jungle cat

there is this stray neighborhood cat that sleeps out in the alley beside kyungsoo's house. his fur is a sweet shade of brown and he has dirty orange eyes. kyungsoo calls him baekhyun. why? he doesn't really know but the hungry little thing took to the name without complaint. (baekhyun actually did complain but kyungsoo doesn't understand the language of such a superior species).

"how are you today, baekhyun?" kyungsoo asks, rubbing his forefinger against the small cat's head.

"oh, i'm fine. i played tag with a street mouse today and won. had a close encounter with a delivery truck. hissed at small children for no reason. how are you?" baekhyun replies, purring under his breath at the treatment he's receiving. he stops when all kyungsoo does is coo. rude much? he can't even grace baekhyun with a decent verbal response.

scoffing, the chocolate mix breed shows the squishy looking human his tail. his graceful saunter away is interrupted when kyungsoo screams. baekhyun runs and hides behind a water sodden cardboard box.

"what what what? why are you screaming? what?" baekhyun screeches from his hiding spot.

looking to the human, baekhyun notices a small black cat around the corner of the building, obviously afraid of the loud kyungsoo.

“i’m late for work!” the frail, stupid human flees from the scene much to baekhyun's confusion.

carefully leaving his temporary shelter, baekhyun approaches the other cat.

"sup," he greets casually.

the black cat tilts its head to the side. "woof."

baekhyun stares.

the ?

the black cat is obviously stupid and refuses to tell baekhyun his name. baekhyun has named the black cat 'caf'. it's more classy than just calling him 'cat' and stands for confused as .

"where are you from, caf?"

caf slowly blinks his eyes. “woof.”

baekhyun’s tail swishes to the right. “no. no no no no no no no. there will be none of that woof business going on. you’re a cat.”

the black cat tilts his head to the side.

baekhyun straightens his back and maneuvers over to the other feline. “meow with me okay? meoooooooooow.”

“…” caf tilts his head to the other side. “wooooooooooooof.”

caf is curled up beside a large cardboard box and baekhyun is lounging on top of a trash can lid when kyungsoo comes around. he immediately notices the black cat and coos at him. baekhyun hates that. not because he’s jealous but just because the sound kyungsoo makes reminds him of a dying moose. (or what he assumes is the sound of dying moose since he’s never encountered one).

“what’s your name, little guy?” kyungsoo asks, running a finger behind the black cat’s ears.

“his initials are caf. first name: confused as. last name: . sounds nice, right? sounds fancy,” baekhyun chimes in from where he’s lying.

caf blinks open his eyes. he glaces at baekhyun before looking at kyungsoo again. he doesn’t make a sound aside from the hum of his purring.

the human makes a sound of deliberation, and when he has a thought he jumps up, scaring both cats. “i’ll name you tao.”

“what a tasteless name. catnip is a better name. hell, diarrhea is a better name.” baekhyun pushes up onto his paws. “you tried, though. one gold star for you.”

tao, as he has now been named, seems to like the name as he nudges kyungsoo’s shoe with his head.

“woof!” he barks happily.

and at that, baekhyun makes it his new life-long goal to educate this confused puss.

baekhyun stalks around the small black cat, eying him from nose to tail. he stops in front of him, sitting.

“maybe if i tried to teach you with disney songs, it would help.”

“chirp.”

baekhyun’s paw shoots out to slap tao in the face before his mind has a chance to catch up with his actions. he isn’t sorry.

“okay, stupid, repeat after me: everybody wants to be a cat, because a cat’s the only cat who knows where it’s at.”

“scooby dooby doo, where are you?”

“no. no no no no no.” the chocolate cat sighs. “that isn’t even a disney song. look at your life. look at your choices.”

the black cat blinks slowly. “hakuna matata?”

“i quit.”

when a tiny squeak disrupts baekhyun’s twenty hour beauty rest, he leaps in the direction of the sound, slamming his paws down on the pest.

“holy french toast smothered in maple syrup, don’t kill me.”

puzzled, baekhyun peeks down at his prisoner.

“tao?” he stares with narrowed eyes at the black cat. “tao, what the are you doing making noises like thaaaaaaat — HOLY YOU USED OUR LANGUAGE.”

tao rolls them over so he can push himself to his feet. “of course i did. what did you think i was? stupid?

yes.

“noooooo, of course not.” baekhyun nuzzles his head against tao’s. “i was just … concerned since it seemed like you were confused as to what kind of animal you are.”

“i’m from china,” tao says.

baekhyun’s affection ceases. “and that was completely unrelated to the topic at hand.”

“i like beef.”

“and so was that.”

“woof.”

the. .

kyungsoo comes around for his weekly check up. he grins when he sees baekhyun lying lazily atop a trash can lid.

“baeky poo~”

baekhyun lifts his head and rolls onto his back. “now who in the hell do you think you’re calling baeky poo?”

the human, as expected, doesn’t answer baekhyun’s question.

instead he walks up to the cat and rubs under his chin. baekhyun is conflicted by his instinct to purr and his desire to eat kyungsoo’s hand.

“what do you want?” baekhyun asks.

“i brought you milk~” kyungsoo smiles.

it’s unbelievable how they communicate when they don’t speak the same language. it’s like aliens having contact with those delusional humans. e.t. phone home and all that jazz.

the human sets down an empty bowl and pulls out a small carton of milk from a bag baekhyun didn’t even notice he was carrying.

“i can’t drink that. i’m lactose intolerant.”

kyungsoo looks at him expectantly. “well, come on. drink up.”

baekhyun stares at him, unamused. “lactose. intolerant.”

kyungsoo continues to stare at him, waiting for him to stick his tongue in that hypnotic white liquid and drink.

“are you going to drink?” the human frowns. “are you sick, baekhyunnie? should i take you to a vet?”

baekhyun hisses when kyungsoo tries to pick him up. “touch me and i’ll rip off your nose.”

before baekhyun has a chance to swipe his paw at kyungsoo’s face, he hears a meow. he turns his head just as a wall of black enters his line of sight and darts straight toward the milk. his expression sours at tao drinking as if there isn’t a care in the world.

“hey, jerkface, that’s my milk.”

tao’s tail whips around happily. “you weren’t going to drink it,” he says, still lapping at the milk.

“…”

kyungsoo is completely ecstatic that at least one of them accepted his milk and claps his hands before waving to them both and leaving.

when tao finishes he looks at baekhyun. “i’m a leopard.”

baekhyun shakes his head. “no, no you aren’t.”

“grawrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.”

oh well, it was close enough to a meow.

“hey, baekhyun, we should go around town toge— woof!”

whatever.

i bet you all were expecting more goldfish xiuhan but nope~ you get street cats baektao. i started this after i finished 'the snack that smiles back' cause someone (sorry too lazy to look up who it was) said something about baektao as cats and so i did it but i didn't post it until now. but goodness it's so much harder to write exo as animals when i'm not writing fishy xiuhan. this is like twice as short orz

question: who should be the human for puppies!krisyeol?

until next time~