Chapter 2
What Should I Call You?
Hours passed peacefully and morning rays began to crack through the spaces between curtains, indicating a new day had arrived. The feline woke up feeling content, not having slept as good in years. He yawned softly, licking his fangs tiredly before burying his face further into the big source of warmth beside him.
WAIT -
…big warmth..?
The blonde's eyes flew open, realizing a hand straddling his waist. He could not remember anything from yesterday other than escaping and somehow ended up in this strange human's den, his pounding head not letting him thinking clear enough.
The werecat could never handle intimacy or physical contact too well and felt extremely anxious being trapped in the stranger's hold so he soon began scratching on the other's shirt angrily (though he currently did not have his long sharp nails) after not managing to wriggle out of his hold, letting out desperate grunts in the process.
Why was a human so damn strong again?
A human mewling like a cat would probably be seen as a freak so the blonde eventually forced himself to shut up and instead flicked his tail back and forth in attempt to ease his frustration as the human began to show signs of waking up.
"Hnngh~" A yawn escaped Yuu's mouth as he stretched his sore muscles but made no effort of getting up. Just then, the raven caught hold of something soft and snuggled closer to it. Before drifting back to sleep, he heard soft, if not distressed meowing of a cat and wondered if a cat had somehow snuck into his apartment last night. Feeling rather sleepy still, the ravenette decided to ignore the sound and continue his disturbed slumber.
Not long after, something fluffy hit his face and Yuu scrunched his nose in annoyance, "Five more minutes, Guren…" Huh? Guren? But, he moved out not long ago so shouldn't he be all alone in his apartment..?
"Wha-?!" Yuu popped his eyes open and jerked his body backwards until he fell onto the floor with a loud thump.
"Ow..ow…" Rubbing the back of his throbbing head, Yuu peeked on top of the bed to find a rather dashing blond with cat ears and tail protruding out, staring coldly at him with his gleaming sapphire blue eyes. Oh, the werecat - he remembered everything now.
"H-hey… good morning." Yuu said, rather sheepishly with a wan smile.
The blonde shuffled backwards as he watched the human fell to the floor, creating further distance between them whilst giving him his infamous death glare.
"…"
Was he supposed to respond? Judging from the other's expression, he seemed rather uncomfortable. Well, the werecat could say the same for himself. Honestly, he was more irritated with himself than the human for actually liking the idea of sleeping in the other's warm embrace. Mikaela blamed it on that the fact that he was running a fever and began whipping his tail more aggressively, simply staring at the other, waiting for some kind of explanation or at least - something.
…
…
…
...?
Not wanting to prolong the silence any more than that, Mikaela decided to ask this 'Yuu' human something that had been on his mind.
"Why…" the blonde paused, his expression turned incomprehensible before continuing; "…were you holding me?"
The question escaped the werecat's mouth without him realizing and now it was too late to take it back. He knew he should not engage with the human in any way and should just flee the moment he woke but he did not. Falling sick proved to be a major problem. He was almost too tired to even move. However, he refused to come off as weak in front of the other though and tried to keep a fierce stand.
"Well… because you were warm… and fluffy..?" Yuu hesitantly answered before covering his face from any possible claw or paw attack by the grumpy werecat. He didn't mean to make fun of the blonde or anything, he was just being truthful about it.
The blonde's face bloomed a deep shade of merlot rose at the other's words. He was used to humans complimenting him merely for his looks, but the way this raven expressed his self as..
...…warm and fluffy?
'W-what?'
It did not took Yuu long to realize something was off somewhere. "Holy crap, did you just spoke?" He leaped from the cold floor directly towards the blonde on the bed, shortening their distance as emerald eyes shone excitedly like that of a child's. "That's so cool!"
The werecat let out a surprised yelp, stumbling backwards and almost falling off the bed when the human male suddenly shot up all the way to his face. He balanced himself just in time but did so by grabbing the front of Yuu's pajama shirt, pulling him face to face with him. Realizing his mistake, the cat immediately let go but in the end dropped from the bed head first. Scowling, he crawled under the bed in embarrassment, hissing at the other, only more annoyed now.
"Pfft-" Yuu couldn't suppress his amusement as he eyed the embarrassed blond hiding under the bed after bumping faces (or noses to be exact) with him. "Hey now, are you alright? You fell pretty hard from the bed just now." The raven playfully peeked under the bed to find a very angry looking human cat, yellow eyebrows all scrunched up in irritation. "Here kitty, kitty. Come out of there. Don't you know, there's a lot of creepy crawlies hiding under the bed?"
"Hsssssh!" The cat hissed at the other as he peeked under the bed, not liking how the other seemed to be making fun of him in the least. Kitty? Did he really look like a child in the human's eyes? And he absolutely could not give two shits about spiders or such.
The blonde decided to turn around to avoid looking at the raven and settled himself further under the bed, wrapping his tail around himself anxiously. He was sick, tired and now hungry. The werecat felt more scared of than irritated with the human, not knowing when he was going to start treating him differently or send him back to the evil hounds he risked his life to escape from. Could he even trust the raven-haired man to begin with?
"Meow.." He unconsciously whimpered all cat-like, the thought of his dead mother further made him more miserable.
"Ah-" Words seemed to be hanging at the back of Yuu's throat shortly after the blonde blatantly ignored his immature jokes and decidedly turned away from him, suddenly looking very frail and defenseless. The raven mentally smacked himself across the forehead for getting a bit carried away with his strange sense of humor. Yuu'd admit, he's not the best person around to comfort a physically and emotionally wounded werecat.
Sighing deeply, the young man climbed down from the bed and sat cross-legged with his back against the bed. "I'm… I'm sorry, okay? It was insensitive of me just now. Won't you come out, please? I'm not here to hurt you." Yuu spoke in the gentlest and softest tone he ever used in his entire life, careful not to hurt the cat's feelings again.
A long silence stretched between them before quiet shuffling could be heard and a mop of blonde hair suddenly emerged from underneath the bed, tentatively glancing up at the human. The blonde stayed halfway under the bed for a while before crawling out completely, quickly rolling over into the middle of the room, laying on his stomach with his limps all spread out like a squished stuffed animal. He eyed the human shortly before staggering to get up and coughed weakly, almost forgetting about his fever. Not knowing what else to do, he awkwardly pulled at the oversized pajama shirt that he wore, eyes down on the floor.
Mikaela, being as reclusive as he was, had no idea how to start up a conversation with the human so he ended up mostly staring at him before eventually settling a bit in front of him, sniffing at him to make out his smell, crawling more on top of him boldly by the second he deemed the human wore no sort of weapons and proceeded in sniffing him all over.
"H-hey, that tickles~" Yuu giggled when Mikaela's fur tickled his nose as the werecat began his sniffing mission. 'Well, at least he's not hostile against me anymore…'
"Okay, okay. Timeout!" The raven grabbed hold of the blonde's shoulders, half smiling before clearing his throat. "I'm not one of those bad guys, alright? I actually bumped with you at the back alley last night before you fainted. So, I had no choice but to carry you home." Yuu explained carefully as the other kept his doe blue eyes on Yuu's neon green ones.
"Ah, and I make sure no one followed us!" Yuu spluttered. "So, uh… the name's Yuu. And what… what do I call you?"
The blonde flinched as the human grabbed a hold of his shoulders, freezing up completely. He listened to what the human had to say before slowly backing away a bit. "Yuu.." The name rolled off his tongue in a soft but unsure tone, still eyeing him in great wary.
Not sure if he trusted the human enough to reveal his own name yet, he decided not to and simply stared down at the floor. "Why did you ..bring me here..? You could've just left me there..." Mikaela cautiously asked in a hushed tone, keeping his tail close to his body.
And the young man didn't take long to answer, "Because you were injured! And you looked terrified so I just-" Yuu paused, deliberately gave a long sigh to let off some steam. "I thought of terrible things that'll happen to you if I didn't help. And I will end up regretting not helping you. It's just- I don't like that, okay?" The green-eyed man finished his sentence. He may seem like one of those hypocritical people who would feign fake righteousness just for the sake of it but Yuu meant every word he said.
Not to mention, Yuu always had a thing for small, furry animals; especially cats. Unfortunately, they don't seem to share the same mutual feelings. Kittens, puppies or the likes hated him and would quickly run off if they see him, even from a mile away. Did he had some kind of intimidating aura or something, Yuu was not so sure but perhaps it explained why the oversized cat in front of him was still dubious about him.
"Uh.. look here-" A grumbling noise resounded throughout the bedroom and both of them fell into an awkward silence.
And it was Yuu who cleared his throat first, "Say, you haven't eaten anything at all yesterday, did you? So, I'll go and fix us a quick breakfast, alright?" Yuu stood and stretched his sore muscles again. "You're free to use the bathroom if you want to and I must say it's not a good idea to escape this place in broad daylight?" Yuu smiled kindly before making his way to the kitchen, leaving the blonde to his own devices, trusting him enough to not do anything harmful to himself again.
Eyeing the other, the werecat's tail waved back and forth idly as he listened to Yuu talking. He couldn't understand this human at all. Why'd he even cared for an injured stranger? In order to survive in this cruel world, you have to stay independent, caring only for yourself and satisfy your own needs. The blonde had long grown accustomed to that iron rule, never ever thought of dismissing it. But this human went as far as to take him in and felt sympathy for him. On top of it all, the human had even offered him food.
'..Kind hearted humans… do they really exist..? Not in this godforsaken world…' The blonde revered as he watched the raven walking out of the room they were in. Escape? Well, he sure as hell wasn't gonna jump out of the window at least. He had no idea how to get it open anyway.
The blonde decided to tail the other out of sheer curiosity, but braked halfway when he caught a glimpse of his collar resting on top of a bookshelf in the living room.
"…" Mikaela looked around carefully before making his way towards it. Sure, he despised the collar used to cage his human form but anything to make this whole thing less awkward. Being so close to another human while in his more 'humane' form made him feel somewhat anxious, he wasn't used to it and he felt - exposed. The werecat stopped short in front of the shelf, reaching out only to get electrified when he tried putting it on himself. Right. The collar would not allow the blonde to freely change out of his form, he'd forgotten that. Only his master, or anyone else other than himself would be able to do so. Dammit.
Hissing, the teen dropped to his knees, releasing the collar as it rolled in front of him almost mockingly. Bringing his hands to his burning throat, the blonde coughed lightly, squeezing his eyes shut. 'Shit..' He had to get back to the room before the human comes back... Stinging sensations lingered a bit longer in his body, weakening the already fatigued blonde more. Not knowing what to do, Mikaela curled into a ball, hoping Yuu hadn't heard him.
In the kitchen:
Yuu searched the kitchen for any edible food or raw ingredients he could use. Opening the cabinet, he saw; flour, canned food, sugar, salt and uhh he remembered seeing a slab of butter in the fridge along with some eggs and a carton of milk. And there's also some syrup and jam left if he remembered correctly. Maybe he could make some pancakes? Wait - do cats eat pancakes to begin with? Damn, he just had to run low on both food and allowance when he had a guest to feed. Guess he should ask the feline himself whether he could stomach them hotcakes or not.
So, the raven made his way to the living room again only to find the blonde werecat curling on the floor with a painful expression on his face.
"Hey, are you alright?! Oh my god, what happened!" Yuu didn't waste a second in running towards the feline and scooping him up before settling him on the couch. "You don't look so hot. Did you hurt yourself?" The raven inspected the werecat's body for any external injury and heaved a sigh of relief when he found none.
"..." Quickly hugging his knees close to his chest, the werecat glanced at the human, his cheeks heating up in humiliation. "..I-I'm fine.." Feeling the other's eyes on his body however did nothing to ease his shame and he found himself burying his head further into the big pajama, wishing he could just turn invisible from Yuu's attention.
"So... uh, this might sound stupid but - do you eat pancakes?"
Feeling a bit out of place and confused, the blond perked his ears up at the mention of food but soon mumbled quietly in confusion. "..Pancakes?" Peeking out from the pajama shirt, the werecat looked up at the raven curiously, feeling somewhat relief to find that the human didn't seem to have noticed he'd touched the collar earlier.
"Y-yeah.. have you ever eaten one? Like, what do you usually eat before coming here?" Yuu asked, rubbing his chin in wonder. He knew normal cats like to eat fish. Should he order some sushi right now? Wait, it's freaking 8 AM in the morning - he didn't think any shop would be opened yet so early.
Why did it felt like he forgotten something so important? 8 AM..? Morning? Hold on - his morning lectures! Goddammit, how could he had forgotten?!
"SHIT, I have class at 9 today!" Yuu stood abruptly, startling the werecat. "Hey, sorry, I have to go to college now. Think you can settle for some toasts- I mean - milk first?" Yuu gave an apologetic look before darting into his bedroom.
The feline clutched onto the large shirt and was just about to answer the human's question when suddenly the raven blurted something about 'college'. It was a new word; one he had never heard of before being sheltered away from civilization his whole life. Puzzled, the blonde decided to just nod, watching Yuu sprinting in panic.
Mika clumsily stood up and walked up to the collar in great caution, feeling a bit out of it in his human form still. He leaned down and grasped the collar carefully before following the human into his bedroom, stretching out the collar towards him in an apathetic manner, completely indifferent against the fact that the other was changing.
"Woah- oh...hey." Yuu, currently in his boxers only, was trying to get in his jeans and sweatshirt at the same time. He must've looked ridiculous as hell since he noticed how the blonde werecat's ears twitched, his face slightly amused.
The raven didn't know why but he felt so embarrassed all of a sudden, even though the werecat was also a male like him. "Y-you want something?" Yuu tried to smile, lips stiffened from mortification.
When the blonde showed the collar to him and pointed to his own neck, Yuu got the gist of his request. "Ah, want me to put the collar back on you?" He wasn't too sure, but he remembered something about these special collars restricting the werecats to shapeshift into their human forms. "Are you not... able to shapeshift on your own?" The raven looked sad as he said that, this was the equivalent of animal cruelty, wasn't it?
The werecat stared at the other quietly, nudging the other with the collar instead of answering verbally, thinking that the other could probably guess by now that yes, he couldn't transform back on his own and that's why he's asking for his help.
Swallowing on dry air, the blonde shifted his gaze from the melancholy expression of the green-eyed man and boldly pressed the collar up against the other's chest, clicking his tongue to himself. "P-please.."
"Okay... hang on just a sec." Yuu properly zipped his jeans up before slipping into a turquoise sweatshirt afterwards.
He gently took the collar from blonde and was about to equip it to the werecat but stopped short. "This... won't hurt you, right?" Yuu asked, hesitant. He could never be too sure and he certainly wouldn't want to hurt him anymore than he already suffered.
The blonde automatically stepped closer as the human took the collar from him, sad blue eyes quivered but Mikaela braced himself, reminding his self that Yuu was not one of those heartless hounds. Growing impatient fast, the blonde began to idly scratch on the other's chest, looking up at him while thumping his tail up and down. 'Hurry up already…'
Yuu nodded albeit surprised by the sudden contact. Guess he had to be satisfied with that answer for now. Just then, his eyes caught some kind of writing on the inner part of the collar and he flipped it around to get a better look.
'Mikaela'
Only that one word was written or engraved to the collar to be exact. And Yuu without a doubt assumed that it was the werecat's name. "Mikaela?" He awkwardly pronounced the foreign name, eyes never leaving the blonde whose ears quickly raised briskly at the mention of his name. He looked mildly surprised, only to recall having his name engraved onto the collar like some kind of pet the humans were treating him.
"That's your name, right? It's a bit mouthful though..." Yuu scratched the back of his neck when an idea suddenly crossed his mind. "Aha! Mika..! Can I just call you Mika instead?"
The werecat studied Yuu for a short moment before nodding slowly. 'Mika...' Perhaps he wouldn't mind the nickname too much, it was much better than being reminded of his past each time he was addressed.
Mikaela lowered his hands a bit before pulling away, only now realizing he'd been scratching the other's chest lightly due to his silly little hastiness.
Clink!
Yuu clipped the collar back on Mika's neck and caught the feline just in time as he transformed, the long-sleeved shirt worn by the werecat fell to the ground. "That was… weird."
Mika in his cat form was just as majestic, his soft fur gleamed a royal gold under the morning light and his eyes shone a beautiful navy blue. The raven caught himself momentarily mesmerized by Mika's beauty once more.
Feeling the other's intense gaze on him, Mika started shifting uncomfortably, feeling slightly self-conscious after a while. "Meow?"
And Yuu shook out of his trance by then. "I think I still have some milk left in the fridge. Let me warm some for you?"
Milk?
Mika cancelled the thought of breaking free from Yuu's hold at the mention of that sacred word. It instantly made his ears twitched and his mouth watered in anticipation. He was unmistakably, a cat after all.
His body was a bit warmer than usual and Yuu suspected he might not be feeling well. Maybe he'd take the cat to the vet later after class. And as promised, Yuu brought the sickly cat into the kitchen and poured the creamy white liquid into a dish after reheating it.
"Drink up, okay? I need to prepare for my classes." After putting Mika down to the floor, Yuu ran off to gather his books for the day, his thoughts busy thinking about an unfinished assignment to be submitted that very day.
As soon as the raven left the kitchen, Mika immediately stormed over to the bowl of milk, hungrily lapping it down and spilling milk all over causing some of his shiny golden fur slowly turning powdery white. He was that famished, having not eaten in about 3 days after all. It was as if the auctioneers decided to let him starve on purpose. Those bastards.
Licking up the last drops of milk before cleaning himself thoroughly, Mika purred in content before draping his tired form over and out of the kitchen when he saw a big cave-like pouch in one corner and strode over to it, his curiosity piqued. He gave the object a sniff first before carefully stepping inside of it, made a complete circle and settled down comfortably. The space was decently warm and comfy and for the first time in a long while, he felt oddly - at peace. 'Maybe this 'Yuu' human isn't as evil as I thought...' was the cat's last musing before falling into a deep slumber.
To be continued…
Hello.. I'm sorry for not updating in such a looong time. I thought it might be a good idea to post this first before the new chap of my other fic, Protect Me!. To tell the truth, I lost my motivation to continue this story and editing an rp of this story into a fic wasn't all that easy. But I'll be sure ti wrap everything up before discontinuing this fic. Gomen...
