Chapter Text
Keith turns into a kitten. This happens sometimes, when he’s stressed; not a lot but enough that he can usually anticipate it when it’s coming. In this case, it’s a confluence of events: poor sleep after a nightmare, running late to a mandated training session, refereeing an argument between two recruits in the hallway. To cap things off, he’s caught in a sudden torrential downpour on his way to meet Shiro for one of their all-too-rare sparring sessions.
It’s this last thing that’s the final straw. As the water plasters his hair to his skull, Keith can feel his bones abbreviating themselves into a different arrangement —
He ends up in a puddle, half-smothered by his sodden jacket. He’s not always the same kind of cat — this time he seems to be a leggy adolescent with smoke-blue fur, from what he can glean when he drags his satchel out of the puddle and stashes it in the wheel well of a parked all-terrain vehicle. All Keith really knows for sure is that his fur is short and dense and he’s never going to dry out properly; he lets out a plaintive mew without really realizing he’s doing it.
It’s that sound that catches Shiro’s ear. Shiro, who must have come out into the storm to look for Keith; Shiro, who is even taller and more wonderful when Keith is so small like this.
Shiro, who is kneeling down, heedless of the puddles, and offering his prosthetic hand to Keith.
Well, Keith thinks to himself, at least Shiro’s got the tactical awareness to withhold his more vulnerable human fingers.
He allows himself to be coaxed out from under the vehicle, hoping he’s done a good enough job of hiding his belongings that Shiro won’t see them lying about and send out a search party. No need to search: Keith is right here. He’s just not himself today.
As a cat, Keith is a little too long to fit comfortably in Shiro’s hand, even if the prosthetic is ridiculously large. Shiro can’t seem to decide which is more pressing, keeping Keith’s chest supporting or preventing his rump from slipping off Shiro’s beautiful forearm. Keith knows that he keeps meaning to get it adjusted, now that the war is over, but there’s never time. It’s why they spar so infrequently.
Shiro finally makes do by letting Keith’s cat-body drape across his entire arm, and secures the hold by clasping Keith to his perfect chest. He’s so strong. A not-insignificant part of Keith feels terrible about the muddy streaks he’s leaving across Shiro’s white exercise shirt, even if he still thinks that wearing a white exercise shirt is the height of absurdity. Shiro always says that it’s his trademark or something; he’s a beacon within the ranks of the Garrison-Coalition headquarters. He deserves to wear Keith’s pawprints, really.
“Hey, little buddy,” Shiro says, and brings his human hand up to offer a tentative stroke to the tip of Keith’s nose, the tentative boop transitioning immediately into a persistent burnishing of the short velvet fur. Keith starts purring immediately: he can’t help it. Shiro’s warm and comforting, and the little extra nose-touch feels good, like when someone scratches your back right in the spot you can’t reach yourself. “Aww, you’re a nice kitty. Let’s get you cleaned up, you can keep me company while I wait for Keith.”
Shiro bundles Keith back to his office, because of course he won’t go home like a normal person. Shiro is superlative in all things. Keith supposes he can live with the shorter trek to the admin building instead of the longer commute to Shiro’s off-base housing if it means that he’s that much closer to a dry towel. Keith won’t be a cat forever, just for as long as it takes him to regain his equilibrium; the sooner he shakes off the horrible clammy chill of the rain and has a minute to gather his thoughts, the likelier he is to become human (well, human- ish ) again.
Keith isn’t feeling very lucky — hence turning into a cat, thank you very much — but he hopes that when he comes back to himself, he’ll have a chance to recalibrate without an audience. Being naked isn’t the worst part about turning back into a human. The worst part is remembering how to walk on two legs, or how to tuck and roll once his spine has less in common with a rubber band. If he’s stuck in Shiro’s office when that happens, at least Shiro always keeps an extra change of clothes in the bottom desk drawer. Hitching an oversized pair of sweats as tight as they’ll go around his waist and rolling up the bottoms will be a small price to pay.
Once in Shiro’s office, Keith is indeed offered a towel. It’s not a clean towel, but it’s not bad considering it’s the spare one from Shiro’s gym bag. It smells like Shiro; it smells used , like a person has touched it. If Keith was feeling like himself, he would never wriggle his whole body beneath it and chew on the corner to soothe himself, but he’s a cat right now. Cats do things like this. Anyway. Shiro is too busy looking for cat-appropriate snacks to notice.
“Wonder where Keith ended up,” Shiro muses aloud as he offers Keith the choice bits of a bag of trail mix: there’s some kind of rice cereal mixed in. Keith appreciates that Shiro ha staken pains to without the raisins. “Not like him to miss out on a meet-up.”
Keith mews commiseratingly. He’s a poor conversationalist on his best days; this at least takes the pressure off, though he wishes he could do more to soothe Shiro’s growing concern.
“You’re right,” Shiro says. “He must have gotten called in for a mission.” He exhales gustily and ruffles Keith’s whiskers with the force of it: his breath smells like MSG and dried fruit, probably blueberries. Shiro eats them by the handful despite them being, objectively, the worst dried fruit you can buy on-base.
Keith is still very much himself, but the cat-part of his brain is tempted to shove its face hard against the corner of Shiro’s mouth and lick, to get a better sense of those smells. To taste the salt of his skin. Keith loves Shiro in all his human absurdity. Keith knows he’s a little animalistic anyways, so the sensation of wanting to mark Shiro, to roll around in his scent — it’s familiar.
“Might as well get some work done,” Shiro says, and that won’t do at all. Keith feels harassed by the very idea of Shiro doing more work , of not getting a chance to blow off steam. It’s Keith’s fault they aren’t sparring right now .
He oozes his body across the desk until he’s sprawled right in the spot where Shiro always sets his datapad. It’s not an effective move, really — he’s about 80 percent leg, and even after a handful of trail mix his belly isn’t round enough to distract from the mountain of virtual paperwork. But the point has to be made.
“Mrrp!” Keith trills. It’s not very commanding.
Still, Shiro laughs and abandons his datapad in favor of petting Keith's flank, until his hand smooths the fur that had dried a little matted from the rain. Almost better than being licked clean. “You sounded just like him,” Shiro teases, and boldly scrubs at Keith’s belly once Keith flops invitingly onto his back. Shiro’s using his flesh hand, likely to keep from catching tufts of fur in the joints of his prosthetic, and Keith wants to wallow in the sensation of being caressed. Shiro’s hands are warm and gentle against his fur and it feels impossibly good to have someone just… stroke him. Of course he starts purring again.
It’s a ragged sound, like a choked engine that hasn’t been kick-started properly. Keith feels the purr increase in volume and intensity when Shiro’s hand slips up from Keith’s belly to skritch at the corners of Keith’s chin and jaw. He leans into the touch, chasing each caress as Shiro offers it.
“You like that, huh,” Shiro laughs. “Well, I can take a hint. You look like you’ve been through the ringer, I suppose I can spare an hour to help you get back on your feet.”
Shiro’s true to his word. He does spend the next hour fussing over Keith, going so far as to make a little nest for him out of the towel and one of Shiro’s extra shirts. Keith aches at the kindness: here Shiro is, making a place for him. Without even knowing that he’s Keith! Shiro is just that good. Despite being a person, not really a cat, Keith can’t help but lick encouragingly at Shiro’s fingers in thanks.
The only hitch in the whole interlude is the way Shiro keeps checking his communicator, looking for a text or a voice memo from Keith explaining why he’s not there.
Keith hates being left behind. In any given situation, he makes sure he’s the one doing the leaving; but not where Shiro is concerned. He knows that Shiro is becoming restless with the lack of news. The anxiety Keith feels at being the cause of Shiro’s dismay, however mild, is enough that he can’t relax back into a person-shape. It’s a terrible loop.
At last, Shirro leaves a message — not demanding, but concerned. “It’s me,” he says into the recorder, “just checking up on you. I know you can take care of yourself, hotshot; I just… missed you today. Was looking forward to kicking your ass.”
Keith makes a noise that would classify as a hmph if he weren’t a cat; it sounds more like a low whine of dismay.
“Anyway, I found a new protégé,” Shiro says cheekily. “He’s just like you! Dark hair, long legs… he’s a cat, though. Don’t worry.” His voice drops lower, fond in the way he gets sometimes. It’s the finest sound Keith has ever heard, and he’s traveled the stars. “I could never replace you, Keith. Stop by my place when you get this — doesn’t matter how late.”
Shiro bundles Keith into his jacket — the rain has stopped, but Keith’s not complaining. It’s nice to be carried, and it’s even nicer to be carried by Shiro — and heads to his studio apartment. Keith doesn’t understand why Shiro refuses to take up more space than this, but it’s not his place to judge. He just explores under the sparse furniture (finally locating that stray data card Shiro dropped a month ago; his big fingers are terrible for holding onto this kind of thing. It’s a small delight to scuff it across the floor and out into the open) and weaves in and out of Shiro’s legs while Shiro reheats a frozen dinner and again shares bites.
The frozen dinner is another sign that Shiro’s worried. He normally cooks, even if he’s on his own. He told Keith once that he liked the ritual of it, of thinking about how he was going to take care of himself and taking satisfaction in creating little moments of unrequired pleasure. Frozen meals are fine, but not the same, not now that Shiro has time set aside to savor.
“Guess we should turn in, huh, bud,” Shiro says at last. He’s forced himself to set his phone in the cubby beside his bed — it’s a floating shelf, really, one that Keith installed for him when Shiro moved into the little place. “Should I take the couch?”
He’s joking. Shiro’s too big for the couch, and Keith — is still a cat. He’s starting to worry about that, too. The last time this happened, Keith bounced back into his human shape after a few hours with no one else the wiser. Shiro removes his prosthetic and sets it to charge, rubbing at the port for a minute. Keith chases the light it casts on the apartment floor, more for something to do than out of any real interest, until Shiro climbs into bed and shuffles his knees under the covers for a restless era. That’s Keith’s cue to steal across the floor and leap into the empty island of bed between Shiro’s thighs. It’s as effective as any pin maneuver; Shiro stops fidgeting.
Keith needn’t have worried about changing shape: sleep is a reset all its own. Sometime in the night, pressed close behind Shiro’s bent knees, Keith feels the change start to reverse itself. Soon enough he’s a person again, albeit naked and aching from the hours spent in a shape too small to really fit all of his “Keith-ness” inside of it.
It doesn’t take any of the skills Keith learned with the Blades to retrieve a pair of sweats from Shiro’s basket of unfolded laundry. The basket is right there, in the open, and Shiro’s sweats are the first item of clothing in the pile. Opening the chest of drawers would have been more of a challenge, but Shiro once told Keith that it didn’t matter how long his life was going to be now — he wasn’t going to waste it by folding laundry. Keith thinks there might be a middle ground and vows to keep him company, the next time Shiro bothers with laundry; Keith is excellent at folding. Shiro doesn’t like to ask for help, but Keith loves to offer his services in whatever fashion might be of use.
He slithers the worn terrycloth up over his hips, knotting the ties at his waist.
Keith looks at the couch for a long moment before crawling back onto Shiro’s bed, curling himself into the lee of Shiro’s body. It’s so much warmer than the couch would be. Maybe there’s still a little of that feline desire for comfort left in him.
“Keith,” Shiro breathes, mostly asleep. The worry line between his eyebrows starts to fade.
“Shh,” Keith murmurs in response. Shiro’s made space for him automatically and Keith fusses at the bedding until he’s cozy, the tension of his day and the stress of his transformation finally leaving him. “’M tired. But I heard your message.”
“Was worried about you.”
“Sorry, Shiro. Go back to sleep,” Keith tells him. It’s the tenderest order to which he’s ever given voice. Shiro relaxes at the sound of it, obeys, sinks back down in his pillow-nest. Keith’s eyes are still good in the dark: Shiro is so luminous against the mattress, white hair mussed and mouth full, slightly open. Keith can count his thirty-two teeth.
If Keith were to press his cheek to the corner of Shiro’s jaw, he’d be able to smell the way his breath is souring beneath the sharp scent of toothpaste. He doesn’t; he does lean close, though, and he does press his mouth against Shiro’s brow. It’s not a kiss, Keith thinks. Kissing is something else. This is a reassurance.
It’s been a while since Keith and Shiro shared a bed like this — the last time was on the Black Lion, after that terrible fight and Shiro’s resurrection. Shiro’s bed is more comfortable than the little camp cot in Black’s storage area, and Keith burrows underneath the blankets without any further invitation, confident that Shiro would offer an invitation if he hadn’t already fallen back asleep.
In the morning, Shiro wakes him. Keith rolls hard away from Shiro’s chest and knocks his head into the wall before sitting up.
“What time did you get in?” Shiro asks him. And, “did you see a cat anywhere? He stayed with me while I waited for you.”
“It was late.” Keith’s never been a good liar, but he knows how to let others make assumptions of their own. It’s easy to imply that he came in through the unlocked window; no, Shiro, he didn’t see a cat.
“Hope he’s okay,” Shiro says, distracted.
“Whatever happened to the cat,” Keith says, and he leans over to stroke his hand against Shiro’s big prosthetic port, the same way Shiro stroked Keith’s fur the night before, “I’m sure he was better for having spent time with you.”