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There were a lot of questions when Rudo came back to HQ with a cat. Mostly questions along the lines of why do you have a cat, where did you even get it. Enjin took over answering for him, telling them the brief overview of having found it in the no man’s land. Thank goodness he did. Rudo wasn’t sure he would have been able to get the words out if he tried.
After the initial shock, there was really no issue to be had with the cat. After making sure no one in HQ had any severe allergies, Corvus gave the okay for the cat to stick around, so long as Rudo took responsibility caring for it.
That’s what led to him now, sorting out a space in his room for the kitten. Luckily all of his trash hoarding meant he had many of the items he needed, or at least things that could work in place of what he needed. A cushion was refurbished with some old curtain fabric to be a bed, the broken frame of an old bookcase was set up into a climbing area, toys were made out of basically everything he could find. He was working on setting up the climbing structure when Enjin leaned in his doorway.
“I found these,” he said, holding up two small bowls.
Rudo got up to retrieve them. “Thank you,” he said, taking the bowls. He brought them back over to the little set up he’s made. An entire corner of his room was now dedicated. There was honestly more set up for the cat than there was for him at this point, since he really just had his bed and his trash collection.
“How’s the little guy settling in?” Enjin asked, watching as Rudo got the bowls set up in the corner, filling one with water.
“He’s doing good,” Rudo said. “I think he tired himself out exploring.” He pointed over to his bed. Despite the full set up that he’d made, the kitten had curled up on Rudo’s pillow. It was so small against it, curled up into a little ball.
Enjin gave a nod, looking at that. “You should give that thing a bath,” he said, looking at the dirt it had tracked across Rudo’s pillow while settling in. “Get that polluted stink off of it.”
“Gris said he would do it tomorrow,” Rudo said.
“It’s not Gris’s cat, is it?” Enjin asked teasingly.
Rudo didn’t look back at him, pausing as he looked down at the set up in front of him. Then he looked down at his hands. To bathe the cat, he would need to take his gloves off. Ever since coming to the Ground, the pain was acting up again. Of course he always had his baseline, but after being dropped in the Pit he felt like he couldn’t go even a few moments without the gloves before things started getting noticeably bad.
“Those gloves are due for a cleaning too, aren’t they?” Enjin asked. “Just dunk the cat while you’re at it.”
Rudo didn’t reply, still looking down at his gloves. Enjin studied him for a moment, but did not push for an answer. “Well, whatever you do, just make sure it doesn’t track dirt in the hall,” Enjin said casually, allowing Rudo a chance to not have to answer about his gloves. “Semiu would not be happy about it.” It was just a teasing comment, and after that Enjin took his leave, leaving Rudo behind with his cat.
It wasn’t until that night that Rudo decided to give it a try. It was long past when most would be asleep, and he was still tinkering with the cats set up in the corner instead of getting to sleep himself. The cat had spent the evening wandering around, and now laid curled up near Rudo to watch the process.
Rudo kept looking back at the cat. He was pretty dirty. That couldn’t be comfortable for him, even for just another night before Gris stepped in. And didn’t cats have strong senses of smell? Was he able to still smell the scent of no man’s land in his fur? That couldn’t be nice. He looked down at his gloves. It had been a while since he had cleaned them as well, not wanting to deal with them being off his hands. They probably had that no man’s land scent too.
Rudo scooped up the cat, who let out a small mewl as it was lifted. “I’ll get you cleaned up tonight,” he said, determined. The cat just looked up at him with those big eyes.
He carried the cat down the hall to the bathroom. It was quiet during this time of night, which is why Rudo often used this time to clean his gloves since he could have some privacy. He flipped on the light, letting it fill the room. He sat the cat down on the counter next to the sink, letting it sniff around as Rudo gathered the bucket, soap, and other supplies he would need.
First he dealt with cleaning his gloves. He set the bin in the bottom of the sink, filling it with water and soap. He kept the gloves on for as long as the washing process as he could, like he was just washing his hands, but that could only last for so long. At the last possible moment he took a breath to prepare himself before pulling them off.
There was no immediate difference. This moment was always a weird one, looking down at his scarred hands before the intensified pain set in. He felt so exposed without his gloves, the idea putting knots in his stomach. He gave the gloves the last of the scrubbing they needed before laying them out on the counter to dry.
The cat didn’t show interest in the gloves as they were set beside him. Rudo found that odd, as the little guy had been interested in everything since coming to HQ, experiencing a world it had never seen before. Instead, it turned its attention to Rudo’s hands, giving his fingers a little sniff, its whispers tickling at his finger tips.
Rudo almost flinched at first, but he managed to hold himself still. He let the cat sniff, even though all he wanted to do was shove his hands back under the water in an attempt to numb them for as long as possible while his gloves dried.
For a second he wondered if this was going to go badly. This kitten had not seen many people, but from everyone fawning over it when it was first brought into HQ, it had gotten accustomed to them pretty quickly. This skin, scarred black and red, it wasn’t like anything the cat would have seen up until this point. The pain was starting to build now, causing small involuntary twitches in Rudo’s fingers.
Despite his worries, however, the cat didn’t seem to mind. After sniffing enough to be content it gave Rudo’s hand a little headbutt before rubbing up against it. He’d noticed the cat doing that a lot during the day, bumping up against Rudo’s shoe or rubbing its face all along his pillow. Maybe it was itchy or something? It was probably a good call to be giving it a bath.
“Alright, buddy,” Rudo said, scooping the cat up once more. His hands tremored slightly, not unusual for his glove-off time, but he was steady enough to keep a hold on the kitten. The fur was matted, grainy with dirt and debris. Yeah, definitely a good call to get this done sooner rather than later.
Cupping his hands, Rudo carefully lowered the cat into the water. It looked up at him, giving a confused mrow at the sensation, but it didn’t try to jump or squirm.
“I know, I know,” Rudo said quietly. “It’ll just be a little bit, I gotta get you clean.”
He started by just rinsing the cat's fur, getting the base layer of grime away. Despite knowing the cat wouldn't be able to understand him, Rudo found himself talking to the cat as he worked. It started as explaining what he was doing, but moved on to other things.
“You know,” he said, grabbing the soap bottle once the initial rinse was done, “I’m new here too. Enjin found me in no man’s land and took me here. Kind of like how we got you.”
He grabbed the soap, squeezing some onto the fur of the cat before lathering it in. It required delicate movements, which made his fingers ache and lock up. He paused for a moment, trying to breathe through that new round of pain. Maybe this had been a bad idea.
He tried to redirect his attention, keeping up his talking. “I guess we still need to get you a name, don’t we, buddy?” He said. His voice was tense as he tried to push through the pain, but he kept going. “Enjin said we name the things we care about. I have never named a cat before, though. Maybe something like-”
A new current of pain went through his hands, searing and burning as it jolted through him. Rudo bit back his gasp at that. He leaned forward, forearms braced against the counter as he doubled over, hissing in a breath. At the same time, he found himself fighting back tears.
The tears weren’t because it hurt. Not really. He had stopped crying from pain when he was younger, like his body decided to stop allocating those resources to something that happened so much. No, this was frustration. Why was he like this? He couldn’t go ten minutes without his gloves to bathe his cat. He couldn’t do anything. Was he really supposed to spend forever like this? He loved his gloves, he really did, but being unable to function without them hurt him, in every sense of the word.
Rudo’s body was shaking now, tears he couldn’t suppress rolling down his cheeks. Wow, how pathetic could he be? Crying over some pins and needles when he had so many bigger things he had failed. He really was pointless. Maybe the Sphere was right to throw him away.
He let out a shaky breath that bordered on the line of being a sob, when his spiral was broken by the feeling of buzzing in his hands.
Rudo looked up, confused. The cat still sat in the water bin where he’d been placed while being washed, but now it was nuzzling up its face against Rudo’s hands. Every once in a while it stopped to give his hands a small lick before continuing to rub its cheeks and forehead against him. The whole time Rudo could feel this buzzing, vibrating sensation from the cat. If he listened closely he could hear it too, like a small rumble, or a snore. But the cat was very much awake. He wasn’t sure what that was.
Without thinking much, Rudo moved the hand the cat was headbutting to give it a pet on its head. The rumbling intensified, as did the attempts to wiggle up against his hands. So he continued, gently petting the small cat. He could feel the softness of its fur brushing up against his skin. The graininess was gone, and now it was silky from the water and soap.
They stayed like that for several minutes, Rudo losing track of time as he stroked the cat. The tenseness in his hands lessened the longer this went on. While the pain didn’t necessarily go away, Rudo was no longer focused on it. It was just vaguely there in the back of his mind, a bearable nuisance, as his focus was instead on the peaceful rhythm he’d entered with the cat.
After a while of this, he didn’t feel like such a disaster anymore. “Okay,” he said, straightening up and pulling in a shaky breath. “Let’s get you dried off.”
He pulled the cat out of the water after one last rinse and got the towel to begin drying it off. The cat's little face ended up cupped in the palms of his hands as he used the towel to dry it off, and Rudo found himself remembering the time the same had been done to him.
“I think I know the perfect name for you,” he said, his voice almost a whisper. “What do you think of the name Regto?”
The cat- Regto- gave several slow blinks, looking up at Rudo through squinting eyes as he nuzzled Rudo’s hands, that buzzing sound intensifying.