Work Text:
A cat and a dog trotted alongside each other, one purple and one orange. The pair of toys sniffed and explored and scratched and chewed things, generally causing a ruckus that Dogday knew he had to report to the humans at some point, but right now he didn’t care because he was having fun with his best friend.
He loved Catnap! The tiny purple kitty was so fun! And cute! And sweet! And shy! Just hearing the faint jingle of Catnap’s moon charm was enough to make Dogday’s tail wag faster than kids running out to play.
Keep an eye on your friend, okay? the scientist had told him as Dogday munched on a bone. Catnap gets nervous easily and needs a strong, outgoing best friend.
This was why, when the orphans suddenly broke through the doors of Playcare’s school, Dogday heroically shielded Catnap (as the poor frightened kitty sprang up and dug its claws in).
The little dog pointed. “See there? That’s the school! Sk-ool,” he repeated, slowly and articulately. Catnap had a speech delay, and, as its best friend, Dogday wanted to help! “Catnap? Can you say sk-ool?”
“Dogday says: woof,” said the cat.
Dogday blinked.
Catnap started to clean its ears.
Then the little orange cocker spaniel burst into giggles. “Hahah!! You’re so funny, kitty!” He petted Catnap on the head with one dark orange paw. The cat looked up in surprise and kept twisting its head to try and lick the thing on its head. This just made Dogday giggle harder.
The two had been friends for about a week now. Friendly, sociable and enthusiastic, Dogday was the polar opposite of the strange and quiet kitten sitting beside it. The pair were often put together to play (under strict human supervision), and this was their very first time out, unsupervised!
Dogday had been given very strict instructions to watch over his friend. Don’t let Catnap escape, don’t let Catnap eat the furniture, don’t let Catnap pee on the floor, blah blah blah… and the loyal little cocker spaniel was trusted enough by his human friends to have the honour of being Catnap’s bodyguard bestie. He knew the Playcare quite well already, having been given strict lessons on what his job was meant to be: the leader of a group of toys who were yet to be brought to life. They were called the Smiling Critters! And while Dogday was beyond enthusiastic to be the leader of a team of happy, grinning plushies, he wasn’t quite sure Catnap was ready to be told yet. The kitty still had to get to know the world. So today was meant to be all about learning!
And what better place to learn that at Playcare’s very own school?!
Dogday perked up his otherwise-floppy ears. “Hey! Catnap! Do you wanna go into the school?”
“Sk-ool?” The cat paused its grooming, leaving one paw up and its little pink tongue sticking out. Its tail flicked nervously.
The new leader of the Smiling Critters beamed. He yapped and bounced and ran around in circles. “You did it! You said the word! Good boy! Good boy! Good boy!”
Catnap looked like it understood what its friend was saying and puffed up its chest in pride.
By now, all the orphans were playing in a fenced-off area in the Playcare. So the school was free! And surely the teachers there wouldn’t mind a little cat and dog popping in for a visit, riiiiight?
Dogday realised this was his chance to be a bright, shining mentor for his best friend, so he launched into a happy explanation on how the Playcare facility worked.
“Okay, Catnap! You see this big, colourful, painted space around us? This is called the Playcare! It’s still under construction, but I promise it’ll be done soon! It’s where the humans put their kids when they have nowhere else to go! It’s very sweet, really, I’m sure you’d love the idea. And anyway! Anyway, at Playcare, we have six buildings… Can you count up to six, Catnap?”
“Wun, too, free, forr… ummm… meow?”
“You can do it! What’s after four?”
“…I said too?”
“You’ve already said two, but good try! Kitty, after four, we have five …”
The pair trotted along until they stood at the school’s entrance. The walls were painted bright, happy blue. Dogday wandered up to the entrance - and realised he was far too short to actually reach the door handle.
This was a problem.
So the little dog yapped its head off, leaping and barking and howling and trying to reach up on the door. When that didn’t work, Catnap offered to reach its very long tail up to reach the handle, but it couldn’t do that without striking a very undignified position. So one animal chose to climb on the other animal’s head…
The door opened.
Cat and dog tumbled down, rolling over each other and landing in a tangled heap. Dogday woozily rubbed his head, then instantly sprang up to check if Catnap was alright. Thankfully, the purple kitty was, except it looked to be coughing up something. Something… red?!
What things are red? Dogday tried to think as hard as he could. In his limited education, he didn’t know a whole lot about the world, but he’d diligently studied the colours and their meanings. And red - what was red - um - apples! Apples were red!!
Was Catnap choking on an apple?!
No - there was this other word - what was it again?
The Blud?!
“CATNAP! DO YOU HAVE THE BLUD?!” Dogday howled, practically throttling his friend in an attempt to get a better look.
“Who has the blood?” asked a calm female voice.
Both cat and dog looked up.
A strange woman with blonde hair and a white grin was looking at them.
They stared.
She stared.
Then Dogday shrieked, “CATNAP HAS THE BLUD! WE GOTTA HELP HIM!!”
The woman didn’t frown. Her face didn’t even move. She just kept smiling. Dogday found it kind of creepy - sure, he loved to smile, but he wouldn’t smile when his best friend had a case of the Blud!!
Her head turned - again, totally creepily, because Dogday sure couldn’t turn his own head at 180 degrees - and she called, unnervingly calmly, “My sisters, where is the biology teacher?”
An identical woman stepped into the doorway.
“Where is the kitty?” she asked, with the exact same voice, smile, hair and clothes as the teacher who had opened the door.
Catnap, who was indeed choking (AAAAAAAH!! THE BLUD!!!), mewled pathetically as it was picked up and coddled. Dogday anxiously ran in circles around the woman’s ankles, pleading, “Please! You gotta help him! We were just messing around and then we tried to get the door open and then we fell over and then Catnap started choking and I think he has the Blud -”
The creepy smiling woman brought both animals inside, and her sister closed the door. CLICK.
Suddenly Dogday started imagining awful things. What if Catnap didn’t make it?! What if it was seriously hurt? Had Dogday failed his job as a bodyguard?! Had Dogday failed at life?!
The biology teacher sharply twisted Catnap’s moon pendant.
Gasping and meowing loudly, Catnap’s throat came free.
Alongside a thick cloud of…
…red gas?
Dogday barely had time to blink before the smoke blasted him in the face.
The tiny orange cocker spaniel shrieked.
Suddenly the world looked really silly…
…ehehehehe…
…was that a smiling lady with nice golden hair and a nice dress? Her dress was changing colours! It was pink and blue and yellow and all the colours of the rainbow all at once, and it was shimmering like a puddle of water…
…there was a silly giggling noise that Dogday liked, it was funny ha-ha, and he giggled too and rolled around on the floor and then he was rolling in the grass…
…there were little purple cats all meowing and dancing around him, they were tickling his belly, they were all counting to the number six, and now they were licking Dogday’s ears, mewling happily…
Dogday woke up.
There was a purple cat furiously licking his cheek.
Instantly, the cocker spaniel’s face split into one MASSIVE grin.
“CATNAP! Kitty! You’re alright!!”
“FWOND!” Catnap cried. It leapt on top of its best friend and licked his forehead profusely.
“KITTY! I love you too, I love you so much, I’m so glad you’re okay, good boy, good boy -”
The still-creepily-smiling biology teacher was peering over Dogday’s head. Actually, she was a lot less creepy now that the dog was using his head properly again. It was a nice smile, really! “Your kitten friend seems to have a tank of laughing gas inside its lungs.”
Dogday stopped dead.
His face went white.
“K-kitty?”
Catnap covered its face with its paws and went red. It looked embarrassed and awful.
“Sowwy, fwond,” the cat mumbled.
“Laughing gas?” Dogday sat bolt upright. “LAUGHING gas?!”
He had a feeling laughing gas wasn’t supposed to just make you laugh.
Catnap looked extremely uncomfortable. Its tail flicked and its ears were back. It slowly got off Dogday, then sneezed pathetically. There it was - a cloud of red vapour.
The biology teacher calmly waved away the smoke.
“It is biologically modified and scientifically fascinating. Your kitten friend has told us that it is called -”
“Poppy gas,” mumbled Catnap.
The teacher nodded. “Poppy gas. Excellent speaking, Catnap, well done.” She bent over and stroked the toy’s ears. “Good little kitten. We shall find a snack for you and your canine friend after this, no?”
“What’s poppy gas?” Dogday mumbled, trying to get up off the floor. His head felt heavy and woozy. He just wanted to sleep…
Catnap looked miserable. It pressed its purple paws to the orange ones of its friend. It didn’t look Dogday in the eye.
Dogday would have been so, so proud of his buddy if the words that came out of its mouth weren’t so shocking.
“I breeve the poppy gas. It makes my nose itchy and I sneeze and it gets everywhere. The grown-ups turn the moon and then the gas stops. I felled over trying to get the sk-ool open. The moon went wrongly. I very, very sowwy. I sowwy, fwend.”
Around them, five or so identical schoolteachers milled around, marking papers, replacing stocks, chattering calmly and looking at the toys in interest. Dogday started to suspect that they weren’t actually human. They were like dolls. So that’s why they had that constant smile! Their faces were drawn on! That at least made Dogday feel a little better. Mostly, the dog just wanted his bestie to be alright. A tank of poppy thingy in the lungs sounded worse than the Blud.
“But - but Kitty, are you hurt? Are you okay? Are you still choking? Can you breathe?!”
“It don't hurt none,” squeaked Catnap, shrinking into its own fur. “I… I want to tell yoo…”
Dogday, with a paw on his head, managed to wriggle up so he sat like a human. “You… want to tell me something?”
“I be trying to tell,” Catnap said miserably. Its tail moved again - and Dogday had to remind himself that it is not good when a cat’s tail wags. “I want to. But I got a-scared. I don’t want yoo to not like me.”
“Poor, poor kitty,” the biology teacher said. She sounded genuinely sympathetic.
“Pleese don’t be mad,” the kitty begged. It put its paws over its head and looked like it wanted to bury a very deep hole and crawl into it and never be seen again.
Now, Dogday may not have understood what on earth ‘poppy gas’ was, or why it was in Catnap’s lungs in the first place. He saw the zipper that cut along Catnap’s chest - Dogday had that exact zipper, too. Though their contents may be different, they were still buddies. And it looked like poor Catnap had no one else to talk to.
Dogday’s heart broke a little for his friend.
He shook his head a couple of times to try and clear the weird feeling that the red smoke had induced. “Catnap?” he said softly. “I want to tell you something.”
Catnap was visibly shivering. It kept sneezing up more and more clouds of poppy gas in its anxiety, and the teacher kept sweeping them away.
Dogday tried to stand up and instead fell onto its gut. Oof! Its face landed on Catnap’s front paws, and the cat went to instinctively jerk them away. But Dogday held onto them.
He looked into the kitten’s eyes and smiled.
“I’m not mad at you.”
“Yoo… aren’t-t-t-t?”
“No! Never! Of course not! You’re my friend and I love you and I love your purple fur and your little necklace and the way you sometimes trip over your words but you try so hard to get them right anyway! You’re still my friend, Catnap!”
Dogday hopefully licked the cat’s face.
Catnap shivered.
Then it mewled softly and rested its head on Dogday’s and licked him back.
“Fwend?” it said hopefully.
Dogday grinned. “Yes! Friend! We’re friends!”
“YAY!”
The biology teacher nodded approvingly. “Now, if you two don’t mind, my sisters and I must prepare for this afternoon’s lessons… Did you know that there are 60,000 miles of blood vessels in the human body? For comparison, the Earth around the equator is almost 25,000 miles!”
Dogday’s eyes widened. “Wow, the Blud is big!”
Catnap giggled. “Blud.”
“Hey - hey! Wait!” The two toys were ushered gently out of the school, but Dogday had a final question that he just absolutely had to know. It was the same sort of intense emotion that he only felt when he saw a tree in a park. “Miss Biology Teacher!”
The doors opened. “Yes?”
“What’s your name?”
“My name,” she answered as her sisters smiled and waved goodbye to their new fluffy friends, “is Miss Delight, and this is for you.” She bent down, and Dogday noticed that her skin was actually a pale yellow - not like any human skin he’d ever seen. And her joints were visible! Still, that made him feel a little better. “Are either of you hungry?”
Could - could it be -?
Was that -?
STEAK?!
And CHICKEN?!
“THANKYOUSOMUCHWOOFWOOFBYEMISSDELIGHTBYETEACHERSTHANKYOUSOMUCHSEEYOUBYE!!!!!”
“Bye,” said Catnap, snorting up a little bit of poppy gas in its desperation to grab the chicken.
Yet it seemed not even the strangeness of the gas could sever Dogday’s love for his bestie.
And what an awesome bestie Catnap turned out to be.