Work Text:
It's been quite some time since his claws had scratched the floorboards of a balmy, heated home.
He used to live in one—with his mother and all of his siblings. He barely remembers the feeling of his fur near the fireplace, his mother hissing at him whenever he got too close.
Well, he knew that the brightly-lit embers would turn to lonely Octobers, instead of four walls, he’d be surrounded by tall, brick buildings outdoors. He had held out his hope that his previous home would last.
Now, Techno sits outside a bakery where all the children would stop by for a few free slices of raisin bread. And he thought this—if nobody likes him when he's human, if he is a burden even when he's a kitten, then nobody would truly want him.
Nevertheless, his eyes spark up in wonder upon hearing a yell. He sees the two brothers he's been noticing around more frequently these days. There's Tommy, the blond eight year old boy with his boisterous voice and his borderline unhinged humour. Then there's Wilbur, the sixteen year old brunette whose favourite hobby is pestering his sibling with eleventh grade math that Tommy would rather gouge his eyes out than hear about.
“Wilbur, oh my god oh my god oh my god,” Tommy half-whispers half-shouts.
“What is it this time?” the older sighs.
“Look, there's a kitten! A cute little tiny kitten,” Tommy’s irises swirl into curious orbs of light as he points at Techno. The cat-shifter freezes at being discovered.
“What? Why the hell is it pink?” Wilbur scrunches up his nose.
“That's what makes it special, Wil. We have got to take it home.”
Wilbur shakes his head. “There's no way, Toms. We live in an apartment. There's simply no way.”
Tommy shrugs. “We can keep it if we don't tell dad.”
“We’re really just gonna snatch up a random cat from the streets?” Wilbur raises his eyebrows. “You don't even know if he likes you.”
“Oh, he does, you prick! Watch this.” Tommy opens his arms wide, expectant of the cat.
Techno stays oblivious to the child’s needs.
“Come on,” Tommy urges underneath his breath. “Come here, kitty.”
Techno hesitantly trots over to him. His whole perception shakes as the blond boy scoops him up in his arms. He lets out a quiet, instinctual hiss.
“See? He loooves me,” Tommy drawls.
Wilbur sighs in defeat. “Oh well, guess he'll be coming home with us. But it's on you if we get caught.”
Tommy jumps up and down; Techno feels his poor organs churning. And they head home together, wherever that is.
There's something eccentric about how fast things could change. Techno never expected to be laying on the lap of a stranger yet not-so-stranger.
Tommy begins to pet his fur. Techno can't help but to covertly lean into the touch. It's the smallest gesture you could give to an animal—affection. He soaks in it knowing that he'll never have this whenever he's in his human form.
Tommy fondles his ears, ranting to thin air about how adorable, how lovely, how majestic his new pet is.
Techno wouldn't want to ruin the boy’s happiness by revealing that he's only a shifter. That as much as he wants to, he couldn't always stay a cat. It's an exhausting thing, shifting back to human in secret, when nobody is watching. It drains him, his brain forcing him to stay in his animal form when his body is already crying out to bring him back to his human one. He'd say calling it a life-and-death situation would be an exaggeration, but he's gotten close multiple times, so there's no denying how dangerous it is to attempt to endure.
“And did you know?” Tommy snaps him out of his thoughts. “Wilbur is a little bitch. He annoys the fuck out of me. Uh oh, please don't tell him I swore– wait, you can't do that. Whatever. My point is that he's the meanest person I know. He knocks on my door and shoves his math homework in my face. All I see is calculus calculus calculus before I go to bed. It's fucking traumatising.”
Tommy sighs in irritation directed towards Wilbur who is currently not present in the room. “He's decent when he's calm. Sometimes Wil would play me his guitar. I like that. I like it more whenever the string breaks while he's playing though,” Tommy laughs at a memory he holds close to his heart. “He's still ninety-nine percent asshole. But you,” Tommy pokes at Techno. “You're not an asshole. You're the most wonderful, endearing, majestic, lovely, gorgeous cat ever.”
Techno could only smile at him and purr. Those sweet-sounding words that he'll only hear as a kitten, he dwells in them, he rests between its cracks and hopes that one day, he'll be told these things no matter his form.
Wilbur throws him up in the air. Techno doesn't mind it, in fact, he finds it mildly enjoyable.
“You're a scruffy little thing, aren't you?” Wilbur coos. “I'd give you a bath in our bathroom if only you wouldn't shed fur. I guess we'll have to find another way.”
They sit on the couch and Wilbur turns the television on for some background noise. “We haven't named you, have we? Hm, I think ‘Blade’ would be quite nice. Yeah, I'll name you that before Tommy names you something stupid like ‘Big Puss 2.0’.”
“Alright Blade, what do you think of Tom and Jerry?”
Techno tilts his head—he doesn't know what that is, but he finds it vaguely familiar.
“I have no idea if you'll like it, it's about a cat and a mouse–” The door creaks open, slower than acceptably normal. The person on the other side must be exhausted. “Dammit! Dad is here. I need to hide you.”
Wilbur carries him and swiftly runs to his room. He opens the door to his closet, revealing the most disastrous pile of clothes to ever grace this accursed world.
“I’m sorry, buddy, but you'll have to stay here for a while if we don't want to get caught. Stay quiet, alright?”
And with that, Wilbur closes the closet and leaves the room with an innocent smile on his face.
Techno looks around him. His vision allows him to see a couple of stacked sweaters and trench coats that seem like they've been rummaged through. It's cramped in here, too cramped. All four corners start caving in on him, pressing on his lungs and swallowing him whole.
Techno blinks through the darkness and buries himself into the crumpled mess Wilbur had turned his closet into.
He could always open that door. He could always allow himself to be let out, yet he won't. That would get him in trouble and Wilbur and Tommy would be disappointed and their father would scold them and nobody will like him anymore. He'll be back on the streets, homeless and devoid of anyone setting him on their lap and brushing his fur. The love will leave him if he leaves this house. It's an illusion, a temporary thing. But he finds that this place is safe. He finds that these people are safe.
The closet creaks open slightly. Techno closes his eyes in fear that it might not be Wilbur or Tommy.
“I'm back, I'm back.” It's Wilbur. The brunette gives him a half-grin. “Was it scary in there?”
Techno shakes his head. Tight spaces don't frighten him much, they just spike his anxiety in levels that the human-version of him cannot handle.
“I'm sorry, Blade,” Wilbur apologises. “I'll make it up to you, buds. I'd say fish for dinner, is that good?”
Techno nods willingly. He hasn't had fish in so long, only ever scraps from garbage cans and canals. He hasn't eaten good food in a long while.
He felt it gurgle inside him, that surge of impulse scratching his insides. He needs to turn. He needs to turn now. He can't turn now.
But it's a horribly inevitable thing.
They would hate who he actually is—an orphaned thirteen year old boy, annoying and disinteresting, a deceiver and a liar. If the fur on his back is replaced by the hair on his head, they would certainly kick him out of this apartment he has dared call a warm home.
Techno leaps off the couch. It's Tommy who notices; Wilbur is too occupied by this show called ‘Tom and Jerry’. The blond watches him with regard before going back to focusing on the cartoon with his older brother.
Techno runs straight to the laundry room. At least here, the disarray would be enough to let him keep his cover.
Behind the basket of dirty laundry, he shifts into his human form after days of suppression. He clutches his chest stiffening at every breath he takes. It aches it aches it aches it aches.
The feeling of his own skin feels unfamiliar. The loss of his tail is a drastic change, no longer can he wrap it around himself to keep him stable.
Techno backs further into a corner. He knows the only one to blame here is him. Did he really think he could go a week without turning human and the process wouldn't be too painful to bear? Chunks of tears leave his eyes as his brain shuts down, it couldn't handle the capacity of his thoughts. His own blood weighs his body down. He isn't a little animal anymore—his throat bobs and his heart races at that fact. Everything is too big to fit in his ribs.
Distantly, he hears footsteps. Distantly, he hears screaming.
Someone is shaking him. Someone is calling for him. Reaching, reaching for him. Holding him so gently that his heart and his mind and his lungs start to grow to fit perfectly.
Techno’s eyes flutter and widen as his vision expands and clears the blurry mist.
Wilbur is kneeling in front of him, stroking his hair away from his face. “Hey, c'mon, breathe with me.” He grasps Techno’s palm and pulls it near his beating heart. “One, two, three, four.” In. “Five, six, seven, eight.” Out.
They sit there for a few minutes, Wilbur’s hand on his back and two pairs of eyes affixed on his faltering form.
Tommy enters the room, gulping when he sees this unknown boy on the floor with his worried brother. “Um, Wil?” the younger calls.
“Shhh,” Wilbur hushes. “Now's not the time, Tommy.”
“O..okay. Should I call dad?”
“Yeah, you'll probably have to.”
Techno’s eyes dart up to Wilbur's insistent gaze. “No. No. D- don't. Please.”
“It’s okay, buddy,” Wilbur reassures, wiping his tear-stained cheek. “He'll let you stay if we give him a reasonable explanation.”
“..Really?”
Both Wilbur and Tommy nod.
“Let’s get out of this cluttered place,” Wilbur lifts him up, just like he did when Techno was in his cat-form.
Below, Tommy blinks at him. “Does this mean I'm getting a new, better older brother? Pog!” he exclaims as he skips happily to the living room.
Wilbur scoffs at him fondly. “You don't need to explain anything to us right now. Do you want some..er- apple juice? Look, it's the only drink we have around.”
“Hey!” Tommy groans. “That's my apple juice.”
“Tommy,” Wilbur says sternly. “Sharing is what?”
“Sharing is caring,” Tommy huffs.
“And will you share your apple juice?”
“Yes. Yes, I will share my apple juice..”
“Good.”
Tommy sticks his tongue out at his brother.
Wilbur rolls his eyes. “You'll have to learn to live with this,” the brunette looks at Techno, and grits his teeth.
“I don't understand what that means,” the cat-shifter says.
Wilbur returns only an enigmatic smile.