The Curse of the Cat

191. Skill

Dreams weren't supposed to hurt.

Gods weren't supposed to go back on their word as well, but he'd had an inkling long before Chiaki had cast her own doubts into play.

Fuyuno didn't make a good god. He tried to be cold and rigid. It didn't work. He tried to be cruel and it didn't work. He just wasn't either of those things, and he was surrounded by animals who could smell the weakness and act on it.

If he didn't have to act a certain way, he could have been better. If he wasn't himself caught in the chains of his ancestors, he could have been better.

He almost felt sorry for him, but he was the cat and the cat always got the short end of the stick, and he, right now, couldn't even be grateful it wasn't worse.

Sometimes, it's hard to imagine worse in the heat of the here and now.

But now that he knew it wasn't a dream, that he was awake and apparently out of his lifelong prison, he didn't know what to think. Was this temporary? Permanent? Was this a trick or trap of some sort, or was this the ultimate victory he couldn't enjoy because he'd be forever paranoid?

Fuyuno was indecisive, at the end of the day, and that was what made him most dangerous of all.

192. Rust

Everything was rusty, and still covered with memories of that room.

He worked out, not long after that asthma attack, that he wasn't spending a lot of time in his human form. He seemed to cycle between them – human and cat. Somehow, the juzu beads had been replaced, but sometimes, in the dark quiet room he'd slipped them off anyway.

Somehow, he'd wake up with them on regardless. Not that it really mattered. They allowed him that indulgent.

But that wasn't the only thing. Closed doors seemed to trigger the transformation, too. It had taken him a bit to work that out, once he could think more clearly in his cat form. The curtains didn't matter. The door did. The human him craved a freedom he still didn't quite have.

It took a while before he could walk more than the length of the room without transforming.

It took a while before more than animal sounds and ragged breaths snuck out of his throat as well.

193. Enchant

It was strange, seeing Koichi.

Sometimes he was a cat. Sometimes he was a human, but there was something in his eyes that still seemed either caught in a dream or in a cat's body.

He barely moved. He barely spoke. He accepted their hands, their embraces, the warm meals they brought.

He stared in confusion at the games, the books, the empty paper.

And, sometimes, he'd stare at the empty door like he was enthralled with it. But he never got up and just walked through.

But as time passed, he seemed to slip back into their world. He offered slow, automatic replies. He turned pages, probably too quick to be reading or taking in the tales at all. He draw on the paper: squiggles, then lines, then simple shapes like a child working their way through the development stages. He started putting puzzle pieces sensibly together.

And then, one day, they came to visit and Fuyuno was there, but Koichi was gone.

Koji could swear he felt his heart skip a beat, but Fuyuno only shook his head and took a seat.

Koji left him there. Right then, Fuyuno didn't matter.

Koichi did.

194. Shadows

The infirmary was similar to a small hospital. They even had a rooftop, and the sun beat down gloriously on it.

Koichi stretched. The sun was warm on his skin. The heat was hot beneath his feet but that didn't matter. Cats loved the heat, the sun, the freedom that came from being high up.

From here, he could see the entire compound. From here, he could see the room. He could also see the gate.

What was going on? He didn't know. What was Fuyuno thinking? He didn't know.

If Fuyuno told him to go back, what would he do? He didn't know. He didn't think he could walk in there willingly again, but he also didn't think he could run.

There was still something broken, inside him. Something still trapped in that room, not quite here in the outside world.

But there was something a little broken about all of them, wasn't there? All of them cursed by the zodiac, with animal spirits in human bodies and centuries of skeletons in their closet.

'Koichi!'

Koji had found him, somehow.

They managed to get by even in pieces.

He offered a jagged smile as his brother scrambled over the ladder just like the rat spirit he bore.

195. Powerless

The twins came back together.

Just another way to taunt him, Fuyuno thought. He doubted they'd meant it on purpose, though.

At least, he doubted Koji had meant it on purpose. Who knew what Koichi was thinking, nowadays.

His eyes seemed filled with smoke ever since that day.

'Leave us,' he said to the younger twin.

He looked at the two of them, then left.

He left the door open, though. And Koichi stared at the door a long moment before sitting back on his bed.

He said nothing, though. Just switched the target of his gaze from the door to Fuyuno.

'If I told you to go back to that room,' Fuyuno tried, 'what would you say?'

'I don't know,' was the immediate answer.

And of course not even the cat was going to give him what he needed to know.