Nanaki looked upwards. His tail twitched despite his best efforts to keep it still, beating against the dusty road.
They had got to be kidding him.
Yuffie was practically a monkey. He was sure she would be able to accomplish this in no time flat. But of course, then she'd ask money in return.
Tifa wouldn't have any problems either, but then there was the issue of her skirt. Frankly, all present had caught a glimpse of what hid underneath considering the number of times she'd jumped around in battle. But he liked life enough not to point it out.
That left Cloud and Vincent. But since Cloud was Cloud and Vincent was Vincent, it was not to them the plea was heart-brokenly addressed, but to him. Which made no sense whatsoever, seeing that he was not even human.
As it was, everyone was watching him with more-or-less concealed smiles as soulful eyes brimming with tears looked pleadingly up at him. Resisting such a plea was a hard enough task in itself, but now it was made about impossible by the crowd that had assembled to watch with amusement.
With a deep sigh, Nanaki gathered back on his hind legs, hunching his shoulders and concentrating on his destination. It was high enough that he couldn't take it lightly, no matter his abilities. He blocked out the people around him from his mind, focused only on that point, and jumped.
The branch shook and creaked menacingly under his paws, but held. Nanaki waited a beat to adjust his balance to the swinging branch, then reached forward to the trembling ball of kitten, grabbing it by the scruff of the neck and being infinitively happy it was young enough not to resist.
Below him, he heard the loud cheers of the little girl as she bounced up and down in excitement while he pounced back to the ground and placed the kitten in her arms.
Really. The things he was made to do. Still, carrying the kitten had reminded him of his mother, and he allowed the little girl to scratch his head.