Thank you CuddlyChristina. Merry Christmas to everyone and happy Hannukah to everyone especially the few who celebrate it I know.
XXX
"Good afternoon." Nuo replied. "Can I make a request of an animal to take in?"
"Oh, sure, young man." he replied, and looked at Yasei. "A leopard? Where on earth did it come from?" he asked Nuo.
"Not Japan, I can assure you of that." Nuo stopped looking at the doctor and looked at his belly. "Do you have stitches here for humans?"
"You couldn't have gone to the hospital?"
"And leave a dangerous predator by itself? Hell no."
"So why are you asking me for stitches?" the doctor asked.
Nuo raised his shirt. There were three open wound marks with blood spurting everywhere.
"Oh, geez...I got a few things that might patch you up, don't worry." the older man exclaimed, before taking him to a nearby restroom.
Once they were in, he was able to take out a first-aid kit and what not. "By the way, my name's Kirigawa." Kirigawa told him.
Nuo sat perfectly still while Kirigawa rumbled through his medical cabinet.
"Let's see...hmm..." Kirigawa was able to find bandages, as well as antibiotics. Soon, he'd patch Nuo up, though at times Nuo grunted as indication that it hurt. Once he was finished, Nuo would put down his shirt and headed out.
With Kirigawa right behind him, Nuo saw that Yasei was waiting for them.
"Apology forgiven." Nuo told the leopard, finding the humor in what it did.
Yasei purred and nuzzled its head against Nuo's side. He chuckled, as did Kirigawa, before Nuo said, "Well, it's been a long story since I got here. It all started when I began investigating this strange mask I brought along with me." before showing Kirigawa the mask in question, to his bewilderment.
"Fascinating. I noticed other injuries prior to your cat attack. Is that also from your investigation?"
"No. I got those in Canada from my previous tutelage. I called him Death Sensei."
"Death-sensei? Clever nickname you made for him!" Kirigawa said as he chuckled. "Thanks." Nuo replied.
"But seriously, this man really hurt you? That's heinous."
Nuo was distracted by a very loud squeal outside.
"What on earth was that?" Nuo asked as he looked around.
"It's just the animals." Kirigawa replied.
Nuo listened again, this time he heard a little kid scream.
He looked over at Kirigawa and said, "I think there's more than just that. Follow me!"
Kirigawa simply nodded, and as Nuo headed for where the kid's scream came from, Kirigawa and Yasei also followed him.
There were more screams when they were outside and not because a wild giant size cat followed them.
People nearly fled when they saw Yasei following Nuo and Kirigawa, but Nuo was quick enough to reassure them that Yasei was docile at the moment.
Turns out it wasn't Yasei they were afraid of. There were wild animals all over the zoo yard.
"Just what are they doing all over the place? It seems abnormal, in my opinion." Kirigawa asked Nuo.
"Maybe, but even animals make mistakes. Good thing they have a teacher to round them up."
"A teacher? What for?" Kirigawa asked, before a few zookeepers showed up to tackle the situation.
"I'm not really going to teach them. I'm going to round them up."
He walked towards the zookeepers, and asked, "Do you mind if I take this over? I can figure out a way to stop this. This almost perplexed the group, but they ended up nodding in agreement.
Nuo figured the best animals to round up first were the monkey's.
He went right after them, calmly signalling them to follow him to the zookeepers. They were initially puzzled, and nearly screeched. Eventually though, they calmed down before following him.
These monkey's were already moving on all fours to get to the trees. Once they had finally reached their homes, Nuo smiled a bit, before moving on.
Next was the zebras. They did not look very docile.
They leered at him, looking as though they were about to run them over. "Maybe you guys got something to get them to listen to me." Nuo told the zookeepers.
"Not really. Animals don't understand our words, they understand their schedule and how we bargain with them." A zookeeper explained.
'Crap,' Nuo thought to himself. Then, he had an idea: perhaps he could find some food that the animals could only eat, such as grass.
He needed a bucket and hands that could pulls out grass without getting tired, by that he meant gloves. Already the zookeepers were rushing towards the buckets to get some grass in them.
Eventually, they would have enough grass to feed the zebras with, and Nuo brought the buckets over to them. They looked over at the buckets, and a brief beat followed before they started eating the grass excitedly.
Now Nuo could grab the buckets they were eating and slowly lead them to their dens. With the buckets in hand, he started luring the zebras down their dens. Soon, they caught up with him, and even as they arrived, they were still wanting to eat more grass.
"Look down for yourselves you spoiled bizarre animals." Nuo told the zebras.
The zebras would heed his command, and began consuming the grass like crazy. This allowed Nuo to deal with the rest of the animals.
They were actually pretty docile. They were easier to take care of then the zebras.
Soon, they were all calmed down thanks to Nuo's unexpected kindness. The zookeepers were impressed as to how a kid like him could do a good job taking care of things.
"I'd like to see another kid BS about how their day was exciting." Nuo said in his cocky way.
"Well, we can't help but offer you complimentary passes for you and your family!" One zookeeper exclaimed with a smile.
"Really? Passes? Heh, thanks for the reward." Nuo replied as he grinned.
Nuo got a phone call not soon after he was given an awesome reward. It seemed his phone always called to tell him some terrible news whenever he has fun.
"Hello? This is Nuo speaking." he said as he answered the phone.
"You better get your ass back home right now!" A shout that loud could only be from his stepdad.
Quickly hanging up, Nuo told Kirigawa, "I should get going; see you!" before leaving. Yasei had also followed him closely.
"What the fuck?!" Nuo shouted for no one but a yellow coat with black spots and orange eyes with red irises could hear. "I thought you were suppose to go live in the frigging zoo!"
Yasei leaned against Nuo's leg and purred, his voice much deeper and yet cuter to be a cat's.
He shrugged and said, "I guess it can't be helped. Come along, then." before Nuo resumed heading to his house with Yasei in tow.
Nuo ordered Yasei to head to the backdoor at home before knocking on the door. Yasei heeded his command, and as he left for the back, Nuo saw the door open.
Instead of his stepfather answering the door, it was his sisters who answered the door.
Hanako and Asami were both panicking as Hanako said, "Nuo! Oh my gosh, you're here!"
"What happened?" he asked.
"Dad heard about a leopard roaming through the streets."
"He even claimed it was scary and would hurt anything that dares to tread his path." Hanako added.
This alarmed Nuo: the leopard actually happened to be Yasei, and from the looks of things Yasei was now anything but violent and scary.
"Thank the Lord I managed to find a way home without encountering that leopard. Now where is Dad?"
"He's in the living room waiting for you." Asami replied.
Nuo thanked them before walking into the living room. His stepdad was standing near the sink with an apron tied around his torso.
"Well, you've finally showed up. I'd been hearing nonsense about some animal being let loose in the city." he told him.
"That's exactly what my sisters told me." Nuo replied bluntly.
"Well all that matters is your safe. I know I'm not your real father, but I worry about your safety."
Nuo sighed in relief. "Thanks...dad." he replied. He had no idea why he was referring to him as 'dad' but still...
"You also received two phone calls. One from a man who says you helped him in his divorce case and another who says call me back, it's me Yugi, we are planning a long vacation overseas."
"Yugi? Takayuki, too? Geez, I've got such a hectic schedule!" Nuo exclaimed.
Nuo managed to sneak past his stepfather to get to the back door where he slowly opened the door and let the docile leopard in.
"Just don't make too much noise, or else my dad will freak out." he whispered to Yasei. It shook its head in agreement, making sure it wouldn't cause as much chaos in the house.
It slowly moved its toes and swayed its tail while Nuo led it to his bedroom. Putting a leopard in someone's room is just asking to be eaten or make it go wild from enclosed space, but what other choice did the young detective have?
Yasei cocked its head to the side, indicating that he was wondering if Nuo had any food for him that was edible.
"Luckily for me, you can have some primate meat to gobble down."
Taking out what happened to be a roasted leg, Nuo offered it to Yasei, who began chomping it hungrily and eagerly.
Nuo could see how this food wasn't enough. Only the kill of a moving animal could quench it.
Though Yasei was content, and more than happy to heed anything Nuo advised it to do, it growled in indication that it wanted to find something more appetizing besides the roasted turkey leg.
Nuo was thinking the best way to do that was to get the leopard outside which was asinine considering all the trouble he did to get it inside.
'Crap, there has got to be a way to get Yasei out the house,' he thought to himself, cupping his chin in thought.
Thought about making an exit hole. That was a stupid idea. He realized the best thing to do was to use coming home as an excuse to sneak by from the security his step-siblings and parent felt.
"Nuo, aren't you gonna come to the table for dinner?" Hanako's voice called out.
Nuo realized being able to get Yasei out wasn't going to happen right now.
Nuo whispered towards Yasei, "Don't destroy anything while I'm gone, okay?" It nodded, agreeing with his words, before Nuo eventually left.
As Nuo sat down at his chair across from his stepdad, he wondered how the hell a wild animal knew what the hell he was saying and could nod as if it were a toddler.
Which was pretty clear that it could only growl instead of talk like normal humans.
"Is there something wrong?" he asked.
"Well, no. I think I've been dealing with this weird mask, lately." Nuo replied.
"A mask? What do you mean?" Asami asked as she and Hanako ate.
"Long story and I won't tell it in short. I was meeting a friend, she shows me this mask this person in one of those conventions she visited gave her, turns out this mask has some sort of oracle or spiritual awareness powers, has a weird symbol on the back of it, I followed a tip from it that led to weirdos and the zoo, and now my best way of solving this is to visit another showing of a model group to see if that same person will try the same action twice."
"Wow, sounds intriguing!" Asami exclaimed. "Did you meet any people there?" Hanako asked.
"Well, I met this pretty nice man named Kirigawa; he used to work for KaibaCorp, and since he knows a lot about anything medical-related, helped me out with a small wound. It was caused by a leopard whom eventually became pretty friendly to me after I did some convincing and persuading." Nuo replied.
"Leopard?!" Nuo heard his stepfather shout. "You encountered the leopard and got attacked without telling me?!"
Hanako and Asami's jaws dropped in unison. As for Nuo, he felt as though he was in a tight spot.
"I didn't chose for it to happen. The leopard just growled at a street magician so I stepped in."
The stepfather asked, "Oh, really?"
"Yes, really...dad." Nuo replied, almost curtly.
By now the leopard was outside roaming the house, didn't take a guess when Nuo could hear the squishing of grass from the leopards paws outside.
All he had to do was to keep his cool for the time being. "Uh...you wanna change the subject?" he asked.
"Change the subject? What for?" the stepfather asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Because I need to learn from my strong stepdad." He lied.
He sighed, before asking, "Well, what do you want to bring up?" Nuo could tell that he was truly fooled by his words.
"How about your job. How far is Mr. Kaiba making you go just to do an errand of his?"
"Well...it's great!" Nuo replied, sporting a big smile. "I see..." the stepfather replied, cupping his chin briefly before resuming eating.
Nuo ate telling himself inside that Yasei was going to be okay enough for him to eat and then find him.
When dinner eventually finished, Nuo would take off, heading outside to see if the leopard was safe. "Yasei? Where are you?" he called out.
The leopard didn't come running to him, but it didn't get very far away either. Instead, Yasei remained still, prompting Nuo to shrug and walk towards it. He briefly petted it, before he said, "Thank goodness you're still around."
The big leopard purred when Nuo strokes it's back. Better than it chewing off his arm.
"Just remember, I have to make sure that my stepdad doesn't find you. If he does, then I'm dead meat!" he told Yasei.
Yasei licked Nuo's hand which melted his heart.
He smiled and hugged the leopard, before he added, "I better get back inside. Goodnight, Yasei!"
Yasei nodded, and Nuo soon headed back inside the house.
His step siblings and father didn't even know Nuo left the house and he continued to act as if he was caged by cleaning the dishes.
The next day, Nuo was able to invite his stepfather and his stepsisters to the zoo together. What Nuo didn't expect was that Yasei wanted to come along with them, which made him worried that they'd find out and lash out at him.
Good thing Yasei was very shy at going after Nuo when other people were beside him.
"Yay! We get to visit the zoo!" Hanako exclaimed. "That's right, and if it weren't for your brother being a good Samaritan, we wouldn't be here." the stepfather added.
Nuo hoped he didn't run into Kaiba's Ex-employee there or things would get awkward.
Soon, they would take in the sights of the animals that resided in the zoo, which also included Hanako and Asami's favorite animal: Panda bears!
Nuo stayed behind them watching them look in awe to see a panda bear move its heavy behind around.
Hanako and Asami were both gushing and squeeing, with Asami asking, "Is there any chance there be a petting zoo? I wonder if pandas are in petting zoos?"
"Are you crazy? Panda's are vicious enough to rip your arm off, only professionals should approach them," Nuo remarked.
"Unless they're little. Little pandas are so cuddly!" Hanako exclaimed. "Yeah, but only when you some pros to help out." Nuo added.
Asami and Hanako just really liked pandas so there was nothing to persuade them to like more docile animals.
Nuo shrugged and said, "Guess it can't be helped." and began to find someone who not only worked there but was also good with animals, too.
He walked around the zoo looking for the person who feeds them.
"Excuse me, ma'am?" he asked as he finally found one.
"Yes?" she replied.
"Do you like playing with animals?"
"Well, of course. I work here, after all. My name's Tina." Tina said.
"Great; I was wondering if you could help out with appeasing my sisters. They want to be around small pandas." Nuo replied.
"Small pandas? Well, we do have little pandas. But right now their sucking on the teats of their mothers. I'm not sure they'll like little kids stroking too hard or playing with their furs."
"Uh, you mean nursing?" Nuo asked.
"Yeah, exactly." Tina replied.
"I guess I'll just wait until they're done." he told her.
Nuo waited for only fifteen minutes before Tina ran back to him.
"They're now playing together! Be sure to tell your sisters." she said.
Nuo nodded, before he told Hanako and Asami, to which they excitedly ran to Tina, very eager to pet the small pandas.
Nuo walked slowly after them, sticking close but not feeling excited.
Hanako stroked one of the little pandas's heads, and it cooed in delight at her touch. Asami even took her turn with another, and it also let out the same happy coo. "Aw, they're so sweet." she told Nuo.
"Well in my line of work sweet gets corrupted and I'm forbidden to touch small/cute things because I'm not a cute little kid no more."
"At least you're a grown up now." Asami told him. She and Hanako happily took their time playing with and hanging out the little critters, until Tina would eventually remind them that they have to go back to their mother.
"Thanks, miss!" Hanako told her, waving goodbye as she and Asami returned to Nuo.
"It's nice knowing pandas still have mother's taking care of them." She said.
"Uh huh." Nuo said, his trigger word being Mother.
"We wish our mother was as caring as those pandas, then maybe she and dad would still be together." Hanako said.
"Not your mother's fault your father was becoming gay. He's gay, pescetarian, and a single father and stepfather of three kids...this is why I chose to be an atheist and someone who just shuts his yap and does stuff."
Hanako and Asami were both floored by his words, before they silently nodded and followed his lead to where he was going next.
Nuo hated when little kids run around him. They are so easy to get stepped on and crushed, even if his stepsisters were over ten years old that problem was still there, like trying to walk around Yugi Mutou without stepping on him. Speaking of him...
He reminded himself of continuing his investigation into the mask, and perhaps wanted to contact Kaiba, who had been Yugi's long-time rival.
Before he could go there, he stepped on the foot of an all too familiar shrimp, Mokuba.
"Ouch! Watch where you're going!" he yelled. "Hey, wait a minute, aren't you that Nuo fellow?" he asked as he recognized him.
"I wouldn't say fellow. More like a big brother and these are my young twin stepsisters Hanako and Asami."
"Well, hey there!" Mokuba told them with a smile.
"Hi, mister!" Hanako replied. "Hi." Asami added.
"These little munchkins got to pet baby pandas today. Does your brother ever let you pet pandas?" Nuo asked Mokuba in his snark tone.
"I don't know...I like petting animals, and baby pandas, too. Though I doubt I'd pet a grown up panda!" Mokuba replied with a slightly embarrassed chuckle.
Nuo never usually saw the young Kaiba brother laugh like this. Nuo was forgetting about his case with the mask and focusing on who needed to laugh more growing up: Mokuba or him when he was the twerps' age.
"As much as I wanna focus on all this, I still have this case concerning this odd mask, and-" he said, but suddenly cut off by Mokuba asking, "A mask? Where did that even come from?"
"I have a life out of you snobbish brothers. Anywho, I'm tailing a person in cons handing out masks."
"Did you find any evidence?" Mokuba asked.
"Yeah; I was able to learn of a so-called 'god' judging by the symbols on it according to some monks." Nuo replied.
"I bet it might be a cult." Mokuba told him.
Nuo left abruptly patting Mokuba's shoulder before he walked away.
It seemed that all of this was bubbling up in Nuo's mind, begging him to keep digging deeper. "Hey, where are you going?" Hanako asked.
Nuo simply looked over at his stepfather, and asked, "Dad, would you mind watching over my sisters while I'm gone? I got some work to take care of."
"Of course not. But just remember to be back before 10 pm." he replied.
Nuo did his best to smile to his stepfather in a reassuring way. He waved goodbye in a familiarity to how his actual dad waves goodbye to his husband.
'I don't understand why he refers to me as 'Dad' all of a sudden...I guess he must be slowly starting to get used to having me as his stepfather,' he thought to himself.
Nuo was quick in finding his suspect.
She was basically outside a convenience store when he located her, and she turned to face him and asked, "Oh? What brings you here?"
Nuo is took out his phone, pressed three numbers, and waited for it to stop ringing.
"Hello, 911, I have a suspicious person with me who has been scaring people at cons and giving masks out. Please come by and see them."
"Sir, this number is for emergencies only. Has this person hurt anyone?" Nuo didn't answer. He dropped his phone on the ground. "Sir?!"
The suspect started panicking.
"What? I don't know you and I didn't do anyone! Why would you call the police in front of my face?!"
"Because you happen to be devoted to a self-proclaimed 'god'!" Nuo told her.
"Huh?! You mean Aethba?! Are you trying to expose us?!" she asked.
"No, just stay away from the idol Ruria. She's my client and you were sought after by her."
"Ruria...?! The girl I gave that mask to...?!" the woman asked, slowly backing away from him. Though it seemed apparent that a duel could be possible if she secretly happened to be a duelist herself.
It was not going to happen once sirens started wailing through the street. Nuo and the lady looked out to see where the sirens were, because they were getting louder and closer with every passing second. And then, a squad car stopped in an angle an amateur driver would make taking two parking spots.
Two young looking cops stepped out, hard to tell which one was a rookie. One had nut-brown eyes with barely any of his also nut colored brown hair and the other was a long hair kept in a ponytail simple black eyed lady. The male approached Nuo.
"Are you hurt?" He asked.
"No. I'm just a young detective with a suspicious lady here."
The police seemed to not even notice her and the attention was on Nuo. The young one was on the cusp of his handcuff pocket.
"Why don't you come down to the station with us."
"The fuck? I'm the one who called on her, a suspicious woman disturbing the police."
"It's our job to check when someone is being suspicious. You called an emergency number when no one was being hurt and dropped your phone to mess with our emergency system. Now come, last warning."
Nuo gritted his teeth, that was an act that warranted the young officer to take out his handcuffs. It was in those few seconds between negotiation and arrest that a wild animal roar made three people of unflinching bones and one highly eccentric woman to look at a friend to only one of them: a leopard.
Yasei's eyes flared with bloodlust and his teeth were bare. It was a wild, dangerous animal and his actions gave the woman cop no hesitation to draw her firearm and shot him.
Nuo's once strong gut was replaced with bone-rattling fear. In just three seconds he thought he would see Yasei's face with a grotesque hole in it. Instead, he saw a ghostly pale imitation of Yasei.
"It's happened." The eccentric woman said to herself, but she wasn't speaking so softly Nuo wasn't able to hear her.
Nuo saw a lot of strange and almost hallucinogenic things in his life, but a glowing leopard wasn't one of them. Yasei went from being a four legged beast to a two legged cat, toga materializing around his underbelly, a completely gold shield with a sun insignia in his right paw and a long spear with a crescent moon blade in his left paw.
Nuo was the only one walking towards the new creature, the police officers were running to their squad car for safety and call for backup, while the woman was raving about this phenomenon.
"It has evolved into a real animal! Aethba has made real Duel Monsters for me!"