'Kitties'

'Kitties.'

'Kitties,' of all shapes and sizes.

How to put it, meow...

Let's suppose, from tip to tail of town, out came cute little things... hm, and let's also assume you like cute things.

They'll appear by your side, without warning or whisper.

But they'll only wander into your life on some certain day.

Kitties aren't like people. They won't cozy up to you just because you're so upstanding, and they won't abandon you just because you're some petty thief.

Are there kitties who bask in the sun in coffee shops? There are. Black kits who give night guards a scare when they flash by? Yes.

Even in jail, jail so stunningly strict... kitties can still tiptoe right in, and leave without a hair out of place.

Oh, I might just really love them. No matter which kitty it is, I can feel just how they feel. I don't want to get up. I'm hungry. It's warm. You know what—I'd like to play a prank.

Everything is a kitty's whim.

How could a person ever learn to be as easygoing as a kitty? Kitties don't ever band up to bully a single cat.

Ah. They're not like livestock or housepets. Don't think of keeping kitties, or shutting them in.

I hear tell that anyone who'd want to hurt a kitty, in the end, would never even find a single one.

...Haze, Haze!

Meow?

You're okay, right?

Mmn... Was I off saying things again just now?

You suddenly ducked down muttering something, and then you wouldn't say anything at all, like you'd fallen fast asleep.

My, my, this hat is incorrigible, scaring people by raving lunatic and arcane. It does ab—solutely nothing to fit my style.

Dr. Kal'tsit said that when Operators display this sort of loss of self-conscious response, we have to report it to Medical straight away...

Oh, I'm fine, I'm fine meow. I wouldn't be caught dead on those bloody infirmary beds. The kitties by my feet are just too adorable, and I couldn't help losing myself in loving them.

Haha. There's always so many kitties around Mousse, that's why.

And what a mewtiful thing! For absolute kitty-addicts like me, Mousse becomes an indispensable part of life...

Heheh, they're all so kind. That's why they've been protecting me since I was back in Victoria...

......

...Haze?

(She's in another daze...)

Haze?

...Miss Haze!

Myah! ...I'm—I'm alright.

What's weighing on your mind, Haze? You've been paying extra attention to our surroundings since a bit ago.

(Whisper) C—Could it be a scent? Has something dangerous sneaked into the Rhodes Island base?

It's not, I just... happened to notice woman of distinction passing by.

Woman of...?

Distinction...?

Ah! You mean Miss.Christine? I didn't detect her at all.

It's clear to see while all the kitties around gather in the plaza to bask and frolic, Miss.Christine doesn't seem one bit taken by it.

Miss.Christine is a very self-determining kind of kitty. She prefers quiet, lonely places.

Now that we mention it, that sounds familiar. You usually love playing about with us, but in front of Miss.Christine, you turn all quiet.

Because... there's a deep, very familiar sense of respect living in Miss.Christine. I can't help it when I gaze at her.

......

Could it be, you've met Miss.Christine before, Haze?

How could an escapee like me hope to know a kitty of her status? No, it's—her manner, graceful, unhurried, self-pleasing. Not one bit unlike some 'benefactors' who aided me in the past.

Are you talking about...

Well, well... a bygone tale already, is it... myah-hah-hah, this hat's off on its crazed ramblings again. Steals away my attention without notice if I'm not careful.

Mm! Mousse, Mint, treat all of that jabber as my joke!

But I know there's no joke here.

To anyone else, a fugitive like me is just as good dead or alive... some might even curse me.

Society has the type who find joy in evaluating other people's worth. Being bullied by them is far from new for me.

It was harder than you'd believe to escape that prison... my sickness hit me worse and worse.

But in catching this nuisance of a disease, I caught an absurd, hitherto unpossessed hope too, the capacity to put my Originium Arts to full use...

With the catch that at first, it did absolutely no good.

Once they all saw the cuts only an Infected could have, even the nicest baker's lady wouldn't pass a crumb of old bread onto me.

I had a mind to use the power of my Arts to strike up terror in those shopkeepers' hearts... but then it slipped far out of my control, and blew straight through an entire neighborhood's worth of houses.

That kind of barbarous strength could never take me back to my normal life in Victoria. I understood that inside and out.

But, well, you know horrid 'nuisances' like me could be dead or alive to anyone else...

If even my own self turns a blind eye to my life, what other need is there to be alive?

However—I wouldn't like to die.

I spent such a tremendous amount of effort to escape that prison by the skin of my teeth, and yet I found not one person in the whole of Victoria who had any concern left for me, any willingness to accept me...

Not even... a sliver of charity to give.

Look at me, in that state. Imagine if I'd never met 'it.' If I'd never met 'them.'

I was near to forgetting why I bothered with my escape in the first place.

My, have mew been standing here for long, Doctor?

Hah-hah. I'm shirking exactly nothing. It's a break between shifts right now, and my stroll has the right to go anywhere it wants.

Doctor, did you know? When you care too much about something, it's all too easy to let the important things slip you by.

This pen from your pocket, for example. Could I have the honor of using it for a day?

Let me say upfront: I'm not trying to hide anything under the covers here. I'm just plainly, simply greeting you face-to-face. Right, plain and simple.

......

Ah. See, Miss.Christine's noticed your scent too. She's taken an even higher-up ceiling strut to rest on.

Meow? Yes, that's right, I was staring at Miss.Christine a moment ago.

I just stopped in my tracks to admire her. Observing from beyond, at a distance that won't put her on alert. Up until you passed by, Miss.Christine and I were getting along like a house on fire.

Hm? Why don't I try chit-chatting with Miss.Christine, is it?

There once was a kitty with quite a resemblance to Miss.Christine who, back in my Victorian days in hiding, came to my help.

Gave me food to eat, offered me clothes to huddle in, led me to dingy little alleyways and warehouses where I could hide from the hunt for me...

After some time, when I'd finally learned a little Arts, I wanted to find that kitty again. Repay it, you know.

I'd gotten such splendid food in comparison, such warm clothes I'd pilfered to offer it, and all it ended in was my forsaken, lonely exit from the streets.

*sigh*... Doctor, why is a raven like a writing desk? Why must we meet at three in the afternoon? Why do perfectly decent people take the fall for the awful, and why does misfortune prey on good people?

Why... am I unable to live as a kitty does?

Hah-hah... meow unbecoming of me, Doctor.

That certainly wasn't Haze grumbling to you. If you were just subject to someone rattling strange things off at you, it's alright now.

That moody, depressing little scamp. I choked the life out of it myself only a meowment ago.

If I—If Haze loved whining so much, then she would've looooo—ong, long ago crumbled under the weight.

But she—I've been through everything, followed my heart for everything, came to Rhodes Island holding my faith in myself dear.

That's quite the extraordinary feat to pull off, isn't it? Myah-hah-hah.

Well, then, have your pen back. *yawn*—It's about time I find a nice spot to sway my tail and have a nice sleep...

Mreow? Yaah—!

Ah! I found Haze!

Haze, are you okay?

Oh, it was just a trifle. Simply wasn't looking and fell right down. No need to worry, Mint, Mousse, Doctor.

Knew it—you love running off to hide every time there's a health checkup. The Medic Operators tasked us to take you with us to the consultation room, or bust!

Tsk... it's so cruel to make me stare down the state of my own health.

Haze?

No, it's alright. I suppose it's good of Rhodes Island's doctors to keep some form of privacy. Let's take a siesta for a while first, before we visit that dreadful, disinfectant-stinking room.

Bu—But you almost fainted a moment ago...

Look at that, I have Mint and Mousse with me too. You won't be one bit late carrying me over after I faint for real.

And the Doctor's right here as well.

No—can—do—! Health maintenance is incredibly important! Um, though we don't really qualify as 'healthy' people...

Leave the meat of the lecture until after we find those adorable little kitties, and have ourselves a proper group lie-down. Mousse, where have those kits gone to rest today?

Hm? I-If I had to guess, probably in the Garden...

Then time's of the essence. Let's convene the kitties right now and tour around the Garden together!

Ah, Doctor, you're still here.

As you can see, I'll be taking a nice, lazy afternoon nap, getting a pre-departure physical exam done and dusted, and then I'll report in with my team, and we'll start today's acts of 'chivalry.'

Coming from a former thief and a criminal on the run, it might be quite ironic to hear.

But, Doctor, as far as I'm concerned now, this is quite nice.

As things stand, my strange little self somehow has battles to fight for the sake of saving others, and thus the chance to be approved of by more and more people...

Doctor, you're not like those once-adorable twice-adored kits, and versus one of refined manners and a concern only for her own freedom like Miss.Christine, you're a world apart.

I just can't make heads or tails of you... but I know that here and now, you're partial to frolicking about with me, and willing to entrust missions to me with proud and confident airs.

If you ask me, having earned that much from you makes me absolutely content.

Myah-hah-hah, that's what you wanted to say, wasn't it, you lunatic little hat? So long, meow revoir!

......

Meow.

Meow!

......

Yes, rather than my 'liking' kitties, it might be better to say I revere them.

Or, perhaps... envy them.

It's an envy which, at some times, compounds my frustrations.

Ah, humanity... always this way. Any one of its desires coming about can carry unforeseeable dangers. Pay a shred of attention less, and you'll cause yourself to fall into the straits of distress.

That said... never anticipate a kitty's actions based on your own dear wishes.

They're kitties. Free, merry, lucky, ill-omened, saddened kitties.

What's more important is they do as they please, come and go unfettered, with none of those complicated human social devotions. They simply enjoy life, full stop—

After all, what could people ever hope to demand from a kitty?