to listening to the far-fetched ideas about how he could rescue Huang Shaotian from a dragon.
“Xiao Tang dragons don’t exist.”
“Not in real life but you play Glory remember, I saw that there are dragons, you could swoop in and save him and then he’ll faint into your arms and you can help him with his wounds!” Yu Wenzhou made a mental note to send his sister more romance books, she’d clearly read the latest one he’d bought her. “You can be so unimaginative you know.” Yu Wenzhou hummed in agreement, already planning how to deflect his parents’ questions when they inevitably called him asking about his crush.
He could sense his older brother selling him out already and his tail twitched. He heard a thunk from the doorway and looked up from his computer but there was no one there. Yu Wenzhou strained his ears to see if he could catch any other sounds but whoever was in the doorway was long gone. He returned his attention to his little sister who was now suggesting that he buy Huang Shaotian snow globes because everyone loves snow globes. Yu Wenzhou reminded her that not everyone adored snow globes as much as she did and his sister reminded him that she was the one who’d just read the romance novel meaning he should cede to her knowledge.
Disagreeing with her would only ensure that she told her parents exactly what they’d spoken about and Yu Wenzhou was willing to sacrifice this battle to win the war and invited her to tell him more of his ideas for winning over Huang Shaotian. Not that he planned to act on them, he wasn’t entirely sure if it were possible to spell out an entire sonnet in fireworks, but his sister was excited by the possibility.
Yu Wenzhou couldn’t help but wonder if he’d actually heard someone in the doorway or just imagined it.
Huang Shaotian thought, as he retreated from the training room in case Yu Wenzhou came to investigate, that Yu Wenzhou had no business sitting in the training room looking that cute and fluffy. His crush was getting out of hand, he thought to himself.
Huang Shaotian liked to think he was observant even outside of Glory. He did his best to try and read other people and while he wasn’t as good at it as others were, he thought he was fairly perceptive. This meant that he didn’t miss the way Yu Wenzhou’s ears and tail reacted to him, ears twitching whenever he went by, his tail curling towards him before Yu Wenzhou intervened.
And Yu Wenzhou was distracting enough with his pretty lips, warm eyes and fluffy ears, Huang Shaotian didn’t need the added distraction of the ears and tail reacting to him. Especially since it seemed like Yu Wenzhou was here to stay after his victories against Wei Chen. Huang Shaotian watched the way Yu Wenzhou’s ears pinned themselves to his head after his three victories, as if he were nervous about how people would react. It happened again after Wei Chen retired, Yu Wenzhou holding himself tensed, tail twitching whenever someone’s eyes landed on him and Huang Shaotian couldn’t help but feel bad.
“Hey Yu Wenzhou! Come sit here!” Huang Shaotian hadn’t thought his words through before they came out of his mouth, but that was okay, he could think quickly and he was pleased that his mouth was faster than his brain when he noticed that Yu Wenzhou’s ears flicked up straight, head turning to focus on him immediately. Yu Wenzhou’s cheeks were lightly flushed when he took his seat and Huang Shaotian shoved some notes he’d made towards him, asking him about Ye Qiu’s coordination with Wu Xuefeng in their season two final. Yu Wenzhou had lit up and produced his own set of notes and they’d become so immersed that they were late to practice.
As Huang Shaotian spent more time with Yu Wenzhou, he learnt that he responded to his voice immediately, ears swivelling to find him, head turning to look the moment he heard him speak. And he also found that he liked having Yu Wenzhou’s full focus on him, dark eyes meeting his own, sharp and intelligent and very pretty, it was no surprise that Huang Shaotian was always pleased when Yu Wenzhou gave him his full attention.
However, being this close to Yu Wenzhou just meant that it was easier and easier to get distracted by the way his ears and tail reacted to him. When they sat next to each other, it became common for Yu Wenzhou’s tail to wind itself around Huang Shaotian’s wrist until a bright pink Yu Wenzhou yanked it away, refusing to meet Huang Shaotian’s eyes, flush spreading down his neck.
Huang Shaotian didn’t want to push, but he suspected that the reason Yu Wenzhou’s ears and tails reacted to him like this was because the other liked him. It was easy to find testimonials of this online and Huang Shaotian made up his mind to confess his own feelings to Yu Wenzhou at the next opportunity. After all, ever since Yu Wenzhou’s tail began wrapping itself around his wrist, he found out that it was just as fluffy and soft as it looked, meaning that he had extra incentive to be allowed to touch Yu Wenzhou’s ears and tail openly.
The next time Yu Wenzhou’s tail wound itself over his skin, Huang Shaotian reached out and caught Yu Wenzhou’s hand as he went to move his tail. Yu Wenzhou looked as if he’d been caught in headlights, eyes wide and lips parted in shock as Huang Shaotian took the opportunity to tangle their fingers together, meeting Yu Wenzhou’s gaze with a bright wide smile.
“Wenzhou, Wenzhou did you know that there are all sorts of blogs online that tell you what it means when your tail behaves like that? Did you know that you could have just said that you might like me, I was hoping that you might like me, but I didn’t want to tell you if you didn’t like me back, but then I found the blogs online and forums and I thought that maybe you might like me back?” Huang Shaotian went silent as Yu Wenzhou blinked rapidly at him, as if he was trying to process what he’d just heard.
“I didn’t save you from a dragon though?” Yu Wenzhou’s words registered with Huang Shaotian, and yet they made no sense to him. “My sister said I should save you from a dragon to get you to like me back.”
“That would be very impressive, I would be very impressed if you saved me from a dragon Wenzhou, but did you know that there are no dragons in China? And since I already like you, you don’t need to go off and save me from dragons Wenzhou, but you could tell me if you like me back?”
“I do! I do like you back!” Yu Wenzhou’s cheeks were pink and a soft smile was tugging at his lips, Huang Shaotian felt a smile spread across his own face and he blurted out his next words before he could stop himself.
“Can I touch your ears please?” Yu Wenzhou blinked at him and Huang Shaotian went on to clarify, “when I first met you I saw your ears and tail and you’re so fluffy and cute and pretty, and I saw you when you’d fallen asleep in the training room, you were purring and I would just like to pet your ears, please?”
“You can pet my ears if you want Shaotian,” Yu Wenzhou hadn’t expected Huang Shaotian to be this enthused, but his face lit up and his touch was gentle as he began to scratch softly at his ears. Yu Wenzhou didn’t bother trying to hide the purr rumbling out of his throat, and from the way Huang Shaotian grinned, this was something that would be happening frequently. The firm scratches felt so good that Yu Wenzhou thought he could drift off like this, safe under Huang Shaotian’s touch.
And he did. And he was.