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"It's hard for him to open up. He's afraid of what he knows about life and death, and he's afraid that we're going to die at any moment. He's actually really friendly, but he likes to keep his distance. The only person he's really close to is me. I'm close to him and Andrew, but I kind of agree with Amani..."
He watched the kitten nip at Tessan's finger, then held the kitten out to her. "Do you want to hold her? Her name's Mamimi." Shozii pulled off, turning away at the end of the street. He took his car a couple blocks away, then parked it on the curb in front of a house of someone he knew. He shoved a couple things from the backseat into the messenger bag, then grabbed his lunch and locked up his car. If he was going to stay at Brodie's again tonight, he sure as hell wasn't going to starve. After crossing the street and slipping between two houses, he concealed himself and walked the rest of the way to the boy's house. He jumped up to the window, conveniently left open while Brodie was at school. He stashed his things under the bed and shifted into a black cat, becoming visible and heading for the bedroom door. Standing on his hind legs, he gently scratched at the door and meowed, waiting for someone to let him out. |
"Of course I would!" she said happily, gently taking the kitten in her arms. As she stroked her head, she said, "I guess that makes sense...but...I dunno, it isn't healthy to be that distant, ya know? Teenagers need close friends, it helps them develop! I mean, if I hadn't had my friends, I don't know what I would have done..."
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"Well, he's afraid of having friends. That's why he just has me. But who knows, maybe you'll be his first friend," he replied, heading for the car and opening the back passenger side door. He tossed his backpack into the seat behind Amani, then opened the front passenger side door.
"You're coming with us, right?" he asked, sitting down in the front seat. |
Brodie turned away as soon as Shozii pulled out of the driveway, walking quickly to the front door. "Mom?" he called as he walked into the house, "I'm home a bit early!" He hung back from going any further in. The thought of explaining the whole ordeal was not a very tempting one.
After a few minutes he heard her bustling through the hall, she was still holding a wooden spoon and a shaker thingy of oregano. "Early? Why? You didn't get in trouble at school, did you?" She sounded worried again. "No...Just," he answered slowly. He didn't want to worry her anymore, but he wasn't quite sure how to answer her properly without doing just that. In his moment of anxious and silent stalling, he could barely hear the small scratching noises coming from upstairs. Mrs. Fisher heard it as well. "Oh! I must not have heard the poor thing while I was cooking," she spoke quickly as she hurried up the stairs. Brodie still for a second or two before dumping the packet on a nearby table and following her. He got to the bottom of the stairs when his mother opened the door of his room. |
The cat meowed loudly and darted out of the room, meeting Brodie at the bottom of the stairs and staring up at him as though in greeting. He meowed again, then gently headbutted the boy's shins like any affectionate cat would do.
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Brodie stared awkwardly at the little animal before him, "Shozii?"
"Aww," Mrs. Fisher said from above him as she leaned over the banister, "He likes you already!" She looked positively giddy. She loved all kinds of furry animals, especially when they did things like that. "Ma, he probably just knows I'm the one who'll feed him," he answered flatly. He ran his fingers through his hair absentmindedly, "Anyway, there's, like, some stuff on the table you need to look through. So, I'll be in my room." He said it quickly as he passed her on his way up the stairs, ending the conversation as he entered his room. |
The cat let out a chirping mew, following at Brodie's heels. He hurried back into the room, jumping up on the bed and sitting, staring at Brodie. Yellow eyes turned bright orange, confirming that the feline was in fact the reaper that Brodie couldn't seem to get rid of.
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Brodie pushed the door closed before he could hear his mother say "Aww" again, without taking his eyes off Shozii. He opened his mouth and closed it again. He waited a minute or so until he heard his mother walk down the stairs before saying what he was going to say. The last thing he needed was for her to think he was talking to a cat.
"So..." he was unsure what to say and felt a bit awkward. "Can you just change back into a guy real quick? I can't talk to a cat like this." He fell into his chair so that he sat at his desk and was facing Shozii. |
"First of all, you haven't fed me yet. Why the hell would I follow you for food?" he asked, shifting back into a man. "And it's for the best that I stay in this form, as I can't very well talk to you as a cat. Unlike Andrew, I cant speak English in an animal form."
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"Pff," he said as he spun his chair around so that he could lean forward and rest his folded arms over the chair's back. With a glance at the bag of cat food that still occupied the corner of his room he said, "So I didn't quite think that one through, it was just an excuse. Don't want Mom thinking I actually like taking care of a cat," he raised an eyebrow, "You're supposed to be a punishment anyway, remember?"
"So, what, you can't speak English as a cat, but you can understand it?" |
"All felines understand English, regardless of whether they're shifters or natural cats. I can't speak English as a cat because it's not my native language. Mm. A punishment, how fitting," he said, laying down on the bed and reaching over the edge, pulling his lunch box out from underneath it.
"Thanks to you, I haven't eaten since yesterday," he muttered, opening up the lunch box and pulling a sandwich out of it. "I was lucky enough to find time to even make food, let alone eat it." |
She nodded, following in silence with Mamimi still in her arms. She scooted to the middle seat, closing the door as she did.
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Brodie exhaled in a slight harrumphing manner, "Well, sorry," he said under his breath without really meaning it. "Um, anyway..." he looked more at Shozii's forehead than into his eyes. Beating around the bush was not something that came easy for him when he really wanted answers, "What exactly happened today? With the, uh, the two students and all." All he knew was that they were dead, and that was enough to get him a little edgy.
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"I didn't have anything to do with it, if that's what you're implying," he said, hanging his head upside down off the bed and taking a bite of the sandwich. He stared off at the wall across from the bed in a bored manner. "Some kid flipped his lid, shot two classmates and a teacher. The kids didn't live, and the teacher most likely won't make it through the night. Just another sob story." He shrugged a little, which looked off given the fact that he was partially upside down.
((I'll reply to Yume later, as she's going to bed.)) |
Brodie picked his head up, "How can you say that so...so passively? I mean, sure you must see a lot of deaths, but this is," he didn't want to say it was different, but he felt like it was, "Something like this happens only two weeks after Terry died?" he now held onto the chair tightly, "It- It's not as if I was the only one affected, especially by what happened today. A bunch of people probably thought they were going to die today."
He looked at Shozii again, "Surely, you can understand that?" |
"Things like this happen all the time. A few people die, a couple dozen are scared senseless, the world keeps on turning. It doesn't matter. What are a couple lives here and there?" he asked, taking another bite from his sandwich.
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"Christ, 'A few people die?! A couple dozen are scared senseless?!' What about their friends? Their families?" he tried his very best not to start yelling. "The entire school for Pete's sake? I don't know where you're from but this kind of stuff does not happen here!"
He held his head for a second, he was sure he couldn't get his point across to this guy. "What about....what about your brother? You can't tell me he was just another sob story or just another life." |
"My brother fought for the Aidans and lost. He was a fool for thinking the king would keep his promises. He should've fought for the Zonchiis and Cozus, but he didn't. It's his own damn fault, and I won't mourn his death. Even his own daughter realizes her father was a fool. Things like what happened today happen everyday, and everywhere. Just because you don't hear about them or see them on the news doesn't mean anything. If the news reported on all of these occurrences, then there wouldn't be any time to report on anything else. You go to sleep, you wake up, tomorrow is another day. The world is still turning. Family and friends don't mean a damn thing. Everyone effects someone in some way, it can't be helped. Grow up and learn the cycle."
"Seatbelt," Amani said with a hint of annoyance, reminding both the reaper and his brother to put them on. He himself already had his on. "Right," Zaitsu said with a tired sigh, quickly pulling his on and leaning his seat back a little so he could lay halfway down and close his eyes. "So, Miss Reaper. What's your name?" he asked, casually trying to start a conversation in order to avoid an awkward silence on the way home. |
Placing Mamimi on her lap, she put the just waist seatbelt on, making sure it didn't cover the kitten. "Tessan. I guess I should ask your name too right? Even though I already know it," she said with a smile.
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"If you know it already, then there's really no point in me telling you," he replied, laying his arm over his eyes to block out the light as Amani pulled out of the parking garage and into the street.
Mamimi mewed and nuzzled Tessan's hand, wanting attention. Amani remained silent, his attention completely on driving and his inner thoughts rather than the two other occupants of the car. |
She smiled silently, turning all of her attention to the kitten in her lap. As Mamimi nuzzled her hand, Tessan tip toed her fingers across her, starting at her nose and quickly moving along.
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"She really likes you, you know," he said, glancing over the back of the chair at her. He smiled slightly. "She doesn't usually take to strangers."
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Later on in his life, if he would live to have a 'later on,' Brodie might laugh about this moment when he couldn't make sense what he would call an incredibly bleak look at life, when his own opinion of it didn't seem to fare too well with the disappearance of a single person in his life. At the moment, though, he was rather unsettled.
"Is that what you think, then?" he demanded of Shozii, "Then, is that what you were thinking when you were talking to us in class? 'Grow up?'" |
"No," he replied, focusing his stare at Brodie. " I was thinking, 'Move on with your lives. Don't dwell on death because you'll just waste away your remaining time thinking of what could've been.' That's what I was thinking."
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A tiny brunette pattered up the stairs of the apartment building, a piece of paper with an address on it clutched tightly in her hand. The higher she got the more her hair lightened, turning a rosey colored brown before it started to fade toward full fledged pink. By the time she was knocking on the apartment door, her hair was a vibrant pink and a pair of calico ears were appearing on her head, "Andrew?" She tapped quickly, glancing up and down the hallway and wishing she could hold her disguise better, but it was harder because she was stressed.
Tobias tapped on the door again, feathery wings appearing on her back as she did so. This was going to look very strange if someone walked up the stairs right now. |
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