Archive of Our Own

Witches do not exist.

This is something that the Crypton Future Media Institute of Magic Studies, or Crypton Institute for short, teaches all of its students.

They were rumoured and feared to be extremely strong magical beings, greedy for power no matter what the cost. It’s been said that one of the sure-fire ways of spotting a witch is to look for an oddly-coloured cat, which is most likely the keeper of her magic: a familiar.

Of course, no one knows if this is true; witches were supposedly exterminated long before the Institute was founded.

Which is why Len is understandably shell-shocked when he notices a small alley cat trotting within the school compounds, its fur the colour of spring leaves.

“No way,” he says to himself, adjusting his grip on his school bag and hurrying to get a better look. As if realizing it’s being followed, the cat moves faster, bounding towards the white fence surrounding the school garden.

The boy curses when the animal leaps through a hole in the fence, inspecting the gap anxiously. It’s close to the ground and looks a bit small, but the space should be just big enough for at least a high school student to fit through.

Usually students aren’t allowed inside the garden unless they have permission to, but considering that he’s in the good graces of practically all of his lecturers, he supposes he can slip in and out for a little while.

Besides, what’s the worst that can happen?

With that thought in mind, Len ducks his head, carefully crawling his way through the hole in the fence.

For some reason the fence almost seems like a never-ending tunnel, leaving him a little disorientated when he emerges on the other side.

“Now, time to find that cat,” Len mutters, looking around. Huh, the school garden seems a lot bigger than he’d initially thought—maybe they’ve planted some new monster plants that’s way above his head.

It’s when he attempts to walk forward that he stumbles, landing on his side.

“What the—?” Len frowns, peering down his front to look at his legs. Or, what used to be his legs, considering that they’re now his hands—or rather, paws.

“Oh,” he says. “Oh, shit.”

This cannot be happening, he despairs, craning his neck back to look at himself. Dark yellow fur, small body, swishing tail—oh, shit, this is really happening.

He’s turned into a cat.

But how is that even possible? He hasn’t chanted or sung a single spell, or come into contact with a magical being—

That goddamn familiar!

Len scowls. He should’ve known this kind of thing would happen—this is like a typical curiosity-killed-the-cat kind of thing, except now it’s more of a curiosity-turned-him-into-a-cat scenario.

If that’s the case, though, that would mean the only way to reverse this spell is to look for that familiar. (Which is technically what landed him in this predicament in the first place, but whatever.)

“Dammit,” the boy-turned-cat grumbles, struggling to right himself up. It’s a little difficult trying to work with four limbs when you were born with two.

Just as Len finally manages to stand up and get the hang of walking, a shadow falls over him.

Rin hums a slow melody to herself as she leafs through her spell-book, seated under the shade of a large tree. She usually volunteers to help Ms Gumi whenever she has some time to spare after school, but currently the green-haired gardener is taking quite a while to get her supplies—wait.

Did she just hear a meow?

She cuts off her humming abruptly as she looks up, eyes surveying the area.

Oh, another meow!

The girl sets aside her book and hops to her feet, quietly making her way towards the general direction of the sound, where was it, it’s somewhere around here—ah.

“So I wasn’t hearing things, after all,” Rin laughs, peering down at the cat. It blinks up at her with large blue eyes, the tufts of yellow fur on its head sticking up like a bunch of bananas. “I’m going out on a limb here to guess that you’re a male...”

She bends over to pick up the kitty, squishing him to her chest in a hug. “You’re so cute,” she coos, gently ruffling his fur. Funny, the cat’s cheeks seem to be dusted pink, as though blushing. “Where’s your owner, little kitty? Do you have one?”

The animal meows, and Rin nuzzles him, her smile gaining a troubled edge. “I’ll take that as a no, huh.”

What should she do with him? Ms Gumi would flip if she found out there was a cat roaming around her precious garden, and it’s getting late, so it wouldn’t do to just send him away...

“How about I take you home, hm? How does that sound, little kitty?”

He hasn’t been here for ages, Len knows, but the warm orange of the walls, the general untidiness with clothes strewn randomly and desk littered with papers, the soft, fluffy bed in the corner—

Everything is just as he remembers it to be in Rin’s bedroom.

Of all people, though, the blond really hadn’t expected to have bumped into her, but in hindsight, he really should’ve. After all, who else would willingly help around in the garden for extra credit or some equally nerdy shit like that?

Just then, Rin re-enters the room with a saucer in her hands. “Here, have some milk, I just warmed it up,” she says, placing it on the floor near his paws.

Len leans down to lap at it, his cheeks heating as he notices her watching him with a gentle smile. You shouldn’t be so nice to me, he wants to snap, wants to stop drinking the milk. What are you, a Disney princess?

He finishes the milk anyway, not leaving a single drop behind.

The girl beams and leans over, presumably to pull him into another tight hug, but he backs away warily—he can still remember the first time she did it in the garden, and god was that embarrassing.

She was really soft, and definitely not as flat as he’d always mocked her to be.

Rin’s features settle into an expression of faint confusion, before she giggles, smoothing his fur over kindly. “Alright, alright. I don’t have any box for you to sleep in right now, so let’s share the bed, okay?”

“We can share the bed!” The blonde squeaked, patting the space beside her on her fluffy bed. Her locks were tousled from sleep, framing her round face prettily. “C’mon, there’s more than enough room!”

He flushed, wringing his hands as he looked between the bed and his sleeping bag on the floor. Her parents were still asleep, but— “A-are you sure...?”

“What’s the point of a sleepover if we’re not sleeping together?” She huffed, pulling him to her with a tug of his hand. After a bit of a struggle with the blankets, the two elementary school friends finally managed to snuggle together in her bed.

They were so close that Len could feel her warm breath fan his face, could count the specks of light glittering on her lashes. Without thinking, he leaned forward and pressed a soft kiss to her lips.

Rin stirred momentarily, her cheeks pinking as she peered at him. “Len, what—”

“I, uh, I just—it was a goodnight kiss!” He blurted as he jerked back, embarrassed. “Yeah, a goodnight kiss!”

Len blinks once, twice. Lifts his head up to see that the occupant of the bed hasn’t come back from school, and sighs.

That’s the third dream in a row now, he thinks, stretching his back out with a yawn. It’s barely been a few days since he’s turned into a cat and somehow ended up rooming with Rin, and already his mind is guilt-tripping him with memories he’d shared with her.

Yeah, he had a big crush on Rin in the past, sure, sue him. But that was back when they were still pretty tight and his popularity amounted to nothing.

Now, things are different—he’s the top of the cohort, the best strategist when it comes to sound wave manipulation. She’s the nerdy one who studies and studies but still can’t score well because her music puts people into comas.

There’s a reason why the guys Len hang out with like to talk trash about her so much, after all—why they sneer at her meekness, her failures, her figure.

(Even though she’s really, really filled out a lot more than he’d felt—uh, thought. Those embarrassing strip-from-pyjamas-to-uniform changes she does in front of him to get to school on time are more than enough proof, but he’ll take this information to his grave if he has to.)

They’re too different, he repeats to himself, reminds himself, his tail swishing behind him in agitation. That’s why they’re not friends anymore. That’s why he distanced himself from her.

They’re just... living in two different worlds now.

She breathes in, and starts out with an airy, wistful note, singing a lovely melody that waltzes over your head and settles around your shoulders warmly, allowing tingles to spread in your chest. There’s power hidden in her quiet confidence, shaking the tiny figurines she has on her desk.

The cat curled up beside her watches with a curious gaze, head tilted a handful of degrees. He’s her audience of one, but he’s the one that matters, Rin supposes. She’s grown quite attached to him over the course of a week and a half, but still can’t quite think of a name that suits him.

She had, however, marked the kitty as hers with one of her favourite silky-white ribbons, having tied one around his neck in a tiny bow in place of a collar.

When her song ends, the girl smiles down at her pet from where she’s seated cross-legged on the bed. “How was it?” She asks, face flushed from exertion and eyes glittering like stars. “Did you feel sleepy?”

More than anything, Rin tries so hard because she wants to improve. Not to spite others for looking down on her, but for herself.

She doesn’t quite know why, but there’s something about her cat’s expression that seems to soften considerably. He pads over to rub his head against her knee, purring quietly, as if saying, Don’t worry, you did well.

Perhaps even saying, I love you, but at this point she thinks she’s probably reading too much into a cat’s simple mannerisms.

But Rin assumes she must be doing something right, at least.

The blond paces back and forth in her room, trying to fight down the swell of panic rising in his chest as the strips of light filtering through the window grows darker with each passing hour.

She’s late, even by Rin standards. Where is she?

He jumps when the bedroom door creaks open—my, he hadn’t heard her unlocking the front door—and sees the girl standing in the doorway, dripping wet from head to toe.

Len looks at her with some degree of confusion, while she offers him a smile—faint, tired, but still so very kind.

“Hey, little kitty,” she greets, settling her bag down in its usual corner. It’s wet too, but not soaked to the bone like her. “I’m sorry I’m home late today; are you hungry?”

“What happened,” he says, his demand coming out as a sharp meow. “Who did this to you?” There’s no way in hell she’d drench herself on purpose.

Rin’s smile falters. She takes a seat on a chair gingerly, running a hand through her hair and sending small droplets of water flying. “I—I was worried,” she admits. “About... Len.”

He stares. What—?

“See, he hasn’t come to school for two weeks now,” the girl explains as she worries her lower lip, which has an insistent little sore. “I just—Len’s an old friend, and we don’t talk anymore, but I still—care. I still care for him.”

She pauses to let that sink in, before continuing haltingly, “No one else seems to know anything, not even our lecturers, so I thought... I thought I could ask his friends.”

Oh dear god, he thinks, the dread pooling in his stomach freezing to ice instantly. You didn’t.

“I did,” Rin admits, as though hearing his thoughts. “They said they didn’t know, and started—well, they started talking about how I’m still hung up over him. And because I approached them when they were washing hands, they sort of... yeah.”

Len can piece together the rest, but he doesn’t say a word—he knows full well what assholes Kaito and Gakupo can be, and the whole thing is making him feel sick.

“I don’t mind being... teased,” she says, folding her hands in her lap and fiddling with her fingers. “I can take that, I’m used to it. I’m just afraid Len will get the short end of the stick when he returns to school.”

Len can’t even begin to comprehend the way her brain works. How is it that she can still think of him when she’s the one who got bullied?

And he’d laughed, he remembers miserably. He’d laughed right along with his friends to poke fun of the one girl who’d done absolutely nothing wrong. He’d abandoned her for fame, for popularity. Blinded by his own arrogance and stupidity.

They’re too different, yes—but only because he’ll never be able to be as kind or selfless as her.

Len pads off towards a stack of clean clothes and grabs a towel with his mouth, before returning to drop it into her lap with a soft meow of comfort.

It’s the least he can do for now.

“So how have your studies been?” the green-haired gardener asks conversationally, checking on a patch of noisily-snapping carnivorous plants. There’s a smudge of dirt on her cheek that Rin would point out to anyone else, but she knows the lady couldn’t care less about it.

Ms Megpoid Gumi, better known as just Ms Gumi, is probably the most normal person Rin has befriended on campus. She’s the once-in-a-blue-moon case of being born with no powers at all, and tends to the school garden with her own two hands—a mind-boggling feat considering the sheer size of the garden.

“Pretty good, actually,” Rin replies cheerfully, extracting nectar from some delicate flowers. “I’m getting better at offensive waves, and I’ve gained better control over my own magic!”

The older lady laughs. “No more knocking people out cold?”

“Ms Gumi,” Rin pouts, placing the vial of sweet nectar into a box for safekeeping. “And no—well, I still can if I want to, but I’m able to control the sound of my lullabies to make people fall asleep instead... Oh, I’m done with collection, by the way, is there anything else you need help with?”

Ms Gumi peers over her shoulder to look at the box, then sweeps her gaze over the garden once. “Hm... there’s not much left to do today—why not you go ahead and take a break first? I’ll call for you when I’m done.”

Rin springs to her feet, heading back to her usual spot under the large tree. Her school bag is sitting in the shade untouched, with her school blazer sitting in an undignified heap nearby.

“Little kitty?” She calls quietly, and a pair of large, blue eyes peek out from between the folds of the blazer.

Normally she wouldn’t dare to bring a pet to school, let alone to the garden, but he’s been hell-bent on sneaking into her school bag these days—and the blonde doesn’t notice him until much later in the day. She’s still perplexed by the whole thing, but at length she guesses he’s bored or looking for something.

After a quick glance at Ms Gumi, Rin picks up the kitty in her blazer carefully and lowers them both into her lap, stroking a hand over his fur. It’s a pretty slow afternoon, so she decides a quick shut-eye couldn’t hurt.

Just as the blonde’s about to doze off, she senses the cat stirring beneath her fingers, meowing sharply and struggling to break free.

“Wh—little kitty, what’s wro—eep!” Rin squawks, jolting at the sensation of his warm tongue licking softly at her palm. He seizes the opportunity to squirm out of her grasp, scampering off towards god-knows-where.

When thoughts start registering again, the first thing that comes to mind is, Oh, no. Ms Gumi’s going to kill me.

And then she takes off after the cat.

That familiar, Len chants in his head as he ducks under low branches and jumps over tree roots, eyes locked on the spring-leave coloured target somewhere in front of him. It’s that goddamn familiar!

After the girl came home drenched for his sake, his motivation to look for the stupid green cat had somehow shifted from I-don’t-want-to-be-a-cat-dammit to I-don’t-want-to-worry-Rin-anymore—and he’s been on the lookout for the familiar since then.

In his blind chase after the cat, he doesn’t realize that a familiar shade of pearly white has come into view, where an equally-familiar human-sized hole can be seen right up ahead.

The green-coloured cat looks back at him for a moment, tail swaying tauntingly, before disappearing from his field of vision.

“Not this time, damn you,” Len snarls. There’s only one direction that bewitched creature could’ve sneaked off to, and he’s not going to let it off the hook after coming so far.

Without another thought, he leaps after the cat through the hole in the fence.

Her shoes thud against the gravel as she hurries along the path, intent on finding her cat before Ms Gumi does. She could’ve sworn he ran this way... Where could he be—?

“Urgh...”

Rin jerks her head at the sound of a drawn-out, strangled groan, screeching to a halt just a few strides away from the fence surrounding the garden. It sounds like it’s coming from behind the fence, she notes, and creeps over as quietly as she can to investigate.

“Um, hello?” She calls warily in her approach, dried leaves crunching with every step she takes. “Little kitty, is that you?”

The fence is a fair bit taller than the girl, primarily meant to keep small creatures out of the garden rather than humans, but it’s just enough for her to stand on the tips of her toes and for her head to peer over the top of the fence—

And for her to splutter at what she finds.

“L-Len? Oh my god, Len, are you alright?” Rin squeaks, wide-eyed. The boy who’s been missing from school for two weeks or so is currently sprawled on the ground, dishevelled and covered in twigs and leaves.

He blinks up at her. Shrieks a little, covering himself with his hands, as though expecting himself to be in his birthday suit, before relaxing as he realizes he’s back in his school uniform again, as if nothing has ever happened.

And then he does a double-take, like he can’t believe he’s human, or something—but perhaps she’s reading too deeply into things again.

“Rin,” the blond says, scrambling to his feet. He runs towards the fence and jumps over the top of it, barrelling into the girl and enveloping her into a hug without missing a beat. “Oh, god, Rin.”

She blinks, perplexed, and slowly reaches her arms up to pat his back lightly. It’s a little strange hugging someone who’s done nothing but ignore you for the past couple of years or so, especially when he’s gotten a lot taller ever since. “Um, yes...?”

“I’m sorry, okay?” Len rambles, his voice muffled. “I’m sorry for being so shitty to you, for being an all-round jerk and pushing you around with Gakupo and Kaito, I wish I could take it all back, I’m just so, so sorry—”

“Woah, Len, um, I forgive you, okay? Just calm down for a sec—”

“I love you.” He peels away and grasps her by the shoulders, resting his forehead against hers with a short exhale of air. “I love you, Rin.”

The girl flushes, officially bewildered beyond belief. Sure, there’s a bubbly sense of warmth welling in her chest at his words, but what made him so remorseful for whatever he’s done to her?

She ducks her head and lowers her eyes, not wanting to meet his intense gaze in her embarrassment, and—wait a minute.

Oh. Oh, I get it now.

Rin’s confusion melts to an expression of understanding and realization. She leans up to wrap her arms around him, fingers brushing against the silky-white ribbon still tied loosely around his neck.

“I love you too, little kitty Len,” she mumbles, her smile soft like starlight as she presses her lips to his.

“Ah, young love,” Ms Gumi sighs dreamily, leaning against the wooden handle of her rake as she watches the two students from afar. “Isn’t it just the most precious thing?”

A quiet meow of agreement pipes up from behind her, and she laughs, turning to beam at a cat with fur the shade of spring leaves. “Yes, Gumiya, you played your part pretty well too.”

With the snap of her fingers, a cloud of smoke unravels around the bewitched creature, and when the haze dissipates, a tall, willowy young male with odd-coloured hair is standing in its place.

He walks over to encircle her in his arms, propping his chin on her shoulder contemplatively. “I thought you swore you wouldn’t use your magic to interfere with others, though.”

“Well, Rin’s always the exception,” Ms Gumi says. “I mean, she deserves love and happiness the most among all these selfish humans, don’t you think?”

Gumiya breathes a sigh that’s equal parts exasperated and fond, tickling the shell of her ear. “And so this sneaky little witch decides to play Cupid.”

“Yep!” She chirps with a mischievous grin, turning to cup his cheek and bring his lips to hers for a sweet, fleeting kiss.

“With the help of her trusty familiar.”