Author: Rapis-Razuri
Beta: N/A
Prompt: Wearing Animal Ears
Word Count: 1,514
Notes: Here's the first of the four oddity prompts (the other three being "Cosplay", "Wearing kigurumis", and "Genderswapped") and I'm not proud of this one at all. Also, a thousand pardons if the other characters are OOC...

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Lucina didn't know why she was standing outside his tent.

...Well, okay, she did, but she was still trying to figuring out what to do.

I shouldn't have lost my temper with Inigo. He works on my nerves sometimes, but I know he means well. I should go apologize...I actually kind of miss having him badger me about my smile...

Steeling her resolve, she called out, "Um...Inigo? Are you in there?"

"Lucina?! Is that you?"

"I was just wondering if we can talk for a moment."

There was a bit of fumbling from inside. "For a moment? Oh sure. Um...you can come in. I think. Just...uh, mind the mess."

Frowning, Lucina did so. As soon as she entered she noticed there was definitely something fishy going on. Then there were several plants and other random items lying on the cot with an open book and a few sheets of loose paper and Inigo had his hands over his ears.

"Why are you covering your ears?" she asked, rather concerned for him.

"It's...just a little, uh discomfort." Inigo laughed nervously, "It'll go away soon and I can hear you just fine. What did you want to talk about?"

Torn between wanting to drag him off to Aunt Lissa to treat this "discomfort" and wanting to apologize to him as she intended, she was spared the need to make a choice because she caught sight of something very interesting behind the mercenary. Something that was admittedly much more troubling than an apology or a bit of discomfort.

"Is that a tail?"

"Huh?" Confused, Inigo turned around to look behind him. "Oh gods, I have a tail!" He removed his hands from his head, revealing to Lucina why he was covering them. Instead of having regular human ears he had a pair of triangular, white cat ears.

Stunned, Lucina looked at the objects on the cot again and the realization dawned on her. "What kind of hex where you trying to cast?" she groaned, completely forgetting what she had originally came to his tent for. "No, wait. Why were you even trying to cast a hex in the first place?"

"Dad said something about what a shame it was for me to have so much potential in cursing and not use it. I just...wanted to impress him, I guess." Sighing, he placed his hands back over his ears, his tail waving around behind him.

"Shall I go find your father?" Lucina asked. While she didn't want to spoil his surprise by getting Henry, she didn't trust the other curse practicer in camp. Tharja would like nothing better than to place every malign curse known to mankind on Lucina and her brother.

"You will?" The relief in those two words were evident,"thanks. I owe you one." Just as he said this, there was a pop and in the place where the mercenary had stood was pile of clothes and something small moving around in circles underneath.

"Meow?"

Lucina wanted to smack herself. Things have apparently gotten a little more troublesome.

"On second thought," She picked up the fluffy white kitten that had crawled out from under the pile of clothes, "I think I'll just take you to him."

She was just about to leave the tent before she thought of something important. She doubled back to toss Inigo's clothing into a rucksack that she swung over her shoulder.

She took a looks outside the tent flap to make sure the cost was clear. Seeing that it was, she took a step outside and...

"Lucy, hey Lucy!"

Things really didn't seem to be going well for her (or Inigo) today. Cynthia had excitedly bounded over to her.

"Hello Cynthia."

"Finally I found you!" the young pegasus knight said, "so I was thinking about a new pose you could try out, you know, to raise morale and all that, and–" She stopped mid-rant when she noticed the rather sullen looking kitten in the princess's arms. "Aww! How cute!" she cooed, flattening his ears as she rubbed his head. "Is it a boy or a girl?"

"Um...boy."

In a flash, Inigo was snatched out of Lucina's hands. "Where did you find him?" Cynthia asked, holding kitten-Inigo in one arm while petting him with the other.

"Well...you see..."

"Cynthia, Lucina!"

Lucina groaned inwardly. A lone Cynthia was one thing, but shaking off Cynthia, Severa and Kjelle? That would be much more challenging.

"Hey guys, what's up?"

"Are either of you up for a spar? The rest of these idiots are too soft."

"Well...I'd love to, Kjelle," Lucina said hurriedly, "but I'm kind of busy right now..."

"What's that?" Severa asked, catching sight of Inigo. Cynthia held the kitten that was actually Inigo out to the newcomers.

"A cat Lucy found. Isn't he cute?"

Kjelle took one look and immediately dismissed him. She was never really into cute things. "...If you think so."

"He's not rabid, is he?" Severa asked distastefully despite doing a terrible job at hiding how much she did think so.

"No."

"Oh, well..." Severa reached out to stroke Inigo between his ears. "I guess he is pretty cute."

"What are you guys doing? Huddled together like that."

Oh lovely. Noire and Nah had decided to join them now.

"Lucina found a kitty!" Cynthia explained again.

Inigo began to squirm under Nah and Noire's gazes. Nah was a manakete and Noire was no stranger to curses. Would either of them recognize that it was actually him under one? His fears proved to be baseless and the archer and half-human manakete began to aww over him with Cynthia.

For once, he had girls fawning over him and he couldn't even enjoy it properly because he was being treated like a pet. Now he knows why Yarne hates it so much when people touch his ears. He liked it better when it was just Lucina.

"What are you going to do with him?" Noire asked, "Mother said she was going to teach me how to skin a cat without curses, so you know...if you aren't going to keep him, can I?"

Upon hearing this, sheer horror flooded over both Lucina and Inigo. Inigo began struggling against Cynthia, clawing the pegasus knight in his panic, desperate to get as far away from Noire as possible. Lucina reached out to take Inigo back from Cynthia and held him close to her chest rather protectively. "No one is going to skin him, Noire. I was going to take him to Henry and...find out where his mother is so I can take him home...yes, that's it Have you seen him? Henry, that is."

"Really now?" Nah glared up at her. "You're a terrible liar, Lucina. What are you really up to?"

Seeing there was no point in telling anything but the truth with Nah and her intent detecting nose around, Lucina conceded. "This is actually Inigo. I don't know what happened, but...a curse turned him into a cat."

There was silence as the other five girls processed this information. Inigo flattened his ears, knowing he will never be able to live this down.

"Inigo? ...Curse? Inigo?" Lucina wasn't quite sure whether the disbelief in their voices came from the fact that Noire had just considered skinning one of their friends with Tharja or that Inigo somehow managed to turned himself into a cat or that they had shamelessly gushed over the the most notorious womanizer in camp. Even if said womanizer was in the form of a fluffy kitten at the time.

"That's I was looking for Henry," Lucina explained, "So, you know...we can fix this."

"Are you sure?" Nah asked jokingly, "I kind of like him better in this form. He's less flirty this way."

Kjelle failed to stifle her agreeing laughter.

Rolling her eyes, Lucina replied, "we're at war here and we need all the fighters we can get. Do any of you know where Henry might be?"

"Um..." Noire spoke up timidly, "I saw him dragging a Risen corpse out into the forest..."

"That's disgusting," Severa said flatly. "Are you sure you even need him?"

"What do you mean?" Lucina asked, puzzled, "are you saying I should take him to Tharja? You know she hates me."

"No," Cynthia replied with a teasing smirk, "I think Severa's saying all Inigo might need is a kiss from a princess." Severa shot the other twin-tailed red-head a glare.

Lucina blushed and spluttered, "W-what? T-that's completely absurd! And it's only in fairy tales! There's no way it would work for real!" Inigo wished she could at least give it a try anyway. "No, I'm going to find Henry." Embarrassed, she thanked Noire before running off with her face red.

The five girls stayed where they were for a moment longer.

"...She likes him doesn't she?"

Four affirmative murmurs followed Cynthia's question.

"I don't know what she sees in him."

"The princess and the philanderer. How cute."

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Edit 8/31/2013