Title: Recalling Fond Memories
Author: Eeevee
Genre and Rating: Angst/Action/Adventure; M for CD and language
Disclaimer: As much as I absolutely adore Petshop of Horror, it's not mine. D, the other D, Leon, Chris, or Totetsu are not mine. Which is probably a good thing, considering I have some people I'd like T-chan to eat - Starting with my boss.
The lean, blond young man smiled as he chatted animatedly into the cell phone. Despite the fact that he just left a rather gruesome crime scene where the victim had been viciously torn apart by some sort of large canine, Chris was in a fairly good mood. His older sister, Josie, had just announced her engagement to a long-time sweetheart. Of course, his sister Sam had quite a bit to say about it, which meant some long, good-natured talks to calm her down.
"Hey, Orcot!"
"Sam, Sam, it'll be alright, okay? Mom and Dad have given their blessing, so it's cool. Besides, you know that Rob is a perfectly nice guy." There was a pause and Chris made a long-suffering face to his coworker. "Yeah, yeah, I love you too. Bye."
"She gave you the 'find a nice girl' lecture again?" His friend asked, sympathetic. Coffee exchanged hands and Chris sighed, "Like I have time for a girl."
"Yeah, the chicks don't exactly dig homicide either." Jaden added brightly, pulling out a lighter and tapping a cigarette into his palm. "But man, that was a gruesome one. Do you think wild dogs did it like they say?"
Chris shrugged, "Seems a bit too convenient if you ask me Jaden. Funny how the victim just happened to be hiking alone, especially when he isn't exactly known for his exercise prowess. Something had to have convinced him to leave his air conditioned haven and computer."
"Maybe it was just some bad luck." Jaden countered and took a drag. He looked at his friend from the corner of his eye, knowing what was coming next. It bothered him that Chris spent so much time obsessing over the china man who ran the pet store. So what if a few mangy mutts got loose and killed some overweight hacker? Did that mean that Count D was involved? "Dogs do sometimes get thrown from cars and shit. They form packs and go wild. Actually, didn't you hear about those dogs that attacked and killed those two toddlers right in someone's backyard? That must have been five years ago…"
"…So there's no way D was involved, right?" Chris finished with a harsh laugh. He crumpled the coffee cup and tossed it lightly into the trashcan to the left, "Is that what you were going to say?"
"Well, yeah. You obsess over that guy more than you do about getting a date or something. You're not—well, you know…?"
Chris glared, daring him to spit it out. Jaden looked at his own cup and took another soothing puff of drugged air. He flicked the butt down and crushed it underneath his boot heel.
"No. I'm not gay." Chris remarked stiffly, "I'd like to find out about my older brother, you know that. Except there's these funny coincidences where the Count keeps showing up. I'm a cop; how can I just ignore what's right under my nose?"
"Touchy." Jaden hissed putting his hands up in a gesture of submission. "Sorry man, that was over the line. Wanna go to the bar after work tomorrow then? We can play some pool and get wasted."
"No, I have some business."
"With that bloody china man I bet." Jaden grumbled, "Well, whatever, dude. You know where I'll be if you wanna catch up. Just don't bed him. Guys that are prettier than girls probably used to be one. Who knows what you'd catch."
Chris jutted his jaw and stalked off much in the manner his brother used to.
He easily took the winding side streets that curved and twisted towards his destination. Originally, he had come to find out what the Count knew about his brother. Leon had just… disappeared. Chris used to get letters every so often when he lived with his parents, but slowly they just stopped coming. The last one was dated ten years prior and came from somewhere in India. The message had been short and filled with discouragement.
Of course, when Chris had first knocked politely on the door, he didn't know what to expect. He wasn't expecting the Count D his brother knew, however, the young man that answered the door was so uncannily similar it creeped Chris out. And every time he entered the shop and the smell of sweet incense swept over him he felt a pang of nostalgia. Over the years, after being told over and over again that there were only animals in the shop and that he couldn't possibly have seen people, Chris started to wonder. He stopped talking about Pon and Tetsu and all his other playmates from when he was a lonely, repressed little boy living with his rough yet kind older brother and visiting the mysterious yet understanding Count D. Even so, he still wondered.
Even a child's overactive imagination couldn't have produced all those imaginary people and voices? What about the long, cheery conversations and the heated arguments? And did he really think girl? Because Pon was most certainly a female.
"Detective." The current count said genteelly and held the door open with his head in a half bow. He closed it behind Chris; "There are fresh cinnamon buns if you are interested. I am afraid I cannot speak for long, seeing as I have an engagement with an old friend of my father's."
Chris' ears perked at that. He was going to see one of Count D's old friends? Could it be someone that Chris knew?
The other man seemed to read Chris' eager thoughts because he gave an eerie smile that ghosted him predecessor and said, "Do you wish to join us? I believe you two have already met."
"Sure, why not." The blond replied, careful to keep the excitement out of his voice. It seemed he got overexcited about things like that. It was like his past was missing some huge chunk of his memory and he pined for it in some subconscious way. Or at least that's what Sam would say with her mumbo-jumbo psychology crap. "I don't work this evening."
"Well then, shall we meet in a half hour? I assume you would like to change…" The paler man suggested delicately, his own silk outfit hugging his form beautifully like a living cloth. Chris realized he probably looked like shit. And he didn't smell so hot either. A bit of blood and mud had tracked in on his trainers and leaves from the autumn leaves were tucked in the folds of his clothing and hair.
"Yeah, guess I better."
It didn't take too long to get home and take a burning hot shower. Chris absentmindly stripped and tossed his dirty clothing in a basket for his part time maid. He had decided a long time ago that he wouldn't let his apartment fall into the same slump as Leon's had. But he simply didn't have the time to clean his house, nor the inclination. That's where Lucy had been a godsend. She cleaned and anticipated his needs, even leaving him food to heat up when he got home from a really long shift.
'Almost like a wife,' he mused as he pulled a fresh, black tee shirt over his lithe frame and fumbled for some clean jeans. Lucy wouldn't mind being his wife either, if the hints she left were any indication.
Unfortunately for her, Chris just wasn't interested. Not to mention Sam absolutely loathed the other woman with a passion. It was sad to say, but Chris wouldn't dare hook up with anyone that Sam or Josie didn't approve of. To do so was just asking for hell.
He made it back to the pet shop in plenty of time. He played with a few kittens (which looks suspiciously like tigers to him) to kill some time. He missed his own cat, who had just passed away after thirteen years. He knew he would probably get another one, but replacing Rainbow so soon just seemed harsh. He would just have to work up the courage to step foot in the local animal shelter and see what was there. And hope he didn't come home with more than one. Or a dog, because he just didn't have time for a clingy mutt.
"Hey! Who are you?"
The kittens Chris was teasing hissed and fluffed up in surprise. They danced around with their backs arched and snarled at the intruder's ankles. The man looked far from impressed at their display and invited himself to sit on the couch adjacent from Chris.
The blond didn't flinch under the harsh, hard stare. Instead he gazed back with a lazy, impudent half-grin, looking over the guest, trying to remember if he knew the man from before.
"Jesus, you're just like your punk brother." The man snarled. He had a lean build, but his shirtless exposure showed smooth, well-toned muscles. Despite the lighter-than-usual frame, Chris seemed to know that this man was not a pushover. And it wasn't just his surly attitude.
"What?"
"Nothing." Chris answered, still eying the visitor. "Nothing at all."
"You don't remember me." The man said bluntly, "You humans. I should bite you, but I'm here on business."
"Should I remember you?" Chris asked in a neutral tone. He took a sip of some proffered tea that the count seemed to have left for the two. "You were one of D's pets, right? So…" The blond thought about it, sifting through the old, rotting memories of that year in his childhood. The one where he tore through the endless corridors and played with a whole host of understanding playmates. Or not so understanding ones. "Totetsu."
"So glad you bothered to remember my name." The creature growled huffily. Even though, somehow, Chris was seeing him in his human form, he still looked miffed enough. An extra sharp canine curled out from under his lip and he tilted his mane back in a gesture of indifference. Surprisingly, he had grown from a gangly teenager into a fairly mature man. Chris supposed that a lot of his old friends aged faster than he did.
Chris didn't offer an explanation or an apology for why he couldn't remember who Tetsu was right off the bat. Somehow calling him T-chan now would be disrespectful. It was a title of closeness that they no longer had between them. He had given that up the day he ran out of the shop to rejoin the human world.
"But you disappeared with Count D." Chris puzzled, saying what was on his mind. If Tetsu knew where D was, then there was a chance that he also knew what happened to Leon. "Why are you back here?"
"Are you dumb? I told you earlier. Business."
"Okay, well, you didn't tell me what kind of business." Chris snapped back. "It better not be illegal." He added seriously, "Because if I find out you tore someone apart and left the corpse looking like it was ravaged by wild dogs, I'll have to do something about it."
"Sure," Tetsu snorted, leaning back, "Give me some credit will you? If it were me, I wouldn't get caught."
The blond detective stared at his impassive face wondering what that vague answer meant. The crime scene, from earlier in the day, better not have been Tetsu's handiwork. Even as he considered that, the back of his mind was playing with pieces of the jigsaw. He truly hoped that, for sentimental reasons, that Tetsu wasn't involved in the gruesome killing. After all, so far there was only one and it could have been a pack of feral dogs…
"Recalling fond memories?" The current count asked, reappearing with more tea and a plate of some really good-looking cookies. Tetsu sniffed but didn't take one. Chris helped himself.
"Not really." Chris said, "Well, I don't want to intrude on whatever business you have, so I'll come back later Count. Tetsu, see you." The door slammed behind him leaving the other two occupants in a comfortable silence.
The young man pushed all the thoughts out of his head and made his way to the bar to meet up with Jaden. At the very least he could get wasted and if he got really lucky he'd wake up in someone else's bed.
The smell of smoke and drink hit his nose as he entered the bar. It wasn't hard to spot Jaden and a few buddies from work crowding around the pool table. Several half drunk bottles of beer lay around and the ashtray was already full. Jaden seemed to spot Chris almost immediately and waved him over.
The night turned into a pleasant blur of drinks and loud laughter. Usually Chris moderated his drinking, but since he wasn't driving and he really needed a release, he figured one or two more beers wouldn't hurt anything. He was going to have one hell of a hangover tomorrow morning, but somehow it didn't matter.
"'Nite Chris." Jaden slurred slightly with his arm around his girlfriend of two weeks. The two were practically leaning on each other for support. Someone had called them a cab and they piled in and were off, leaving Chris to meander down into the dark park that cut across to his apartment.
Staggering slightly as his toe hit an uneven spot in the sidewalk, Chris wondered if he shouldn't have called a taxi himself. Even though his place was only a mile and a half away, walking through a dark park at two in the morning alone probably wasn't the best of ideas. Even with his phone and pistol.
Draping himself over the nearest wooden bench, the young man waited for the dizziness to pass. With a groan, he massaged his temples and closed his eyes. The wind whistled softly around the trees and bushes making the leaves rustled. To his hypersensitive ears, it sounded like a pounding waterfall. Even so, he didn't fail to notice the piercing scream that came from the other side of the park.
Nausea forgotten, Chris bolted towards the sound, his gun already drawn.
Skittering around a big oak, he froze in horror. A large, shaggy beast had pinned a middle-aged man beneath it. Giant, glistening fangs and razor claws were making short work of the man's thin, fragile skin. Streams and rivulets of bright red blood stained everything they touched and turned the ground slick.
The creature snarled in pleasure as it tore through muscle and bone while its prey gave weak, death-griped writhes of pain. The femur cracked easily between strong jaws and the upper arm ripped from the socket like it was held with licorice.
Turning with a gory face, the dog-goat regarded the shaking Chris coldly. The yellow eyes were slit in anger and the horns were pushed forward in aggression. Apparently it was displeased to have its gory feast interrupted by a mere mortal.
"I don't know what the hell you are, but you're going to Hell." There was no doubt in Chris' mind that this creature wasn't acting on instinct. There was a daring malice to the act, as if to say, look at me. Any dizziness he had was gone. It was replaced with sure-fire confidence that only came with the experience of being under pressure. He hit a defensive stance and had his pistol cocked and safety off.
What happened next was too fast to react to.
The creature launched towards Chris with a low roar. The animal hit him full force with a body of solid muscle and claws. The talons ripped through his cotton shirt like nothing and dug into the skin and muscle below. There was a harsh cracking sound as the force for the blow bent Chris' ribcage inward and breaking a number of ribs. A mouth full of teeth latched on to the side of his neck just above the shoulder. Suddenly, breathing became extremely difficult because of the blood that rushed down into his lungs. Each breath was a sloshing gurgle.
Finally, after what seemed like ages of blinding, unbearable pain, Chris managed to pull the trigger. Despite the assault, he had stuck with his training and held the gun point steady. It was shoved into the creature's upper rib cage. When the bullet was shot, it ripped through the chest muscles and ground between two ribs to hit the heart. It didn't stop there but shot past the spine and completely out of the animal's body.
The first thing Chris did when he got out of the hospital was hit China Town. To his bafflement, the shop wasn't there. There was nothing there but a vacant, haunted space. No one he talked to seemed to have a clue about when or where the shop went, nor about the mysterious owner.
Which, of course, meant that Chris couldn't return the unwanted gift he found in his apartment. Nor would he ever find out what happened to his older brother.
The bundle of fur wiggled impatiently in his arms, wanting to be put down to explore. He finally relented and patted the puppy on the head. It growled at the liberty its new master seemed to feel he was entitled to.
"Well T-chan…" The young man started, running a hand through his spiky hair, "I guess that's that, huh?"
A/N: Wow, that turned unexpectedly dark. And long! With a sappy, cliché ending. Still, I'm pleased. Although, I kinda danced around the challenge, somehow.