Set during chapter one, because chapter one covers a large chunk of time. This is never going to end, what have I gotten myself into?
Interlude: What to Do?
It had been a fairly quiet morning at Caring Claws Pet Supply. An older lady had dropped off her walking ball of fluff for a grooming, a regular had bought a week's worth of bird seed, and for the last hour or so, nothing. Kenna glanced at the clock with a sigh.
The phone rang, and she answered, glad for a break in the monotony. " Central City Caring Claws Pet Supply, this is Kenna, how can I help you?" she rattled off.
"Hi, um, Kenna. I'm Doctor Snow, Caitlin, and- can I place an order over the phone? And do you deliver? No where else delivers, and I'm just wondering-oh!" The woman on the other end sounded frazzled and harried.
"You can order over the phone, yeah, and...I guess we can deliver, as long as it's in city limits, if it means that much." It had never come up before, but they did have a company van, Kenna was licensed to drive it, and she'd never gotten the chance to. Plus, she had a break coming up, and she didn't particularly want to be around when Mrs. MacVernes came to pick up Fifi.
"Oh, thank God. Um. I need kitten supplies. Lots of them. A couple litterboxes? And some litter, that's safe for kittens? I read somewhere that some isn't, I think? Which is confusing. And cat food. A lot of cat food."
"Hang on," Kenna scribbled down some things. "Can I ask some questions?"
"Yes, fine." In the pause, Kenna could hear shrilling mews of hungry kittens.
"How old are your kittens? And how many?"
"Between, um, we aren't sure. They all have their eyes open, and can walk. So, younger than a year, older than a couple weeks? It ranges. And there are um-" there was a muffled sound. "Maybe 30?"
"..." Kenna blinked. "O...k. Um. So, kitten food. You'll need kitten food, cat food's hard on kittens, young ones, so. Kitten food. If you plan on keeping them a long time, you'll need to switch over at some point, but-"
"We'll stick to kitten food, for now."
"Ok. Probably enough for a couple days…?"
"Yeah. If we can't find homes for them in the next week, we'll buy more food, I guess."
"Toys? Beds?"
"We have some boxes we can fill with paper and sweatshirts, but… yeah, toys. Maybe one of those climbing things?" There was a muffled voice. "And scratching posts."
Kenna looked at the list. "Ok, can I call you back? I can get a, a kitten care pack put together, it'll only take a couple minutes." She took down the frantic woman's number and started down the aisle with purpose. This was much better than standing at the counter.
Kenna eyed the building suspiciously. She was fairly certain that S.T.A.R. Labs was supposed to be closed, in which case no one should be in there doing anything, particularly if it involved kittens. The place had blown up, after all, and been shut down. She should probably call the police, or something. Or maybe it had been a prank? Except that the debit card transaction had gone through.
A woman with brown hair pulled back tightly was at the gate, pulling it open. Kenna got down out of the van, still uneasy.
"I'm Doctor Snow, thank you again, so much, so much, for delivering. There aren't a lot of us, and it's a lot of kittens, and, you know."
"Right," Kenna prepared to force a smile and found she didn't have to when a kitten poked its head out from within the doctor's coat sleeve. It was adorable. As she started unloading boxes and realized she ought to have brought a dolley, she paused. "Um. Why do you have so many kittens. You guys aren't open again?"
"Oh, no, just, um, I." Caitlin Snow froze. "There are a few of us who check to make sure things are...normal. And fix them if they aren't. This morning, there were just. Kittens." Keeping the arm with the kitten in the sleeve straight, she waved the other. "We don't know where they came from, or how they got in. We've got someone looking at missing posters now, but..."
Kenna relaxed, slightly. "I'll help you bring this stuff in? There's kind of a lot."
"Yeah. Thank you again, for the discount." Caitlin showed the kitten from her sleeve. "Scrap, I have a perfectly good pocket, I need to carry things."
"Scrap?"
"One of the guys named her. She's tiny, so it fits." Once Scrap was settled inside the large pocket, Caitlin lifted a large box, grunting at the sudden weight. "I got it," she said. "Uh, follow me, I guess."
The room was indeed full of kittens, and very much empty of cages and medical-sciency things, much to Kenna's relief. She helped set up the cat tree she'd picked out, which was almost instantly colonized by a pair of russet cats that were identical, and looked to be around six months. They seemed to be the leaders. Of course, when food and water were set out in a double-dozen shallow dishes, all the kittens swarmed, abandoning their posts on the climbing tree, stacks of paper, and the shoulders and laps of the few employees.
"I should get back to work," the shop girl said after a moment watching the writhing mass of fuzz. "But, if you need anything else, give us a call."
Caitlin escorted her back to the van with a weary smile, but as she was leaving, Kenna could have sworn she saw a fluffy white kitten walk through one of the now empty cardboard boxes. she shook her head. It was probably just a trick of the light.
Cats were clever, and sometimes the laws of physics didn't seem to apply to them, but that was just plain silly.
Just after Kenna left, Barry returned.
"I checked every bulletin board, telephone pole, and streetlamp in the city, and in the suburbs too. Nothing matching these kittens. Not even one! Do you know how rare that is? I mean, there are what, twenty-five of them? One should have matched at least one of the posters, but no."
"Closer to thirty," Cisco said. "I've been trying to count them, but they keep moving! I'm pretty sure there are, like, four that look like that one," he pointed at a kitten that was black with brown markings and swaths of white, curled up asleep in the doorway leading to one of the supply closets. "She likes closets. They like closets. I think Susan or Lucy for her, and when we find the other ones, other narnia characters."
"We are not keeping them all," Doctor Wells said, his wheelchair once again halted by the marmalade kitten. "If you name them, you will get attached."
"I'd get attached anyway, look how cute they are!" Cisco retorted good-naturedly, raising his arm. The fluffy grey tabby was nestled in the crook of his arm.
Wells sighed. "The ones I've managed to, ah, wrangle, seem to be healthy enough. But we really cannot keep-" Cisco gave him a hopeful look- "all of them."
Barry looked thoughtful. "So, we find them homes?"
"With people who will take care of them, and people we can get in contact with in the event that there was something...Let us just say, I doubt they magically appeared in the cortext without reason. We may need to find them again." Wells rubbed his glasses on his shirt, and looked down at the kitten under his wheel. "Out, you little orange scamp."
"Scamp's too much like Scrap. He's kind of peach colored? Or apricot." Cisco mused, scooping up the kitten. Said kitten scrabbled free, landing on Wells' lap with a soft thud, and began washing her paws.
"She, Cisco," Wells corrected absent mindedly. "Apricot. Fine. If I can't stop you from naming Metahumans, I doubt I can stop this."
"I know some people at the station who might like cats." Barry said, leaning on the desk with a half eaten energy bar in hand. Cisco's first attempts had been fairly terrible, but the latest batch had a decent crunch and chocolate chips. "Whitsmen, one of the beat cops, used to have one. And I think Sava? Oh, Iris always wanted a cat, too, when we were kids, but Joe said two human kids caused enough damage." He paused. "I never did give her and Eddie a "congratulations, you moved in together" gift. Vikings used to give new brides kittens as gifts, cats were an essential part of the household. Same principal applies." His mouth quirked up in a smile as one of the kittens, a younger one with calico fur, attempted to climb up his pants.
"At least it's a quiet day," Caitlin said with a sigh, removing Scrap from her sleeve once again.
Cisco's computer started chiming an alert, and a sleek greyish-white kitten leaped up to peer at it.
"You jinxed it," Cisco muttered, shooing the kitten away from the keyboard. " Armed Robbery on Fifth at Crescent, go."
Barry went, careful not to step on any paws or tails as he did. This was going to take some getting used to.