Chapter Text
Virgil had been going to his humble cabin when he saw the thing. Nothing besides the creatures of the forest really came by, but today was different. Virgil’s surprised when he sees a cat sitting on the railing of his porch when he gets back. Its fur looks black at first glance, but in the light it looks like it’s a deep blue.
“Uh…” Virgil just kind of stares at the creature, arms full of different fruits and vegetables that he bought from a nearby town. “Hi?”
The cat stares at him with curious eyes, seeming like it’s analyzing him. It eventually decides that Virgil is worthy of a greeting and meows in response. That’s normal cat behavior right? He wouldn’t know, he’s never really interacted with one for longer than a second. Until now at least.
“Ok I’m just gonna-” Virgil walks up to the front door and sets a few of his bags in the wooden chair on the porch, expertly typing the house code into the keypad. There’s a click from the other side and he pushes it open. Virgil heads to the kitchen to put down the bags in his arms and goes back to get the rest of them. The blue cat is nowhere in sight though.
Maybe it left? Eh, that’s fine.
He gets the rest of the bags from the chair outside and kicks the door shut, the automatic locks now in place. He decides to put away what’s on the counter and organize his pantry. When he’s finished with that he heads to the living room to read a book, maybe make a few more little models for any invention ideas he has too, and goes over to the purple armchair (the only armchair in the residence). He jumps back in surprise when he hears an annoyed sounding meow before he can sit down.
The weird cat is lying comfortably in his chair, it looks at him with a glare. Virgil never thought he’d be intimidated by a cat, but hey, there’s a first time for everything right?
“Look, you can stay in my house, that’s fine,” Virgil says as he brings his hand up to pinch the bridge of his nose. “Can you at least not take over my stuff?”
The cat puts on what looks like a thinking face (were they supposed to be this animated?) and decides to be a decent cat. But instead of getting off the chair completely it just climbs up to the top of it, resting on the back of the seat.
“Y’know what? Fine, you can stay there,” Virgil sighs out and plops down onto the seat to read through one of the random books he got while he was out.
~~~
Virgil sits and reads for a while before he gets bored, remembering why he went out in the first place.
Though the social interaction and the cold both suck, the silent and suffocating atmosphere in his cabin is worse. He’s been alone for a few months now, he should be used to it. But it feels like it gets worse each day.
Just as his thoughts spiral, Virgil hears a meow above him and looks up to see the cat looking at him. It had its paw out as if to pat his head, but when he looked up the small creature accidentally boops him on the nose. Virgil’s shocked for a second before letting out a snort, lips quirking up into a small smile.
“What the hell was that?” Virgil says through a laugh. The cat's eyes narrow at him slightly, its tail flicking in annoyance behind it. It doesn’t like being laughed at apparently, because that’s when it decides to jump off the couch and walk away from him with its back turned, giving him the cold shoulder.
Virgil laughs even more at that, hand coming to cover up the sound but failing miserably. “Wait! I’m sorry, you just caught me off guard.”
He may sound crazy talking to a cat like they aren’t just having a one sided conversation, but he’s already giving ‘hobo in the middle of the woods’ vibes so what’s one more to add to the list?
“Ok, I won’t laugh at you for that anymore, truce?”
Virgil lowers his hand near the ground and sticks it out toward the cat. It eyes the hand suspiciously from its side, back still turned away from the inventor. It decides to accept the truce and stalks toward him, still with a suspicious expression on its face (again, are cats supposed to be this expressive?).
Instead of rubbing its face against his palm like he expects, the cat puts one of its front paws in Virgil’s hand. This thing is just full of surprises. Still, the point is across and they’ve agreed to not discuss this ever again (spoiler alert: that’s a lie).
~~~
It’s late and the sun is setting, casting its bright rays through his window. He won’t be going to sleep anytime soon but he has a cat to feed.
So VIrgil goes to the kitchen, takes out some fish, and puts it on a plate for the feline. It goes up to the fish, sniffs it experimentally, and then begins to nibble on it a bit hesitantly. Does it not like that type of fish? He’ll have to see what it likes tomorrow.
He doesn’t fix himself anything, which his new companion seems to notice as it starts meowing at him. He looks down at it to see it circling his feet, trying to lead him back to the kitchen. He doesn’t know what it wants at the moment but follows it anyway. The cat goes over to its plate with the fish and pushes it slightly toward the human, meowing and looking up at him expectantly.
“Uhhh…” Virgil looks at the plate confused, and then back to the cat. “Do you want me to eat some of your food? Do you not like it?”
The cat meows again and jumps up onto the counter. It seems to look around for a bit before grabbing a grampet from his fruit bowl. It walks over to Virgil with the fruit in its mouth and sets it gently on the counter in front of Virgil. Then it clicked.
“Oh! You want me to eat too?”
The cat seems to nod at him in confirmation. This is a really smart cat, Virgil would say he’s pretty lucky to have it in his life (oh no, he’s getting attached to a random cat-).
“Well thanks, I do forget sometimes,” Virgil says, rubbing the back of his neck nervously. Why is he nervous around a cat? It's just a cat that decided to come in.
And it’s really smart.
And it’s probably judging him…
…a lot.
C’mon Virgil, get it together! Stop being all upset about being judged by a cat! It’s just a cat.
The feline gives a satisfied meow as Virgil peels the grampet and eats it. It jumps off the counter and heads back to Virgil’s chair, sitting on the back of it like before. It stays there for seemingly the rest of the night.
Virgil just turns back to his reading instead of just staring at the thing while it sleeps. Well, today was interesting.