The Great Escape
He wouldn't admit it even on his death bed, but he was worried. After coming home from work and finding an unusually quiet (and clean) apartment, it took him a few minutes to understand the implications. His roommate, Sakura was out, probably at one of her study groups. She was on med-track, and it took up most of her time. Sasuke was lulled into a false sense of security, believing that his lacking roommate was to blame for the cherished silence.
Plopping down on the couch, he sighed and stretched out his legs. It'd been a long day at work. Waiting tables wasn't all it was cracked up to be. Ten-hour shifts of sweet talking and forced-smiles to asshole customers who were never happy anyhow wasn't his idea of a good time. After all, the shit-hole he worked in wasn't exactly known for its rich and generous customers. He found himself stiffed most days, living paycheck to paycheck with no prospects in sight. Sighing, Sasuke reached for the remote, turning on the television and sifting through the channels listlessly. He stretched out his legs farther, propping them up onto the coffee table. He winced at the strain in his calves, pointing his toes forwards to deepen the stretch. After finishing his half-hearted pursuit of finding something to watch, he turned off the TV in defeat. He didn't really want to watch anything anyway, mostly turning it on out of habit.
Deciding to stop wallowing on the couch, he pulled himself upright, walking towards his bedroom slowly, feet protesting his weight. He froze when he realized that his door was open. Tentatively peeking into his bedroom, he scans his room for any sign of life.
"Goblin?" Sasuke called quietly. Hearing no response, he called again louder, a bit of panic seeping into his voice this time. "Goblin? Where are you?" No response.
Sighing in resignation, he pulls out his phone, dialing the first number that pops up on his favorites list. After three rings, the receiver is picked up and a distinctive voice answers.
"Sasuke? Why are you calling me? You NEVER call me. Do you need me to come home? What happened?" Her tirade got more and more frantic as she continued, finally ending when she had to pause to breath. Sasuke took full advantage of her predicament to get to the point.
"Sakura, did you go into my room while I was at work?"
"Only for a second! I was looking for my Anatomy and Physiology textbook and I couldn't find it anywhere! It was in my car, apparently, but I was desperate"
"Did you happen to think that maybe you should close the door when you were done?" Sasuke asked, his voice strained. There was a pause on the other end of the line. He could practically hear the gears in her head turning.
"Oh shit! Is Goblin okay? I'm sorry, I forgot to shut the door, didn't I? Did you find him? Oh my god Sasuke, tell me you found him!" Her outburst ended once more in a gasp for breath.
"No. I don't think he's in the apartment, and as you know, he's hard to miss."
"So he got out? Do you want me to come back and help you look for him?"
"Don't bother. You've got that test coming up."
"That's okay. I can always study later, right?"
"Sakura, your test is tomorrow." She had no response for that. With a huff and a sigh, she resigned herself to a few more hours of pouring over textbooks.
Sakura knew how much Goblin meant to Sasuke. He liked to pretend not to care about anything, especially the ridiculous cat, but she knew better. He'd found the cat three years ago, a kitten at the time, lacerations covering the poor little things body and one leg clearly broken. It had been dying in a back alley when Sasuke was on his way home. Hearing the whimpering just barely from the street, he'd walked into the alley and been horrified at what he'd seen. He immediately rushed it to the nearest emergency vet clinic and passed back and forth for over an hour as they worked on the poor thing. When the vet told him that the kitten would live, he felt his shoulders sag in relief. Having nothing else to do with the cat, he'd reluctantly brought it home and had him around ever since.
He'd stuck with calling him Kitten for the first few weeks as the poor creature was still recovering from its ordeal, but within a month, his true nature finally showed through: he was a hellion. For almost all hours of the day and night, Kitten would run wildly throughout the apartment, knocking over the Uchihas few potted plants and tearing at the corners of the apartment until they were all up and frayed. Sakura hadn't been pleased and neither had Sasuke, but neither had done anything about it, instead changing his name from the innocuous word Kitten straight to Goblin. The name fit perfectly, in looks and personality. The little ball of mischief was a sleek black, had extra pointy ears, and a longer nose than seemed normal. Goblin indeed.
It only took another few weeks before Sakura caught on to Sasuke's attachment to the cat. As she ranted and raved over a destroyed pair of sandals, scolding the scampering Goblin like a disobedient child, Sakura caught Sasuke smiling slightly at the little hellion. A few days after that, she caught the two of them curled up in bed together in one of Goblin's rare moments of calm, Sasuke gently petting the cat as he kneaded the covers. She'd been surprised to say the least, realizing she'd just have to get used to the shoe-eating, carpet-destroying little bugger.
Bringing herself back to the conversation, Sakura only sighed once more and contemplated coming back anyways. Deciding it'd be futile, she ended the conversation with a "Call me if you find him" and hung up, spirits low at the thought of the little furball out and about on its own.
In their apartment, Sasuke gnawed on his lower lip, a nervous habit, and stared towards the front door. Making a decision, he grabbed his keys off the coffee table and walked out the door, locking it behind him. Scanning the area in front of him, he wasn't quite sure what to do. Goblin had only gotten out once before and he'd noticed immediately and snatched him off the ground within the minute. It helped that the creature seemed to like him so he didn't put up much of a fuss. Deciding to just start walking around the apartment complex, he started down the stairs that led to the parking lot and just kept walking. When within an hour he hadn't found him, he started softly calling out his name, feeling slightly embarrassed. He wasn't one to call attention to himself at all, much less on purpose like this.
"Goblin?" Nothing.
"Goblin, you asshole. Get over here. It's getting dark out." Sasuke muttered, annoyed and worried. And it was. Dusk was making everything turn a dark grey, obscuring all of the hiding places for his also conveniently black cat.
With a sigh, Sasuke kept walking. He'd been doing that a lot today. With the long workday and the fact that he had to get up at seven the next day, he was reaching his last straw. Plus, his feet were still a bit sore from standing upright for so long and aimlessly walking around wasn't helping. Not that that stopped his search. Rounding another corner, he kept at it, circling around each corner of the complex, softly calling Goblin's name and hiding his growing anxiety perfectly.
After another twenty minutes of searching, the sun fully sets and it was too dark to see much of anything. Sighing once more, Sasuke leaned against the support beam of the covering of the parking lot, tilting his head back against the metal and closing his eyes. What if he never found him? What if Goblin was gone forever and Sasuke could do nothing about it? He felt his eyes burn at the thought but suppressed the emotion with a bit of effort. Heaving a sigh for the umpteenth time, Sasuke opened his eyes once more, tilting his head forward. His line of sight was conveniently level with one of the windows of an apartment on the first floor. He gave a cursory look to the potted plants on the window before he turned away only to freeze as his brain caught up with his eyes.
Whipping his head back around, his eyes widened at what he saw. There sat his cat, staring directly at Sasuke. Letting a small, relieved smile play across his lips he called to the cat.
"Goblin! Come here. I've been looking all over for you!" Goblin paid his words no mind, the slight tweak of his ear the only indication that he'd heard at all. Well, that and the fact that the window was obviously open. Sasuke felt a sense of foreboding when he realized that his cat was sitting in a rather large pile of dirt in the only spot on the windowsill in which a potted succulent didn't reside. Realizing the implications, he started forward, intent on grabbing the little hellion. Goblin, as if sensing his owner's intentions, bodily turned, knocking another pot to the floor with a crash, this time landing outside of the window. Sasuke cursed and made a grab for him, missing by a hair as the cat disappeared deeper into the apartment.
Sasuke reached his arm into the apartment, but couldn't feel the furball. Not sure what to do, he decided for the straightforward approach. Walking around the corner to the front door, he knocked loudly three times. After nearly a minute, he knocked a few more times. All the greeted him was a crash from somewhere within the apartment. Sasuke's eyes widened, knowing Goblin's penchant for destroying any and all household items. He had to get his cat out of there quickly, not so much because he was worried about his neighbor's worldly goods, but because he was worried what said person would do once he found Goblin in the ruins of his apartment.
He tried the knob, finding it locked. Darting around the side of the building once more, he quickly assessed his surroundings, finding himself alone. He shoved the window all the way into the open position, assessing the gap. It'd still be a tight squeeze. He picked up one of the plants next to the gap that Goblin had already created and began to wriggle his top through the window in an undignified manner. Once he was through up to his waist, he placed the plant gently onto the ground next to its broken counterpart, wriggling his hips through and balancing on his hands all while trying to avoid toppling any more plants.
He pulled one leg through with ease, the next one following with a bit more difficulty. He gave up all pretenses of even a smidge of grace when his foot knocked another plant onto his back, dirt pouring down his shirt. The unexpected weight on his back caused him to catapult face forward, landing directly onto the plant he'd tried to save. His foot was now stuck on the outside of the window, tweaked at a slightly unnatural angle while the rest of him sprawled on the pile of dirt all over the grey carpet. Groaning in pain, he twisted his body until he was lying on his back, slowly twisting his foot until it was free to move forward with ease into the apartment with him. Assessing the damage in the dark, he decided it was not even quite a sprain, still internally dreading work tomorrow.
Remembering where he was, Sasuke rolled over as quickly as possible, propping himself onto his hands and knees before pulling himself into an upright position, wincing as his ankle violently protested his actions.
"Goblin?" Sasuke called, limping forward with difficulty in the dark with a bum foot. Passing what looked like a kitchen, he saw a blur of pure black dart past him. Too slow to react, he didn't catch the hellion, but instead followed him down a hallway. Luckily, it looked like both doors were closed, leaving the cat trapped. Sasuke crept towards his prey, watching as the cat stared up at him in the dark. Apparently he wasn't going to put up much of a fight now that he'd had his fun.
Scooping up the cat, he turned to leave once more, striding purposefully towards the window. As he was bypassing the kitchen, he heard a lock turn in the front door. Freezing in terror, Sasuke ran forwards, completely forgetting about his injured foot. After putting his full weight on the strained appendage, Sasuke began his downward descent. There was nothing for him to do but cradle Goblin safely in his right arm while his left flailed frantically to find a way to stop his fall. It found such a place on the unfortunate carnage on the windowsill, knocking the rest of the pots to the floor before finally finding purchase on the already broken pottery, cutting into his arm. Even this wasn't enough to stop his descent, causing him to fall on the floor into even more broken pots and soil, pricking his skin in multiple locations.
He was finally stationary on the floor when the door flew open, light clicking on without any preamble.
"What the fuck are you doing inside my apartment?!"