Work Text:
The moment Barou steps into the place, setting his bag neatly into the lockers, a loud, familiar bark catches his attention.
He turns around to see his mother standing there, a tiny rottweiler held in her arms.
“Shouei, could you look after some of the new rescues for a bit? I need to give Eiji here a bath.”
“Yeah,” he replies, reaching up to tie his hair. He’ll need to wash his hands and clock in first, but he’ll be ready in no time.
The animal shelter he’s currently in is owned by his family, more so specifically by his mother. They have two full-timers and a few part-timers that come and go, but overall, his mother does everything. Taking care of the animals, admin work, promotional events… Barou got his work tendencies from her for sure, with how she’s always pushing herself.
Anyway, after that one time he went bowling in Shibuya, Barou returned home to catch up with his family. He has a little under two weeks free, so he came back here to do what he’s always done in his spare time—helping his mother out at the shelter.
It’s not too difficult. He prefers cleaning up feeder bowls and changing the beddings and whatnot, but the animals aren’t too bad either.
When Barou is prepared and ready, he walks into the room where the new rescues should be, careful to ensure he locks the gate properly. Immediately after he steps in, he’s able to tell what kind of ‘clients’ he’s working with from one simple glance.
The first and most excitable one is a small golden retriever. Well, small for now. Barou can already picture the size it’ll grow to with proper care. It bounces up to him, barking over and over, and he squats down to press a finger to its nose. “Shush. You’re being noisy.”
The retriever doesn’t quite quiet down, but it does irritate the black bobtail cat lounging in the corner, enough for it to get up and walk off. The retriever barks again, chasing after the cat, and—
Ugh. Okay. It’s this kind of batch.
Barou squares up, hands coming out, and gets ready to do some disciplining.
“Shouei,” his mother calls, popping her head in the room, “is everything okay? Oh.”
Barou looks up from where he’s leaning against a beanbag, exhaustion in his veins. There’s two animals currently on him—the retriever, who is finally taking a nap, and a larger bengal cat that runs way too fast for his own good. It got excited by the chase that the retriever was putting up, and—
Yeah. He’s tired. This is why he prefers cleaning.
“I’m always so impressed by how well you tame them,” his mother laughs as she enters. She lets go of Eiji, who trots up to Barou with a happy, quiet yip, like it knows that it needs to be softer. This is why Eiji is Barou’s favourite.
The bengal cat lifts its head, nudging Barou’s hand. Maybe he should start giving all of them names, because calling them by their breeds is getting annoying…
“Princess,” Barou says, tapping the bengal cat’s head. “You’re Princess. Because you run too fast.”
From his peripheral vision, he sees his mother frowning in confusion, but he doesn’t bother to explain.
The noisy retriever is given the name Hachi, for bee, because it reminds Barou of a certain buzzy boy who won’t shut up. The black bobtail that hissed at him when he tried to coax it out of its hiding spot and knocked over a scratching post—which Barou was really annoyed about—is The Destroyer. The Shiba Inu that smiles like an angel but barks back at The Destroyer with twice as much ferociousness is Donkey. And lastly, the white ragdoll cat that has been chilling on a hammock for the entire ordeal, not moving a muscle even when Barou tries to get it down, that’s Shiro.
(Originally, Barou wanted to call it Lazy Bum, but his mother said that nobody is adopting a cat named Lazy Bum, so.)
Princess chooses this moment to get off his lap, walking over to one of the cat beds and laying there instead. Which makes Barou wrinkle his nose, because he still hasn’t cleaned all the beds and their cages and their feeder bowls, but whatever. He doesn’t think he can make Princess budge anyway.
“I’ll watch over them for the next hour. Go have your lunch,” his mother says. When he stands up, she pats his shoulder, giving him a sweet smile. “Thanks a bunch, Shouei.”
“Yeah, yeah,” he mutters, leaving the room and hiding a smile.
For the next few days, Barou works.
It’s quite routine, actually—clock in, feed, walk the dogs, clean, feed, maybe talk to some customers, clean some more…
It’s only about a week in, when Barou is arriving back from a walk with Hachi and Donkey, that his peaceful routine comes crashing down.
He’s coming in from the entrance at the back, ushering the two dogs in and bending down to take off their leashes, when a disgustingly familiar voice calls, “Oh, Barou!”
Barou freezes, glancing up.
Isagi and Bachira stand before him, both dressed in casual clothes and peering at him with curiosity in their eyes. They’ve both got clips on their shirts that indicate that they’re visitors, and not customers looking to adopt.
Still. Why are they here?
“What are you two doing here?” he asks as much, unable to keep the reluctance out of his voice. This is his family’s place. He doesn’t need these people trespassing.
Before either of the other two can reply, Hachi barks, leaping onto Isagi with its paws digging into his shirt. To Isagi’s credit, he reacts quickly, catching Hachi with a stuttered laugh.
“Aww,” Bachira coos, squatting down to be more at eye level with the animals. “This is so cute! Barou-chan, I didn’t know you worked here!”
“I do not,” Barou denies. And then, for good measure, he adds, “Get out.”
“What? We just got here!”
“And we booked the visiting slots beforehand,” Isagi says, ever the smartass. As if Barou needs him to tell him that.
He grunts, not much else to say. Scooping up Donkey and also taking Hachi from Isagi, Barou turns on his heel and heads to the room where they’re supposed to be at. Then he gets to work, getting their lunch ready and clearing the litter.
His attempt at getting his peace back shatters once more when he hears footsteps running up to him, stopping right outside the gate. “Hey, Barou-chan!”
Barou takes a deep breath. Yelling would scare the rescues. Instead, he grits his teeth hard and turns around, politely asking, “What.”
“I want to see the other rescues,” Bachira says, undeterred by his tone.
Damn it. Technically speaking, visitors are allowed in this area—it promotes exposure to the rescues, for one, and it increases the chances of them getting adopted. In fact, Barou’s mother encourages it and is probably the one who directed them here.
But the fact remains that Barou does not want to be dealing with this.
“It’s their lunch time,” he finally says with a huff. “Come back after.”
He does not mean it as an invitation. By the time the animals eat, Isagi and Bachira’s visiting hours should be up. This is a sure-fire, effective method to get them away, so Barou can continue with his regular routine until he has to return to Blue Lock and see all these numbskulls again—
“Okay!” the two idiots chorus, accepting his words like the gospel.
Huh. That’s easier than he thought it’d be. Suspicious.
Barou just grumbles under his breath.
“Gotcha,” Barou hisses when he finally catches Princess in his grasp, fingers digging into its fur and preventing it from further escape. It yowls and kicks up a fuss when Barou lifts it into the air, but at least it doesn’t bite. The mark he got from The Destroyer last night is still on his wrist, and he’s been really annoyed about the way it stung when he tried to wash his hands this morning. Stupid cats.
“Why can’t you be more like Shiro?” he scolds, jerking his head at the lazy white cat. “At least Shiro doesn’t complain when I give it a bath.”
Princess just meows in his face. Stupid.
Out of nowhere, Hachi jumps up, racing between his legs and past him. Barou almost falls over while Hachi barks rapidly, jumping and making a big fuss overall, and Barou turns around with another scolding on the tip of his tongue when—
Outside the window, four heads jerk backwards and out of sight, but it’s too late. Barou has already spotted them.
With a crease between his eyebrows, Barou sets Princess down and ushers it to the side. It goes to bother Donkey, so that’s fine. Then he marches up to the window, picks up Hachi in firm grip so it doesn’t get any funny ideas, and opens the window, poking his head out.
Indeed, Isagi, Bachira, Chigiri, and Nagi are crouched right outside, their hands held over their heads like that would somehow make them invisible.
“Oi…” Barou says, a warning more than a greeting. “What the hell do you four think you’re doing?”
A giggle bursts its way past Bachira’s lips. That sets Chigiri off too, who presses his hand to his mouth to badly muffle his laughter. Isagi hisses at them to shut up, trying to hit Chigiri, except he ends up hitting Nagi, who yelps and topples over.
Ugh. Barou’s head is beginning to hurt.
Hachi barks again, pawing at the windowsill, its tongue hanging out in excitement. Chigiri gets up first and drags Nagi up with him, cooing at Hachi. “Aww! What a cutie!”
“There’s more of them inside,” Isagi tells him, pointing past Barou’s frame.
“Mm… Oh, that cat is cute! My sister’s been looking to adopt one.” Chigiri points to The Destroyer, who’s resting in a corner with its tail curled around its body. Barou supposes it does look all cute and harmless like that.
“It bites,” he tells Chigiri with a sneer, then slams the window close on all of them.
His momentary solution is shattered when he sees the four of them entering the shop together, all with visitor passes clipped to their clothes. This time, it’s late afternoon, so Barou doesn’t have the excuse of feeding the animals, or doing anything with them, really. It’s supposed to be their nap slash play time. This is the perfect time for visitors.
He grunts as Bachira shoves past him, hands outstretched towards The Destroyer like he has some kind of death wish. It triggers The Destroyer to try and scratch him, exactly like what Barou expected, but Bachira somehow gets away with a quick dodge, giggling the whole time.
“Heh,” Nagi snorts, pointing at Barou’s injury. “Bet you didn’t manage that.”
Barou closes his eyes and imagines a metal pole falling onto Nagi’s big head.
By the time visiting hours are almost up, the four of them have made themselves home in the room, and Barou has completely given up on chasing them out.
None of them are particularly good with animals, but there have been no casualties so far, so Barou regretfully counts that as a win. He left a while ago, leaving them to their own devices so he may attend to his other responsibilities. By the time he returns, there is a cuddle pile in the centre of the room, Nagi stuck in the middle and Chigiri gleefully snapping pictures.
"Oi, donkeys," Barou calls. "Visiting hours are up. Get out."
"Can't," Nagi calls from where he's at. Princess is curled up on his lap, and he's lazily entertaining Hachi with a dog toy. "I'm stuck here."
"You weigh at least ten times more than those animals, you numbskull." He opens the gate, narrowing his eyes when Hachi perks up and whips its mischievous little head over. Barou quickly shuts it close before it can get any ideas.
Without any more preamble, Barou marches over and tugs Princess off of Nagi's lap. He expects a bit of a fight, but Princess just curls up into his arms with a content meow, and Barou breathes a sigh of relief.
"Oh my," Chigiri says, angling his phone over. "That's so cute. Barou, smile!"
"Hah? Hell no—" He's cut off when something leaps onto his shoulder, four paws digging into the flesh and struggling to hang there. Barou grunts, dropping to his knees before whichever pesky animal that is can fall off his frame. A quick tilt of his head tells him that that's Donkey. Of course.
"I finally got it!" someone says from the other side of the room. When Barou turns his head, he's mildly, and reluctantly, impressed to see Isagi holding up The Destroyer, fingers wrapped around its lithe body. The Destroyer hisses, but it doesn't scratch. Does that thing just hate Barou personally?
"Oh, let me get the other one," Bachira gasps when he notices what's happening. He reaches for the hammock, plucking Shiro from its spot. It does not wake even when Bachira comes over and dumps it onto Barou's lap.
"What is this?" Barou asks, noticing Hachi start to crawl over. "What— wait—"
Chigiri flips his camera to selfie mode, holding it up, and it's only through the screen does Barou see the other idiots crowding behind him, giggling to themselves. Before he knows it, a few pictures are being snapped, and he's completely trapped between the mess of animals and people surrounding him like a cage.
As Chigiri shows them the photos in delight, promising to send it to all of them, Barou peels the animals off of him and finally yells at them to get out.
"Were those your friends, Shouei?"
Barou glances at his mother, who is finishing up with some paperwork. When he looks out the door, he can still see the other four in the distance, chatting and laughing. He takes a clipboard from his mother, the visitor timesheet, and signs at the side to indicate that they've finally left. At the same time, his phone vibrates in his pocket, and he has a good guess as to who it is, but he refuses to open the message right now. Out of principle.
"No," he replies, pettily drawing an ugly cat next to Isagi's name, just because he can. "I don't know them."
"Sure." His mother accepts his response easily enough. "When are you returning to Blue Lock again?"
"This Friday, I think."
"Okay! I'll cook up something nice for dinner on Thursday, then." She gives him a knowing smile. "You should invite your friends. They seem like nice people."
Barou groans. "They're not my friends!"