Chapter Text
“Have you seen Silco? Can’t find him anywhere.” Sevika looked frantic, which was never good. Also a terrible greeting to receive when walking into your job at The Last Drop.
You raised your eyebrows. “If you don’t know where he’s at, it means he doesn’t want to be found.” Somehow the crime lord caused more panic when he went missing than when he was there.
“Yeah, well, we need to find him. Start looking.”
Haphazardly looking around, you shrugged. “You check his office?”
“Of course, you fucking walnut, that’s where we last saw him. He had a meeting, there was a crash in his office, but when I opened the door, no one was in there.”
“Could they just have been—”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“It was an old hag. No.”
You backed off at her firmness. “Alright. Well, I’ll go back up there, maybe there’s a clue where he went.”
Sevika huffed and that was that.
You walked up to the door nonchalantly, not expecting much. The floorboards squeaked about a foot away from his office door and inside, you heard loud crashing sound.
“What the fuck?” Something was obviously in the room. You quickly opened the door and walked in, locking it behind you. The room was empty, but now a few things were scattered around, namely objects around Silco’s desk. You silently walked towards the desk, rounding the corner to check under it. Ducking your head under, you saw nothing but darkness. You sighed, about to stand up again when something caught your eye.
Two mismatched eyes looked back at you from the far corner of the underside of the desk.
One eye was a seafoam blue, but it was hard to even see the color, the pupil so wide. The other was misshapen, but glowed red in the darkness. There were scars that ran from his ear to below his mouth. It looked exactly like—
“Sil…co…?”
As soon as the last syllable came out of your mouth, the creature ran straight at you, weaving between your legs. You could hear the claws on the hardwood floor as he drifted, making a break for the couch. The room became quiet again as he found a new hiding spot.
“A cat? Was that a fucking cat?” The tiny creature was small, gray, and scruffy looking. You slowly tiptoed a few steps before laying your head to the ground, looking under the sofa. “Well I’ll be damned. That’s a cat. A cat that looks a lot like… Silco.”
The name triggered the cat again, going from a defensive to offensive position, his good eye going black as the pupil dilated. Cat-Silco ran towards you and you flinched, covering your face. Once again, nails scrapped against the hardwood floor as he had no traction. You opened your eyes and sat up when you heard fabric being torn and distressed meowing. Cat-Silco was climbing up the drapes and yelling, the noise sounding like something between anger and anguish.
“Oh fuck, don’t do that, Silco will be—” You froze, your brain processing the information. The scruffy cat dropped unceremoniously from the curtain, landing with a loud thud, before scampering off again.
When it became quiet again, you decided to suspend your disbelief. “Okay, let’s just pretend this is normal for two minutes. Silco—” though you could not see him, something fell over, “you were turned into a cat. It seems you can understand your name. Can you understand other words?” When nothing happened, you sighed. “Let me just…” you started walking towards his desk again. “The boss I know would kill me in the most painful way possible if I dared thought about sitting in his chair, so I’m going to sit in it.”
You could only get about halfway to a sitting position before Cat-Silco jumped up on the desk and hissed at you.
“So, you do understand me.”
As if he had been caught, he relaxed a tiny bit and sat down, fluffy tail coming to rest on top of his paws. Even as a cat, he commanded respect. Silco looked annoyed, like he was too good to be here.
“Sevika said there was an old hag that you were meeting with before you… disappeared. Did she… turn you into a cat?” The sound that came from the cat was something like a hum and a grunt. “Does that mean yes? Uhh… if yes, make that sound again.” He did. “Okay. Do you know how to change back? Is it a time thing? Will you change back after a certain amount of time or is there a ritual or something?” Silco only looked at you, cat eyes piercing you like he was trying to kill you. “Sorry, too many questions. Got it. Can you—”
The doorhandle jiggled and Silco hissed. Sevika’s voice came muffled through the door. “Why did you lock the door? You’re not doing anything weird, are you?”
You cleared your throat. “Umm, nope! Force of habit, I have the same lock in my apartment.”
Sevika huffed. “Well, hurry up and help the rest of us out here.” You waited until her footsteps couldn’t be heard.
You looked back at Silco. “You don’t want anyone to see you like this, right?” He grunted again. “Okay. What if I just… did something stupid and you don’t kill me after we figure out how to fix this, hmm?” He tilted his head to the side and his ears twitched, before slowly going into a crouch. Silco started to back up.
Before he could run away again, you quickly grabbed him just behind his front legs. He squirmed as you held him in the air at arms length to avoid getting scratched. “I… AM TRYING… TO HELP YOU!” You grit out between clenched teeth. Silco eventually stopped, accepting his fate.
When you realized he had calmed down, you looked at the cat that used to be your boss. He was pissed; pissed at the way he was being held, pissed at being transformed into a cat, pissed that you found him. But he looked adorable. You smiled and couldn’t stop yourself from saying, “I’ve always wanted a cat.”
Silco gave a small hiss, swatting at you again.
“Okay, okay. I’m just going to put you in my jacket and we are going to escape to my apartment so we can figure it out without you being seen.” His eyes went wide but Silco seemed to accept his fate, being shoved into your leather jacket. When zipped up, he could poke his head out from the top of the zipper. “If you don’t want any more comments, you’ll have to stop acting so cute. Ow! You bit my collarbone!”
You had never seen a cat look so smug.
