Tikki shouldered past her cousin into the hotel room, throwing her face into the mountain of plush white pillows before she screamed.

"Nice to see you too."

"I'm not in the mood for teasing, N." Tikki pushed her face back into the pillow.

"Clearly."

She felt him cross the room to sit down on the edge of the bed. "Are you going to answer your phone?"

Confused, Tikki lifted her head off of the pillow for a second time and glared in the general direction of her phone which had been accidentally thrown in her haste to bury her face in the pillows. "No, it's just Plagg, I'm mad at him, so I'm ignoring him."

She saw Nooroo go tense and turn an accusatory glare at the phone. "What did he do?"

"Tell Mr. Overprotective Cousin to chill, he didn't do anything."

"Come on, Red, tell me what happened."

"Don't call me that, I'm mad at you too you know."

"Get your face out of the pillow and talk to me."

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because- then you'll see me cry."

"Oh, Red."

"Sh- shut up."

"I don't care if you cry."

"I- I do! Because it's stupid."

"No it's not."

"Yes it is, it doesn't fix anything."

"What is there to fix? You know you can't fix everything, Red."

"You think I don't know that? And I still try and that's why it's so... frustrating when I can't!

"Red, come on don't make me give you a pep talk you know I suck at those you're supposed to be the older one here."

"... you're right, that was the worst pep talk ever."

"Thank you."

"Don't make me laugh, I'm trying to be mad."

"Key word, trying."

She refused to lift her head from the pillow, she could feel a smile trying to claim her mouth. She refused to let him see it.

"This isn't really about Plagg is it."

She shifted to make half of her face visible and fixed him with one shining blue eye as she shook her head.

"This is about what I told you on Saturday, about me wanting to leave again."

She didn't move. He knew the truth.

"Tikki, I'm sorry-"

She sat up so fast she almost got dizzy. "Don't apologise for anything! It's not really your fault that you don't want to be around, I don't really blame you for it. I know it's hard for you... I just wish it hadn't happened, I wished I could have done something to stop it."

"Tikki, you know you couldn't have done anything."

"I know. I tried."

"Oh, trust me, I know. I saw you go for my coach."

"Don't laugh! Nothing about that situation was funny! I would have probably clawed his eyes out if my mom hadn't held me back!"

"If I was there I would have let you."

"You weren't there, you were stuck, you were broken."

"I'm okay, I'm fine and I'm right here."

"Why does everyone keep telling me they're fine? Don't tell me any of it. And you're here right now but you're going to leave again and I don't want you to."

She was aware that she sounded like a child, she didn't care.

He sat back down on the bed "You'll always have these," he tugged on one of her earrings, she slapped his hand away. "Ow, Abuse."

She just stuck her tongue out at him and rubbed her earlobe. "Now you know how I feel."

"Ha. That was a smile, I win."

"Don't hold your breath." She rolled her eyes and twisted an earring absentmindedly between her fingers. Feeling the slight impressions of the words that were carved into the back.

She pulled it out of her ear, placing it in her palm. "You had them engraved."

He shook his head. "That was already there when I found them in a pawn shop."

She tilted her head as she stared down at the little piece of jewelry.

It had a different story now and she wanted to figure it out.

"Why would someone want to get rid of them?"

Nooroo shrugged. "Who knows? But if you start talking to it I'm going to call you crazy."

"Girls don't actually talk to their jewelry." She pushed the ruby back into her ear. "Which is why I'd call you crazy." Nooroo bent down to pick up her phone. "Answer it before it drives me insane."

Tikki sat up further, leaning her back against the headboard of the bed and drawing her knees up to her chest as she snatched her phone away from her irritated cousin's hand and looked at the notifications.

Guilt gnawed at her as she ignored the text from Plagg in favor of answering a missed call from Marinette instead- she wasn't ready to explain the situation to Plagg yet anyways. It wasn't really his fault she'd stormed out of the apartment in the first place.

"You're okay, right?" Adrien called me and was really worried about you he said something about you were running out of the apartment looking like you were going to cry."

"I'm okay now, I'll explain it later."

"Well... okay... but where are you?"

"On my way to the apartment right now."


"Dude, where the hell were you?"

"Does it matter?"

"... does it matter? You're seriously asking me if it matters! Don't try to pull that on me Plagg. You can't disappear for four days and then show up and act like nothing happened!"

"Nothing happened."

"You're a real comedian... what are you staring at?"

"What, this? Feast your eyes upon my inner demon!" He waved the sketchbook paper in front of him with a dramatic sweep of his arm.

"Ah, the butterfly, akuma thing."

"Yeah, you know about it too?"

"Kind of, Mari explained it to me once, said it might help me deal with the issues I have with my dad. Haven't actually tried it yet though... so does it work."

"Tikki says it does."

"So, how you going to get rid of it?"

"No idea."


Tikki stood up from the bed and was walking to the door when her cell phone rang again. Mildly annoyed she stopped and leaned against the door instead as she looked at the called ID. Raising an eyebrow in confusion she put the phone up to her ear.

"Tikki dear, I know that I gave you today and tomorrow off of work but I just received some news from the shelter regarding the kittens and I was wondering if you would be interested in coming in tomorrow to discuss something with me."

"Of course. I don't mind at all! I'll be there around seven." She hung up trying to suppress a squeal of excitement as Nooroo looked at her in confusion.

"What was that about?"

She grinned at him, triumphant. "How would you feel about coming to work with me tomorrow?"

"That wasn't an answer to my question."

Tikki bounced on her heels, excitement growing by the second.

"Come on, please, please, please, pleaseeee! Beside Mr. Fu said he wanted to see you, and if I don't bring you to him then he said he would just hunt you down and come to the hotel anyway. Might as well kill two birds with one stone."

"I thought veterinarians were supposed to help animals."

"You know what I meant. Come on, just answer my question."

"You know you scare me sometimes, right?"

"I'm not hearing a no. So that's basically a yes!"

"Ok, I'll go just stop jumping so much, there are people below us."

Oh. Right.

She stopped jumping, still grinning as she threw open the hotel door and raced down the hallway like a twelve year-old kid.

"I'm going to laugh if I hear you trip down the stairs." Nooroo called after her through the open door.

"I wouldn't expect anything less!" She called back over her shoulder.

She shouldn't have overreacted.

Walking into the veterinary clinic the following morning presented her with an unexpected disappointment that came in the form of a little black kitten with ice-green eyes.

The little creature weaved itself between her legs, tail twitching as it purred and rubbed against her.

Jinx

She picked up the little fuzzball and set her on the counter. "What's wrong with her? I thought the shelter said that they were going to go into the foster program."

"They were, her siblings did fine in the program, they just weren't able to find any willing to take her, I convinced them to return her to me to see if you knew anyone interested in taking her."

No one wants her? Had it been the name? The different colored eyes? General superstitions towards black cats? Was she antisocial?

Poor kitty. "So, you know anyone who might be interested?" Mr. Fu pressed, bringing her thoughts back to the conversation at hand.

A different pair of green eyes flashed in her mind's eye and a sly smile crept onto her face as a thought occurred to her. "Let me make a few calls. I might be able to work something out."

She retreated out of the door, leaning against the outside of the building as she dialed on the phone.

"Hey Adrien, random question: When's Plagg's birthday?"

"Uh, next week, why-"

"Are you allergic to cats?"

"..Noooo what does that have to do with-"

"Cool, thanks!" she hung up and dialed a different number.

"Talk to me."

"Crazy question."

"I'm all for crazy, what's up?"

"How would you feel about fostering a cat?"

"No, I won't let you get a laser pointer. That's not a cat toy, that's a torture device, if you buy that you're evil."

"I'm sorry, who's cat is this again? Because the last time I checked it was mine."

"I told you about the cat two days ago!"

"And I'm going along with this."

"You don't have to."

"Are you kidding? I told you I'm all for crazy spontaneous schemes."

"I've had quite a few people say I was crazy, I never took it as a compliment before."

"Sometimes crazy is good. I like crazy unless you're psychopath-level crazy then I'll get you a nice padded room in an asylum."

She rolled her eyes and flickered him on the nose with a feather wand cat toy. "Please, if anyone ends up in an asylum it would be you because you made the awful decision to be friends with me."

Plagg blew the feather out of his face.

For some reason the simple action had her fighting the uncontrollable urge to giggle and she turned her attention back to the shelf in front of her attention fixing on a fake mouse toy.

"Speaking of decisions, did you ever figure out what you were gonna do about your akuma?"

Okay, she could have come up with something else to change the topic that was less likely to depress him but at least the more serious question gave her brain enough time to go sober and stop the blush that was crawling into her cheeks.

"No, but that reminds me that you left your sketchbook at my apartment."

She tried not to outwardly panic.

Oh my god, did he look at it? If he looked at it I will die.

"Oh, that's okay, I'll get it later we're going to your place anyway. I just didn't even realize that I left it... I'm sorry about leaving like I did and then ignoring you on top of that, I just had my own problems and I didn't want you to have to deal with that stuff."

"It's okay, I get it."

Doubt it.

"You do?"

"You don't have to explain yourself to me. Trust me."

"Okay." She turned to look at him and was surprised to see how serious the look in his eyes was it almost took the breath out of her lungs...

"Let's go pick up your cat." She walked past him, spinning the feather wand in his fingers in an attempt to look nonchalant when in reality she was trying was trying to pretend she couldn't feel his eyes burning into the back of her head as she walked away.

"Mr. Fu says that it's easier to get her used to one room at a time.. So I guess that would be easier to start with your room... or the living room since we're here already and I don't think she likes the box very much."

Tikki knelt on the floor and opened the cardboard box, tilting it slowly on its side and sitting on the couch as she watched the little black cat explore her new surroundings.

"Huh, good to know."

"It will take her some time to get used to you hopefully it works out well enough."

"Well she did seem to like you well enough and cats usually do their own thing anyway so I'll only be slightly offended."

"Well, I should be getting back to my apartment. Marinette wanted me to help her brainstorm ideas for her next project."

"I thought classes didn't start up again for another two weeks?"

"She has a charity event on January third that she's going to with Adrien."

"Ah. I remember he mentioned that."

"Are you going?"

Plagg tried not to laugh he honestly did, it turned into more of a scoff.

"Yeah because that's totally how I want to spend my Saturday hanging around a bunch of rich people who pretend they're better than every other rich person because they donate the most money."

"It's for a good cause."

"I'm not judging the cause, I'm judging the method of attention that is given to the cause."

"Why?"

It's supposed to snow that week and whoever arranged the event must be insane because it's outside, I don't want to sit in an outdoor amphitheater when it's twenty degrees."

"Could be worse, it could snow while you were outside."

"Don't even say that word in front of me."

"Snow."

"I mean it! I hate the cold." Tikki shuddered at the very thought.

"So I'll see you that Thursday then? You're coming over for New Years right?"

"Wouldn't miss it. Now, can I have my sketchbook?"


A/N: Apologies for missing yesterday's upload, I could've sworn I uploaded but turns out, just completely forgot. Expect another chapter soon.