To: @choco-maize
From: @interabangs
This is a treat for choco-maize, who gave the genius prompt of Sigma and Carlos in a cat café. Hope it’s all right that I made Junpei the POV character, and I hope you enjoy reading!
Junpei stormed down the busy sidewalk, hands shoved into his jacket pockets as he scanned the area for two tall, muscle-bound idiots. Finally, after crossing a narrow side road, his eyes fell upon a tiny shop with a sign that made his blood run cold: “Purrsonal Space: the best café in town for cat lovers.”
No, he thought, whipping his phone out of his black leather jacket to confirm that this is where his GPS app confirmed their location.
A big red dot on top of the building in front of him blinked at him, and he shoved his phone back in his pocket.
Oh no they fucking didn’t.
Junpei opened the door to the tiny cat café, and heard them before he even got a good look at the place.
“This is great, man.”
“Yeah, meow that we know about this place, we could come here every day!”
“Haha, that’s funny, Sigma.”
“No, fur real, I’m not kitten around.”
“Sir,” a woman at the cash register said to Junpei as he honed his attention on two grown men sitting in the center of the room, playing with cats, “Did you make a reservation?”
“This is business. Even though it feels more like a terrible joke,” Junpei muttered the last part as he took out his wallet and flipped open his detective ID. She opened her mouth to say something, but he blew past her, stuffing his wallet back in his pants pocket.
He slammed the narrow gate all the way open as he barged into the café, stomping toward the center of the room. A grey and white tabby tried to slink out through the gap between the swiftly closing gate, but the attendant at the front grabbed her from around the middle, glaring at Junpei as he came to a stop in front of Sigma and Carlos at the far end of the room.
“Fucking Christ, you two!” Junpei shouted. “Enough is enough!”
“What? Feels like we just got here,” Sigma asked, sitting cross-legged on the floor and dangling a feather on a string in front of a black cat. Its large yellow eyes followed the feather as it lied sprawled out two feet from Sigma, but didn’t budge.
“You two have been here for four hours. Aren’t you sick of this by now?”
“What’s to get sick about?” Carlos asked, shaking some cat treats out onto his open palm. The black cat jumped up and padded over to him.
Junpei slapped his face across his forehead, dragging it down his face as he squeezed his eyes shut. “This is hell. I’m literally in the deepest circle of hell right now.”
“Don’t hissen to him,” Sigma told Carlos, watching with a faint bit of envy as the black cat rubbed up against Carlos’s leg. “He’s exapurrating.”
“They’re not even doing anything,” Junpei said, gesturing around at the other handful of cats in the vicinity. Two of them were lying on shelves, sleeping, and a ginger kitten was struggling to climb up Sigma’s back.
“Cats don’t have to do anything for you to appreciate them,” Carlos pointed out, feeding the black cat treats one by one.
“Okay, fine,” Junpei snapped, balling his hand into a fist when the kitten heroically reached the top of Sigma’s shoulder and gently headbutted his cheek. “Whatever, but we’ve got an important trip to go on.”
“Where mew?” Sigma asked.
“Japan. So put the damn cats down and let’s get going.”
“Aw, can’t you give us five more minutes?”
“Yeah! Paw-leeze?”
Junpei resisted the urge not to seize both of them by the scruff of their necks and drag them outside. “You dumbasses, we’re trying to save the world, here!”
Carlos sighed, petting the black cat on his shoulder before gently scooping him up and placing him down and getting to his feet. “He’s right, you know. We can always come back later, Sigma, once we’ve stopped the religious fanatic.”
“I’m starting to think that guy’s got more sense than the two of you put together,” Junpei muttered, keeping a watchful eye on both of them as they slowly, reluctantly, parted from their furry friends.
———
Six hours into the flight from Tokyo to Narita, Junpei regretted picking the seat in front of Carlos since he was still comparing hundreds of cat selfies with Sigma and arguing about who had a better – sigh – hisstory with cats: Carlos taking pictures and slow dancing with his cat at Prom, or Sigma insisting he could still understand what they were saying, which was likely a result of one too many childhood sugar rushes.
Junpei crossed his arms and fumed silently as he listened to them go on and on about their dumb fixation. He’d tried sleeping, but no dice. He tried watching a movie, but it didn’t distract him from the two bastards behind him. He didn’t drink anymore, and there was literally nothing else on the ride to distract him.
“You know, at this point, you’re being obvious to the point of obnoxious.”
He turned his head to the left, glancing at Phi. She turned the page of a magazine idly, and Junpei huffed loudly.
“Oh, give it a break, already,” she said, rolling her eyes. “We get it: you’re jealous.”
He shook his head, snorting incredulously. “What, me?”
“They have something in common. You don’t like it. It makes you feel left out, doesn’t it?”
“What?” Junpei nearly shouted, then lowered his voice. “No, I am not jealous!”
Phi turned her head away from her magazine, looking straight at him until he started to fidget nervously, and then she pronounced very slowly as she glanced back down at her magazine. “No. Of course you’re not.”
At that moment, Carlos said, “Aww, look at this little guy and his little paws.”
Junpei wanted to grab Carlos’s phone from him, run to the bathroom and try to flush it down the toilet, but he made do with pressing the button to push his chair all the way back.
———
The lead turns out to be a bust, so the four of them agreed to sleep at a hotel for the night and head back to California the next day. Phi went off to a bar, and Sigma and Carlos chose adjoining rooms across the half from Junpei and Phi’s separate ones, which only made Junpei more frustrated. He took an angry shower, then sat on his bed in his towel, texting Akane about how their lead was a dead end – literally. She was disappointed, but understood. Junpei briefly considered getting something for Akane at one of the shops, but decided to bring her back to Japan after they stopped the terrorist from blowing up the world, so Junpei and Akane could fully appreciate visiting their home country, and there was that whole wedding thing he kinda wanted to do. He got dressed, then started pacing back and forth, seething about how Carlos started doing the stupid cat pun thing on the plane ride to Tokyo, and it was really getting on his last nerve.
He called Phi and could almost see her rolling her eyes when he launched into his rant about Carlos’s newly acquired cat tic.
“Oh, give it a rest, already,” she said. “Hey, maybe if you lock them in a room with fifty cats and leave them there all day, eventually they’ll get sick of them. Or end up choking on a hairball. It’s win-win.”
Junpei, who had been lying flat on his back on his bed, bolted straight up and said, “That’s it! Thanks, Phi!”
“You’re all a bunch of weirdos,” she muttered, and he heard her slam down a shot glass before she hung up the phone.
When Carlos let Junpei into his room, Junpei was a little relieved to see Carlos actually talking to another person, without saying anything cat-related.
“Just chatting with Maria,” Carlos said, holding up his phone to show Maria’s beaming face on the other end.
“Hi, Junpei!” she said, and he waved back at her, then asked Carlos where Sigma was.
Carlos’s eyes darted over to the door joining his room with Sigma’s. “He’s, uh, talking with Diana in the other room.”
Junpei headed over to the door, putting his hand on the doorknob, but Carlos called out, “Uh, better not go in there. I think he’s having a… pretty private conversation.”
Maria giggled from the other end of the phone as Junpei jerked his hand away from the knob, taking several long, quick steps backward. “Then why are you here? Listening in on them like some kind of creep?”
Carlos walked over to the side of his bed and plugged a cord into his phone. “No! I needed to charge my battery. Used it all up on the plane ride here.”
“Yeah,” Junpei said, refraining from grinding his teeth, “about that. Can I talk to you about something?”
Carlos wrapped up his conversation with Maria and they did their silly ‘I’m hugging you through the phone’ routine before Carlos ended the video chat and put his phone on the night stand. “What’s up?”
“Let’s stay here another day,” Junpei suggested.
Carlos furrowed his brow in confusion. “But I thought we were done here.”
“Okay, look.” Junpei began pacing back and forth in front of Carlos. “If I take you and Sigma to the best cat café in the entire world, you both have to promise you’ll stop going to them in the States.”
“All right,” Carlos said, and Junpei screeched to a halt in his tracks, nearly leaving skid marks on the carpet.
“’All right?’” Junpei echoed, staring at Carlos. “That’s it?”
Carlos put his hands on his hips. “On the condition that it really is the best cat café in the world.”
“Oh, it is,” Junpei said. “Deal.”
They shook hands, and started hearing muffled noises coming from Sigma’s adjoining room.
Carlos said, very quickly, “Hey, uh, weren’t you at a bar with Phi?”
“O-oh, yeah,” Junpei said, “she’s probably still there. Let’s go, right now.”
And they both left in record time, just as the sounds were starting to get louder.
———
Sigma and Carlos gasped as Junpei looked on, sipping coffee as he leaned against a scratching post that was taller than him.
“It’s purrfect!”
“Litterally heaven!” Carlos said.
“Cats!”
“They’re everywhere!”
“I’m not even lion, this puts the other place to shame!”
“Where have mew been all my life?”
“Look at all the types there are! They’re so purr-ecious!”
“Yeah, I see a Maine Coon!”
“There’s a Bengal!”
“A Siberian!”
“Carlos,” Sigma said, very seriously, “I think I’m going to faint right meow.”
Carlos put his hand on Sigma’s shoulder to steady him. “No, don’t! You’ll hiss out on all the fun!”
Junpei didn’t say it out loud, but he was also kind of impressed. Japan had always been famous for its cat cafes, but this one took the cake. The building wasn’t some rinky-dink one-story box with eight or nine cats. No, this place was as big as a warehouse, huge enough to house at least fifty felines, and Junpei looked on as Carlos and Sigma petted cats, fed a few of them treats, and followed others that were idly padding around. The two big lugs carefully weaved in and out of makeshift trees and caves that were spacious enough for them to stretch up on their toes and pet cats that walked on balance beams, which were interconnected all over the place, halfway between the ceiling and the ground.
It actually wasn’t that bad, watching all the different types of cats hang out with human visitors. A few of them slept, but most of them were eager to approach people, looking for a treat or a friendly scratch behind the ears.
Almost as if she sensed Junpei via homing beacon, a large fluffy cat with light and dark brown patches sniffed him for a bit before rubbing her side against his legs, and he tried twisting away, but Carlos caught him doing that and walked up to him, murmuring, “Don’t worry, she won’t bite.”
Junpei knew she wouldn’t, but he was fine just staying in one spot as Sigma and Carlos disappeared at random intervals, then came back juggling their phones, cat treat bags, and a different kitty to dump their phone in Junpei’s hands and instruct him on taking a picture of them with their new furr-end.
Friend. Junpei shook his head. What was happening to him?
He went to the bathroom while the cat fiends busied themselves elsewhere, figuring he’d give them about five more minutes before they left to meet Phi and head to the airport.
When he came back, however, it took him a few minutes to locate both Sigma and Carlos. He finally found them in a dimly lit side room, a cavelike structure with a ledge propped up against the wall, covered in cushions for people to sit and cats to sleep. There were about eight of them crawling all over both of the other men, who looked more like blissfully overgrown children.
Junpei sighed, kind of bummed that he had to tell them to leave their furry sanctuary. He looked at Sigma, who was holding an orange tabby and saying he would take her home and name her Luna if he and Diana didn’t already pick a name for their future child. Junpei then looked at Carlos, who was serenely petting both a cat with flattened ears and letting two blue-grey cats gently headbutt his arms.
“See?” Junpei said, “What did I tell you?”
“Okay, Junpei, you win,” Carlos said. “But before we go, why don’t you join us fur a moment? Sit down, pet a cat, relax a little.”
“I don’t know,” Junpei said, but Sigma and Carlos both set down the meowing cats they were holding and dragged Junpei over to an empty spot on the ledge.
“Guys,” he said, “It’s okay, really.”
“You’re not allergic,” Carlos pointed out, “and I can tail you’ve been wanting to pet one since we got here.”
“Right,” Sigma agreed. “We’re not coming back for a while, so how about we make the most of this before we head back home, nya?”
Before Junpei could protest, Carlos put a sleek, black kitten with large yellow eyes in Junpei’s lap. The kitten had large yellow eyes and stared up at Junpei for a moment, before she started to lick his hand and then burrowed herself into the crook of Junpei’s arm.
Junpei’s heart truly melted as the kitten started to purr.
“Oh, no,” Junpei said.
“Oh, yeah,” Carlos said. “Meow this is purrfect.”
“What did I tail you?” Sigma said, nudging Carlos with his elbow as he scratched the top of a majestic Persian’s head with his free hand. “He’s one of us meow.”
“Am not.” Junpei said, tears welling in his eyes as the kitten slowly kneaded his arms, then looked up at Junpei, meowing plaintively.
“Don’t worry. I’m not budging from this spot,” he whispered, kissing the top of the kitten’s head. “Nothing and no one can make me, nya.”
———
“Junpei,” Akane said, hands on her hips.
“Oh shit – I mean, hey!” Junpei whirled around to look up at her as the Scottish Fold that had been resting in his lap leapt to the ground and bounded out of the small cave. “Akane! I didn’t think you were going to come all the way over here.”
“I had to!” Akane said. Sigma laughed until she turned her wrathful gaze upon him, making him freeze up. “Diana said that although she likes the two hundred Snap… cat pictures you’ve sent her — ” Sigma grinned proudly at that, puffing his chest out a bit, “— she’s starting to get a little worried.”
He visibly deflated. “She is?”
“And Phi has been pestering me all weekend to make you fly back. I think she’s also worried about you two – don’t tell Phi I told you that – and more importantly, we all need to find out who that religious fanatic is and stop him before he destroys the human race! But instead of coming back to help search for him after the trail went cold here, the three of you stayed clear across the ocean to play with cats?” Akane was nearly shaking with disbelief and rage.
“Hey, not just any cats!” Carlos protested, gently putting his hands around the ears of the striped gray kitten in his lap. “They’re purrfect!”
“Yeah!” Sigma said indignantly, “they’re the most ameowsing cats in the world!”
“You two haven’t seen the island full of cats, either,” Junpei said, a devious smirk on his face.
Sigma gasped, pressing a fist against his chest. “That’s still around?” Tears sprang to his eyes. “Oh man, we knead to go there right away!”
“No! No, we don’t! Junpei!” Akane stomped her foot in frustration.
“It could just be for a day. Then we could go to Rabbit Island,” Junpei said, winking at Akane. Her expression didn’t change much, but Junpei could see a muscles in her jaw twitch.
“Fine,” she said after about a minute of silence passed. “Then we’re going back and saving the world.”
“Of course,” Carlos said, “we don’t want this to turn into Apocalypse Meow.”
“Yes,” Sigma agreed, nodding sagely. “That would be clawful.”
Junpei managed to not burst out laughing and instead picked up a sleek-looking Abyssian Gray that had paused – pawsed, he corrected himself – to rub up against his legs. He held the cat up toward Akane and the cat sniffed at her, then started purring.
She sighed and said, “Damn you all,” and took the happy cat, cradling it in her arms.
“What a wonfurful day, Carlos said.
“Simply pawsome,” Sigma said, and they both beamed as the rest of the cats in the café joined them, merrily meowing.
ZEcret Santa 