Payment on the Past

By Shadowed Seas

Important note (sort of): At the time of posting this chapter I went back and did some minor editing of the previous chapters. While the editing is mostly grammatical and almost nothing has changed plot wise, I just wanted to inform anyone who was reading this that there were in fact some changes made to earlier chapters, specifically Kiri's appearance in the last chapter. On to the normal stuff.

Author's Note: Sorry about the long delay but life decided to come and bitch slap me, so I have been otherwise occupied for a while. I'm going to try and make these notes shorter, just on general principle, so here's the next chapter, hope it's alright. Also, thanks to Arexia, jueru2003, Mandapandalikestoeatchicken..., K.L.W., Thursday's Dove, and SharkSwimmer05 for reviewing. Here's what you wanted.

Warning: This chapter contains language, violence, death, and general freakiness. Other than that there's not much else to warn about that hasn't been already covered.

Disclaimer: I can't afford anything so I disclaim everything. Except my pants. I own my pants.

Chapter 4: Conversations about Conversations

/Duo…is that a…kitten…above your head?/ Quatre spoke in almost a whisper, as if he were afraid of being overheard.

"What?" Duo looked up instinctively, already fearing that he knew what he was going to see. And sure enough, he was looking straight up at black fur and golden eyes held aloft by black wings. Only one thought came to mind as he glanced back at Quatre's shocked face.

'Oh shit.'

Before Duo could finish truly contemplating the horror of trying to explain an alter-dimensional gravity-defying flying kitten, an arm intruded on his upward gaze and with a shout of "Attack from above!" he was thrown sideways into the desk chair as the kitten, arm, and the rest of a person slammed into him.

Right as his mind caught up to the situation and told him to do something, anything, to stop what he knew was about to happen, a giggle and a bright "Hi there! I'm Kiri." came from slightly above and to his right. Pushing himself into a somewhat more normal position only confirmed his fears. Quatre was now smiling warmly at his new undead guest and the winged cat in her arms. Before he could do anything to stop this disaster from getting any worse, Quatre started talking.

/Very nice to meet you. My name is Quatre, I'm a friend of Duo's. That was a very…interesting method of getting his attention./

"Thank you! I thought it was pretty good myself." Duo just stared blankly as she giggled and leaned forward conspiratorially. "And he is usually so much more alert."

Quatre actually laughed at that one, causing Duo to stare at the vid-screen. /That he is. Have you known Duo long? I had hoped that he was meeting new people at the university, but he hasn't talked much about anyone before and I was getting a little worried that he was having problems with the people there./

"Oh no, he isn't having any problems at all! I just met him a little while ago, but we're getting along great together. He is such a sweet guy. He is even letting me stay with him until I can find an affordable apartment! All the housing around here is so expensive and I just could not pay for my own place yet."

Duo just resigned himself to staring at the two of them as Quatre commiserated with her on the price of apartments, and wondered what the hell had just happened. He was sure that this was not a good a thing, and that he should stop the conversation as soon as possible before something really bad happened, but he couldn't come up with anything beyond shooting out the vid-phone. The conversation had turned from apartments to travel and then, to his horror, to the get together Quatre had just invited him to.

/…it's not really a party or anything. We just haven't seen each other in a while and I thought it would be nice to have a little reunion since we all have some free time. So a bunch of us are staying together for a week or so at a house I own./

"Sounds like a great idea to me! It is always nice to keep in touch with good friends."

/If you are not doing anything over the break, you are more than welcome to come as well. I'm sure the others would be happy to meet you!/

Duo froze and his mind went from horror stricken to panic mode before Quatre had finished talking. "Quat, I'm sure Kiri had other plans already made. After all it's only a few weeks away and most people are really busy this time of year-"

"Duo, don't be ridiculous!" Kiri interrupted his try for a safer conversational direction and grinned at him in a manner that conveyed, very clearly, that he would be safer if he stayed out of this conversation. Then, leaving him silent once more, she turned back to the screen to smile in a much nicer and saner manner at Quatre. "I would love to come and I have to thank you for inviting me."

/Great! I'll make sure everything is arranged for you two. It will be nice to meet you in person./

"Thank you. It will be nice to really meet you too. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go see if this little guy is hungry." She lifted the kitten up and nuzzled his face against hers. "It was great talking to you Quatre. I'll see you soon."

/Bye Kiri!/ Quatre paused as Kiri moved out of pickup range and coughed slightly in order to get Duo's attention back from staring at the disturbing houseguest who had just made herself part of his vacation plans. /She seemed very nice…why haven't I heard about her before?/ Quatre asked with a raised eyebrow that completely ruined his attempt at looking innocent. Duo was unfortunately more familiar with this look than he had ever wanted to be and the fact that Quatre was using it now meant that there was some kind of plan in the making that Duo had best find a way of avoiding.

"I just met her Quat, it's not like there is anything to tell." Duo was in full 'holy-shit' mode as he tried to put together a coherent story that did not involve the words Shinigami, death, flying kitten, ghost, or girlfriend, all while still not lying. Well the part about not having a girlfriend wouldn't be a lie, but he didn't want to give Quatre any ideas. "She's new to the area and doesn't really have a place to stay, so she's crashing here for awhile." That was true enough. Now…subject change! "So this party thing, how many people are coming?" Quatre gave him a look that clearly said he knew what Duo was doing but he was going to ignore it anyway, before launching into a list of guests that were coming for just the party and who was staying at the house afterwards. Duo nodded at the right intervals and kept about half his attention on what Quatre was saying while the rest of his concentration went to the reason why the flying kitten that had been above his head just minutes earlier had seemed to be completely forgotten.

He still hadn't found any good explanation for Quatre either not mentioning or forgetting about the cat when he ended the call several minutes later. Fortunately for Duo, the person who had the best chance of explaining it was currently feeding the winged cat a can of tuna in the kitchen. Unfortunately for Duo's sanity, she was doing it while floating a foot above the table and tossing pieces of tuna for the cat to catch. His entrance into the room was heralded by an almost bird-like chirp from the cat, which abruptly changed direction in midair and dove towards him while the piece of tuna it had been diving for landed on the floor with a plop. Duo managed to grab the kitten out of mid-air before it went for his hair again, and it seemed quite happy to be held while it gnawed on his index finger. He winced and wondered why the cat seemed to enjoy chewing on him so much, but figured his hand was better than his head.

Kiri put the remainder of the tuna on the table under her before gazing at Duo with a mischievous look and a smug smile. He just sighed and sat down at the table. Clearly he should have tried harder to kill myself during the war, he would probably be in a much more comfortable position now if he had. "Alright, now explain." Her grin widened slightly, because of his words or his tone he really didn't know and wasn't sure he wanted to.

"Explain what exactly?"

"Don't go stupidly annoying on me, I invented stupidly annoying. Why didn't Quatre ask anything about the kitten? Like how it could possibly have wings perhaps?"

"He couldn't see the wings, so he wouldn't have any questions about them, now would he?" She sighed at his uncomprehending stare. "People can't see anything that doesn't originate from their own dimension; it is one of the basic parameters of inter-dimensional contact. The fact that he could see the kitten at all is a bit unusual, but there are people who are more sensitive to that sort of thing so it isn't too surprising. He couldn't see the wings because he knows that cats don't have wings. It's an impossibility in this realm, so he couldn't see it. This realm does have kittens, so he did see that as it was, but he couldn't explain how it was up in the air. When I grabbed it and brought it down into my arms, he rationalized that I must have been holding it the entire time. It doesn't matter that he never saw my hand before I jumped into the shot, a kitten can't fly so he will rationalize the whole incident away as something completely logical to him."

Duo looked down at the black ball of feathers and fur in his hands as he thought through the semantics of Kiri's explanation. Then he sighed and gave up, putting it in his new mental file, 'Completely Illogical Shit to be Dealt With Later.' The number of things that fell under that heading was getting depressingly large lately. Deciding to let the whys of sometimes invisible kittens go, he addressed the other pressing matter on his mind. "So…why exactly are you coming with me to Quatre's over the break?"

Kiri put her feet down on the table and stood up as levitating was something she did everyday (and she may very well do it everyday the little voice in the back of Duo's head pointed out), and hopped down to the floor before answering. "I am just preparing for all eventualities." At his blank look she explained further. "If you do choose to serve out your payment in this realm, then I will have to stay around to help and advise you. I will need to have a plausible reason for staying with you or people will start getting suspicious about my presence. These people you are meeting with are some of your closer friends, right? Then I have to get to know them just as much as I have to get to know the people around here." She went from reasonable explanation mode to angry woman mode in record time as her eyes narrowed and her hands ended up on her hips. "And if you decide to stay alive long enough to go to the party there is no way I am letting you go anywhere by yourself until I am sure you are trained in dealing with beings from other realms."

He sighed and started stroking the cat, causing it to purr loudly against his fingers as it stretched and snuggled into his hand.

"Fine, whatever. I'm going to go fix my hair and then do some work."

He let go of the kitten, who flew up to perch gently on his shoulder, as he walked out of the kitchen, leaving Kiri to stare at the empty doorway.

His hair rebraided and left unmolested by the now docile seeming kitten, who was once again on his shoulder, Duo attempted to work on some of his school work that was due in the next week, but his attention kept wandering away from the advanced circuitry he was looking at. He already knew that he would be serving out his time by working for the God of Death in the world of the living over the next several thousand years, but he really hadn't thought about what that meant. Kiri had mentioned dealing with other dimensional beings, but what did that mean.

'It means you're an idiot for not asking earlier.'

'I wasn't talking to you, so shut up.'

'Don't get pissy at me because you didn't want to ask more questions earlier. Now, just think about what you've found out so far. Shinigami wants people to work for him in this realm, and it seems that he wants them to work a lot longer here than in his realm. The job was called trouble shooting at one point, and now it looks like you're going to have to "deal with beings from other realms." Right?'

'Yeah. So that means…'

'It means damage control, and who knows what that means for the dead, undead, and god only knows what else.'

'Yeah, but which god?'

'Oh look at that, you made a funny. I'm dieing of laughter. Ha. Ha. Ha. And ha.'

'Shove it.'

'Why don't you try and make me. That should be interesting.'

"God I should not be having this conversation without a straight jacket."

Duo realized that he had said the last comment aloud only when the quiet purring next to his ear broke off into a surprised chirp. He lifted the kitten from his shoulder and held it gently as he stroked its back. After a few minutes, and the resumed purring of the small fluff ball, he lifted the cat to eye level and really looked it over. It fur and feathers were that perfectly dark black that seemed to shimmer with dark blue when the light hit it just right. The kitten's eyes were shifting pools of amber and gold that gazed up at him with an intelligence that was far beyond any normal cat's. Duo contemplated the delicate change between soft fur and feathers on its back as he continued to pet it.

"Don't worry, I'm not crazy yet, or at least not too crazy. Though whether I would be able to tell if I was crazy is debatable." He sighed and started scratching the cat's ears. "You're kind of cute when you're not attacking my hair." The cat leaned against his fingers and purred louder as Duo kept scratching.

"If you plan on staying around I should have something to call you instead of 'you' or 'kitten' or whatever. I've never really had a pet to name…how about Blackie?" The kitten moved its head from his fingers and scrunched its nose at him. "Oookay…that's a no I guess. Um, let's see…Neko? No? Gato? Hane? Noir? Fluffy? Ow!" Duo quickly pulled away the hand that had been bitten by the cat at the last suggestion. "Fine then, how about Kage? I think it means shadow or dark or something like that." The kitten tilted its head as if contemplating the name for a moment, and then starting purring again. "Alright, Kage it is then."

So now he had an other-dimensional pet flying kitten, an undead room-mate who was going to train him to deal with things from other worlds, and a debt to the God of Death that would take around 8,000 years to pay off. How could things get any worse?

Duo winced and immediately wished he hadn't thought that. One life lesson he had learned with a vengeance over the years was that it can always get worse, and often did.

TBC…

There's chapter 4. I know it is short and I know I haven't posted in a really long time. I really am sorry about the length and the delay, I swear I was doing important stuff. I don't know how often I will be able to update in the future, but I will not drop this story, or any unfinished story I may start in the future. It is something that really annoys me in others so I will strive to not do it myself. I may take forever and a day to update…but I will not drop a story. Not sure if that is much better…but oh well. Also, in the first paragraph of this chapter I did a little bit of homage to an online comic that I used to read, mainly because it seemed to fit. Any guesses as to the comic I referenced? That's all for now, 'til next time…Jaa mata!