Chapter Text
The stomping of her heavy hooves resonating in the ground, the sweat dripping off her chin. Katie B has once again found herself in a situation to big for her to handle. She often bites more than she can chew. Like a horse, she is wild and free, but of course this impatient behavior leads to consequences.
The ache in her thighs cause her knees to buckle, tripping over nothing. She screams as loud as she can as a way to draw attention to herself, her throat cracking, spit flying out. She gets back up again despite her body being used up, pushed to the limit. Its almost as if shes trying to get the whole island to come to her aid. If they knew, would they even show up? She pushes the thought away as she reaches a hand out, begging for the nearest waystone to come to her. Asking what she’s running from doesn’t fit anymore. The question now is what has she done. But really, what hasn’t she done? Create a mockery of her family? If you could even call it that. A makeshift promise sewn together with mismatched cloths and fabrics, like a truly loved toy. Despite the strangeness of it all, its what she holds deepest in her heart.
The sky gets darker. Katie crashes into the stone statue and hugs it tight. Hands of shadow graze her shoulder, but they never reach. When she opens her eyes, she is met with a comforting silence. The familiar humming of a strong power source soothes her mind. This place always gave her the creeps but shes been warming up to the green hues and coldness of Multi’s reactor. An alarm goes off and darts start firing at her.
“OW. MULTI ITS ME, DAMN.”
Her voice echoes through the lab. She calls out for the scientist, who is already aware of her arrival, and quite ticked off from her unannounced entry for that matter. He disables the darts from a control panel in his office and heads down to the entrance, making a mental note to update her permissions in his lab, seeing that she is now a frequent guest here apparently.
—
When he makes his way outside, the slight irritation that had overcome him previously immediately vanished, as a new sense fills his system. Panic. He sees her on the ground, laying on her stomach, spreading all four limbs in every direction. Sweat lingers through her clothes, which have been ruffled and stained from when her legs gave out earlier. Not to mention the dirt on her face.
“Kurwa, Katie, what happened?” He leans down to check on her disheveled state.
She doesnt respond, still attempting to catch her breath. She tries to stand, using Multi as leverage. The dirt on her knees seap into her now open wounds, burning into her skin. She sucks her teeth and lets out a small “ow” behind her breath.
“Are you okay? What the fuck happened?” He allows her to lean her body weight on him. Multi isn’t typically fond of closeness or physical touch, and Katie being drenched in sweat wasn’t helping, but he sets his priorities straight and trys to get her walking.
“I’m good! Just..” She thinks for a moment. “..took a little tumble is all!”
“What the fuck you mean a ‘tumble’? You’re fucking bleeding.”
It’s apparent to Katie on why he indulges into her obvious lies, and can’t really figure out why she’s lying in the first place, either to save herself from the embarrassment of almost getting caught by a dark worker, or just for the fun of it.
“Yeah I just- I was just playing around. Im good, really.”
“Nooo Katie, what the fuck did you do..” He massages the bridge of his nose, already feeling a headache coming in.
He always does that. That whiny voice when Katie does something stupid. And how he hides the disappointment on his face. It makes Katie feel like a puppy getting scolded. The way people go easy on her because they pity her. She knows she isn’t the smartest, or the strongest, but still. Maybe thats why she lies, to get multi off her back. Or in this case, her off his.
Thinking about this makes her instinctually shapeshift into her dog form, tucking her tail slightly between her worn out legs. Multi takes note of this, but only because he feels the fluff of her ear brush against his the side of his forehead. He lets out a sharp exhale at the sight of it. He isn’t particularly fond of this form of hers, it makes her vulnerable, being able to see the truth of her emotions, despite whatever expression she wears on her face.
And he’s embarrassed at the fact that it genuinely makes him feel bad when he sees her tail all tucked and scared-like, giving off the same effect Nacho gives when he gets all sad and pouty. He calms himself down and slowly leads her to one of the many rooms in his maze of a reactor.
Katie is still quite unfamiliar with each room, how to locate them, or even function the doors. The tech is advanced and it makes her feel like an old woman seeing how Nacho navigates the place with such ease. The room Multi brings her too is a room within a room, which would be unusual anywhere else. Katie just thinks it is his architectural design, but nobody really knows what he hides within these walls.
Shes been here before. It was the room with the operating table, or something like that. He sets her down on it and she complies, acting as a patient now. She doesnt really mind, she likes the attention anyway. And Multi is so hyper focused on the task at hand he doesnt notice the cheeky expression on Katie’s face. Yknow, the one she makes when she gets stuff for free. She watches closely as Multi examines her injuries, quickly rolling up the ends of her pants and presses a cloth on her knee to prevent further bleeding. He offers her another to wipe the sweat and dirt off her face and instructs her to hold down onto the cloths on her knees.
“Yes ssssir!” She replies cheerily, her content aura already lighting up the room a little.
But from the perspective of Multi, the air feels tense. He hears his heart pounding at his ear and his mind runs through possibilities of what caused her to appear out if the blue like this. He saw her earlier today, with Nacho too. They were discussing her position with the Dark Federation, and what tasks they’ve given her. All he knows was that she left planning on building them an HQ, and showing up here, hours later, with scrapes and bruises. Did they do this to her? Or did she really just “take a tumble”? Maybe the hostile nature of the nether did this. I mean, it is possible, the nether is very dangerous, especially for a woman like her. Despite his worries, he pushes all these thoughts away and throws on a pair of gloves.
Multi grabs a new cloth, downs it in water, and applies it softly to her aching knees to remove the dirt. Despite his gentle hands, she winces and squirms a little before settling down again.
Seeing her flinch, he decides to walk her through it, as to prepare her a little, like how any doctor would.
“I need to clean the dirt off or it will get infected. Please don’t move so that I don’t hurt you accidentally, okay? Stay still please.”
“Yeppers!”
He continues washing softly with soap and a damp towel, removing any unwanted debris. Once the area is fresh and clean he pats it dry and has Katie apply an ointment while he searches for bandages. He does all this without saying a word. The silence was a little awkward at first, but once she settled down, it felt comfortable. She never had anyone take care of her injuries in such a delicate matter before, and for a scrape nonetheless. If she hadn’t warped to Multi’s reactor, she probably would’ve tried to walk it off, letting it stay infected and picking at the injury.
When she was little, Don took care of her. He always pitied her. Always encouraging her to do better. The feeling of being cared for was familiar to Katie yet, different. Multi did not scold her the entire time like Don would, or make fun of her like Ash would. He took care of her without expecting anything in return. A different kind a family love, one she couldnt quite describe. It was a nice change of pace. He wraps the bandages around her knees in silence as Katie watches.
“Okay there. All better, yes?” He steps back and admires his work.
“Good as new!!” says Katie. The bandages were wrapped nicely around her leg, not too tight, not too loose.
“Good, good. Now I think, Katie, you should go home and wash but do it carefully so the bandages do not undo, okay?”
Ah right. She almost forgot. One of the Dark workers from earlier, most likely the administrator, had spotted Katie strolling around the central shopping district and asked her why the HQ had not built yet. As a response to that, she just straight up ran away, as fast as she can in an attempt to shake the worker of her tail, to no effect, because the motherfucker can fly. To no ones surprise, she procrastinated the task given and distracted herself with a million different side quests, and now the consequences of it was hunting her down. She was sure that the moment she leaves the reactor, they’d immediately pull her in for questioning, and she’d probably have to make up some bullshit lie that would only make things worse.
“Sooo.. about that.!” She begins, but only to be interrupted by sound of the door behind them opening.
Looking like he just rolled outta bed, Nacho, walks in, still wearing his jammies. Awww.
“NACHOOO BABY!!!!!!” She howls, hopping off the operating bed to say hi to her son.
“Ah, good morning Nacho. How was your sleep?” He walks over to Katie who is now carrying him over her shoulders, making him look up higher, extending his arm all the way to pat the top of his head.
“hi mama” he replies, a little delayed, as always.
“Hello baby!!!” Says mama.
“very good, dada”
“That is good! Mama hurt herself and I was just-” He gets cut off.
“mama stink”
The bluntness of his statement makes both parents giggle, and Katie sets him down. Multi continues his sentence through a giggle.
“Yes yes. Katie was just about to go home to wash off.”
“Right, so-“
“mama ew” Says Nacho, interrupting.
“So, about that,” She says through a laugh. She hears multi giggle a little as well.
“I’m.. gonna have to maybe probably stay here for a little bit.” That last part was spat out quickly, but Multi caught it.
“What??” His voice goes an octave higher, concern peaking through.
“Just for a little! I can’t go outside right now..” She says defensively.
“Why? Why? What,??”
“Ssso, the Dark Feds are after me right now because they can’t wait like five fucking minutes for me to finish the HQ. Like, damn.” She hasn’t even started btw.
“Oh my goddd, Katie..” He facepalms, too annoyed to look at her face right now.
There it is, that voice again. She placed a palm at the back of her neck, wiping off old sweat.
“I knowww, I know.. Just a few days!” She sucks through her teeth. “You won’t even know I’m here.”
Multi considers. Having Nacho here is already quite a distraction, and now Katie? The two of them combined are a disaster waiting to happen. But she’d be in even bigger trouble if the Dark Federation got a hold of her, all of them would.
“Okay, okay, okay, fine… Just stay out of my office when I’m working.”
He says hesitantly, already sensing the disaster waiting to happen.
Katie gasps, and a smile beams on her face. Despite being roughed up, and covered in grime, her smile still manages to light up the room in the way the morning sun peaks over bedsheets covers, blinding Multi, causing him to look away like a vampire hissing at the sun.
“Y’here that Nacho? Mama’s sleeping over!!!” She bends over to grab his little hands.
“yay yay yay yay yay” “sleepover”
He flatly says through his little voice box, his body doing the talking for him, as he jumps and sways in his Mama’s hands.
Multi is already starting to regret this decision.