It felt like his heart was in his throat as Minseok scrambled back onto his feet. Or, well, tried to. He slipped on the wet cement, awkwardly fumbling onto his hands and knees as he kept his eyes trained on the gap he had been examining. It wasn’t like he knew what he had even seen back there, just that something had been staring back.

He didn’t have much time to think about it. One of the bins was suddenly shoved towards him, with far too much force to be an animal. He flinched away with a hiss, raising a hand to try to protect his face if he needed to as the bin clattered loudly onto the ground.

That was when he noticed a figure pressed between the row of bins and the wall. A human shaped figure, holding the lid tightly in one hand, like an extra barrier to keep between the two of them.

“Minseok?!” Footsteps were thundering from behind him. Yixing must have heard him screaming and ran back to find him. Sure enough, he felt Yixing’s hand into the back of his raincoat, yanking him backwards while shifting his own body forward. Minseok glanced up to find Yixing wedged between the two of them, using himself as a human shield.

Not that there was any need. With Yixing’s arrival, the figure started to cower away, receding behind the trash with their back against the wall. Minseok couldn’t get a clear view of their face, but he could see their head turning rapidly from side to side, as if to look for an opening. Sure enough, when Yixing moved forward to try to grab them, the figure bolted to the side, practically hurling the forgotten trash lid at him, and knocking over another bin in the process of trying to escape. Still on the ground, Minseok lunged out as fast as he could, and, by some miracle, successfully grabbed a handful of tattered pants.

He yanked with all his might, and down the figure went after losing their footing, crying out loudly when they hit the ground. Only then did Minseok let go. Yixing turned to face the two of them, and Minseok, much less gracefully, scrambled closer on his hands and knees.

Surrounded, the mysterious person resorted to curling up in the fetal position defensively, hands pathetically trying to cover their head. Up close, Minseok finally caught a glimpse of a face through the cage of arms. It was a man. There were dirty, brown locks of hair showing underneath the hat he was wearing. Square jaw, and old cut on his lower lip, and even with his eyes squeezed shut, Minseok could see that the left one was immensely swollen and discolored.

Yixing squatted down and reached out to try to touch one of the man’s forearms, maybe to move them out of his face so they could get a better look, only for the stranger to cringe away from them and hiss.

Like a cat.

Oh. They weren’t just looking at a male; they were looking at a male hybrid.

There was a pause, the silence between the three of them only broken by the sound of thunder and the pouring rain.

“I promise I’m not going to hurt you. You just startled us,” Yixing finally said, tone a lot softer now compared to a few minutes ago. He must have realized, too, that they were interacting with a cat hybrid, not just a regular person. It reminded Minseok of the days when he was a kitten, hearing that coaxing kind of voice again. “Let me see your face.”

The hybrid didn’t move, and neither did Yixing. Minseok glanced anxiously between the two of them. Yixing held up his hand briefly in a wait gesture, so Minseok did, turning his attention to the man on curled up in front of them. After what felt like an eternity, the hybrid, trembling, cracked his eyes open. It was like he had been anticipating a blow that never came, but even then, he kept his arms cradled close to his head, body all scrunched up in fear. He clearly didn’t trust either of them.

Not that Minseok blamed him. Once upon a time, Yixing had been just a stranger to him, too, that he hadn’t trusted.

“Let me see,” Yixing tried again, only to yet again be met by the hybrid flinching away from him.

This wasn’t getting them anywhere. “Maybe we should just leave him be, Yixing.”

Yixing’s head practically spun around on its hinges to face him. “Why would you say something like that? He’s clearly injured.”

“I know that! I’m not a monster,” Minseok said, letting out a frustrated little sound. “But you can’t do anything to help him if he won’t let you.”

“Well… I suppose that is true.” Yixing sighed, visibly deflating in defeat. The hybrid stayed motionless at their feet, watching the pair with wide, terrified eyes. Unsure of what to do next, Yixing stole another glance at Minseok. “We can’t just leave him here, though. Maybe we should call one of the centers? They would probably take him in and—”

“No.” Minseok and Yixing jumped at the sudden voice, and sharply lowered their heads to stare at the strange hybrid. Finally, for the first time, he spoke. His voice was hoarse, strained, but deeper than Minseok had been expecting. His chest visibly began to heave in sharp, panicked breaths underneath his shirt. “Please, I can’t—I won’t—”

“Whoa, it’s okay! It’s okay,” Yixing babbled, trying to calm down the cat, who had now started to cry, all curled up on himself and on the cusp of hyperventilating. “It was just a suggestion. We won’t call them if you don’t want us to, but if that’s the case, you need to let me help you. It’s one or the other. Can we bring you inside?”

It took a bit for the cat to calm himself down, but he eventually quieted, taking in heavy but hiccupping gasps of air amidst all the tears and snot. Finally, he nodded, slowly unfurling his body and, shaking, started to sit up, before at last getting back onto his own two feet. Minseok didn’t know what the hybrid had against the centers, but whatever it was, it must have been something extreme for him to hand over his trust to Yixing instead, a complete stranger.

There wasn’t any more talking after that, minus Yixing rewarding the hybrid with some soft words of encouragement as he led the two cats back to the apartment building. Minseok couldn’t help but notice that the hybrid had a bit of trouble walking, like he was trying to lean majority of his weight onto one leg as he hobbled along with the group.

But eventually, they made it. Minseok let out a noise of disgust as he entered their home behind Yixing, already peeling off his raincoat and soaked ballcap before aimlessly throwing them onto the floor, and kicking his shoes away into a corner. He’d fix that later; he just needed his stupid wet socks off right now. He wanted a hot shower too, but there were more pressing matters at hand.

“Leave your shoes here,” Yixing was saying, guiding the newcomer on what to do. He obeyed silently, waterlogged sneakers toed off and placed neatly beside Yixing’s own. Yixing was then ushering the hybrid deeper into their apartment, probably to the bathroom, so Minseok scampered after them.

He poked his head around the corner of the bathroom doorframe, indeed finding the duo inside, the cat sitting on the closed lid of their toilet while Yixing rummaged around under their sink for the first aid kit. The hybrid was dripping wet, staring down at his soaked socks in silence. And under the much better lighting of their bathroom, rather than the darkness of an evening plagued by rain, Minseok at last got a clear view of him. He seemed awfully thin, but was somehow still broad across his shoulders. All he was wearing, despite the weather, was a pair of worn-out black sweatpants and an old t-shirt that had definitely seen better days. He had a hat pulled over his head and secondary ears, and there was a small black crossbody bag buckled across his torso. There was some old, clotted blood on his lower lip around the crease of the not-yet healed cut and quite a bit of bruising on the left side of his face. His eye was puffy but thankfully not heavily discolored minus a few little yellow spots, supposedly from faded bruises of its own.

“What’s your name?” Yixing then asked, before crouching down in front of him, armed with a cotton ball. It stunk of some kind of antiseptic. The smell of it combined with the scent of grime coming from the hybrid was making Minseok’s head spin. His poor sensitive cat nose was not taking it well, so he stayed planted in the doorway.

The hybrid hesitantly peeked up at Yixing through too-long bangs. “…Jongdae.”

“I’m Yixing.” He nodded in Minseok’s direction. “And Minseok.”  And then Yixing’s face compressed into a frown. “I’m sorry, this might sting a bit.”

He pressed the cotton ball to Jongdae’s bottom lip. Jongdae immediately let out a whine, eyes squinting shut and his toes curling in discomfort. But he didn’t fight it, just let Yixing disinfect the cut, before the cotton ball was discarded and replaced with Yixing’s fingers.

He gently prodded at the damaged side of Jongdae’s face. His features scrunched up with discomfort, but at least nothing seemed to be broken, just swollen and tender. “Can I ask what happened?”

Jongdae’s gaze dropped to the floor again. “Only if you promise you won’t laugh at me.”

“Of course not.” Yixing quipped an eyebrow. “You don’t have to, if you don’t want to.”

“That’s not fair,” Jongdae argued softly, a visible wince overtaking his features when Yixing stooped down to tug at the hem of his pant leg. His voice wavered, “you’re being nice to me. I don’t have anything else to repay you with other than telling you things.”

Minseok unhappily pursed his lips at that. Jongdae didn’t know any better yet, but that was just how Yixing was. It was his personality to be kind, even with if there was no opportunity to achieve some kind of gain in doing so. Acts of love were not meant to be transactional.

But before he could interject, Yixing let out a hum of acknowledgment, head bowed and inspecting one of Jongdae’s ankles. “We won’t laugh. I promise.”

“Okay—Well. I got into a fight with another cat a couple days ago. Not somebody I knew, but.” Pause. Jongdae was wringing his hands together in his lap. He seemed unsure if he wanted to continue, before he finally muttered in embarrassment, “I thought I could take him but he kicked my .”

Minseok had no room to judge. The worst scuffle he had ever been in was biting Yixing’s hands when he was a kitten; it wasn’t like he knew how to fight either. “Over what?”

“He wanted what I had.” Jongdae just shrugged, not meeting Minseok’s eyes. He was watching Yixing, who had moved onto his other foot, the one Minseok had noticed that Jongdae tried to keep majority off his weight off of on their walk back earlier. “My safe spot outside, I mean. And I didn’t wanna give it up. But he won, so…he took it.”

The gears in Minseok’s head clicked loudly as they turned, processing what Jongdae was telling him.

“So that was you I heard when I first left the house,” Minseok then blurted, arms folded over his chest. “The cat you got into it with took your shelter so you were just hiding back there behind the recycling, for… Who knows how long. Right? Wait, what about the lid?”

“I mean, I don’t have an umbrella… It was okay cover for my head—”

And then Yixing flexed his foot a certain way to test his range of motion and Jongdae hissed, tearing his limb loose and out of Yixing’s grip. He bent his knee in an attempt of pulling his leg closer to his chest, glare sharp and jaw clenched.

“Sorry! Sorry,” Yixing squawked, reaching out to gently hold onto Jongdae’s foot again. The hybrid was tense, but allowed himself to be manhandled. “I think you sprained your ankle, whatever you did to it. I don’t see any bruising though? So that’s good, at least. Hopefully you running around just irritated it, but if it doesn’t get any better in the next day or so we should probably take you to the clinic.” He straightened up and wiped the moisture that had transferred onto his hands from Jongdae’s wet skin off onto the hand towel that was on the vanity. “You should probably go ahead and take a shower and then we can wrap it for you. I think that would help with any swelling.”

Taking that as his cue to leave, Minseok pulled his weight off the doorframe and slipped into the hallway. Yixing could handle the situation fine on his own, he knew that, but Minseok found his mind whirring noisily over the entire ordeal. Even if Jongdae was a stray with some injuries, he was still a stranger, hybrid or not. He had already admitted to getting into fights; what other trouble had he gotten into so far? He was a potential risk to the both of them, even if Yixing hadn't processed it yet.

It was why Minseok pulled Yixing aside after the man emerged from the bathroom. Minseok could hear the sound of the water of their shower pounding through the closed door as he passed it and instead trailed behind his owner, following Yixing into his bedroom. He found Yixing rummaging around in his dresser, haphazardly chucking a pair of old sweatpants over his shoulder and onto the floor. Minseok could only assume they were being tossed aside for Jongdae to use, and he felt the wave of annoyance swell higher in his gut.

“Don't you think you're being too trusting?" Yixing stole a glance at him over his shoulder. Minseok did his best to give him the most disapproving stare he could muster, but Yixing didn't seem fazed in the slightest. "You don't even know him.”

“When I brought you home, I didn't know you either.”

Minseok huffed. “That's different.”

“How so?” Yixing asked, having turned his back to Minseok again to resume digging through his shirts. “You were a stranger to me at the time—"

“I came from a shelter. I was just a kitten and they vetted me, you know that,” Minseok shot back, voice accusatory. “He's a stray, Yixing. It's not the same.”

“So, just because he's a stray, he doesn't deserve any of this? Because to me, that's what it sounds like you're insinuating.” Yixing turned to face him again, frowning. “Look, I get where you're coming from, but what do you expect me to do? I can't in good conscience leave him out there, and you saw how badly he freaked out when I suggested having him put in a shelter. I don't know if I could forgive myself for dumping him into a place that, for him, is tied to some obvious trauma, even if I’m not aware of what the what caused it. At the end of the day, he’s a hybrid, just like you are.”

Minseok's eyes narrowed. "Does that mean you're keeping him?"

"What other option do I have at the moment?" Yixing replied, gathering the clothes into his arms. "Look, we have already discussed this type of thing several times. I've been telling you that I think getting you a roommate would be good for you, and Jongdae needs a home. Whether he'll stay here forever or not, who knows, but maybe having another cat around will do you some good. I know I'm gone most of the day and that you're lonely by yourself. Maybe if you give him a chance, the two of you could become great friends.”

Minseok's tail bristled behind him, wet fur somehow managing to stand on end in anger. Spoiled as he was, it was a rare instance for Yixing to tell him ‘no’ about anything. But at the end of the day, Yixing was even more stubborn than he was. And with his mind clearly made up about Jongdae staying in their apartment, at least until further notice at minimum, Minseok knew he was fighting a losing battle.

Still, it wouldn't keep him from trying.

"We can't keep him, Yixing," Minseok ordered.

All it got him was a coolly arched eyebrow. "Why not?"

"Because," he argued lamely, ears flattening defensively against his head. He didn't want any of this; no roommate, no stranger in his house, and certainly not yet another person to take away what little time he got to spend with Yixing lately. Everything was fine the way it was! "I said so."

Yixing scoffed. "This is my house, Minseok. He's staying, and that's final."

With that, Yixing brushed past him, heading back towards the direction of the bathroom, clothes in hand. Stomach sour, Minseok found himself alone in Yixing’s bedroom, unsure of what to do next. He could be petty and march into his room and slam his door closed, which had been an idea he briefly pondered, but it wouldn’t get him anywhere. Instead, he stood there awkwardly for a long handful of minutes, noting that the sound of running water had stopped, and that he could hear Yixing and Jongdae’s voices through their thin walls.

Nosiness eventually getting the best of him, Minseok finally made his way out of Yixing’s room and padded back towards their shared bathroom. The door was ajar, and although Yixing and Jongdae weren’t currently talking, Minseok knew they were still in there. It was like he could smell Jongdae long before he spotted him, his unfamiliar scent hitting Minseok like a train. Their apartment typically only smelled like himself and Yixing, the natural scent of his skin that Minseok managed to pick up on with the help of his heightened senses, and the way it blended with crisp undertones of his shampoo and skincare products. The smell of it clashed with a new, unfamiliar one that Minseok could only assume to be Jongdae.

But by the time he walked into the kitchen, Jongdae must have picked up on his presence too, because the hybrid, standing in front of the sink with Yixing at his side, instantly swiveled on his heel to look back at him.

For a moment, the two of them just stood there, staring at one another.

Minseok didn’t know how old Jongdae was – it wasn’t like he had bothered asking – but he couldn’t have been a kitten. His jawline was too sharp, cheeks not full enough. But those features suited his face, Minseok mentally decided, combined with the curl of his lips and shine of his brown eyes and warm hue of his skin.

His hair had turned a softer shade of brunet now that it had been washed. He must have hacked most of it off in the bathroom, too, because it was much shorter than it had been earlier that evening, bangs now hanging in damp, wavy strings against his forehead and back of his neck exposed. His two pointed cat ears protruded from his hair, a gentle shade of brown that almost looked bronze, smudged black at the edges. Perhaps a tabby cat?

Minseok had to admit, underneath all of the dirt and tattered clothing, Jongdae was strikingly handsome. Feeling suddenly self-conscious of his own simplistic black hair and ears and dark eyes and paleness of his skin from however many days he had spent locked away in his room lately without going outside at all, Minseok averted his gaze to instead look at Yixing. He was setting his old haircutting scissors down on the vanity, giving Minseok a pointed look that he knew meant ‘be nice’ as he turned his attention back onto Jongdae. Minseok could see out of his peripheral vision how Jongdae at last turned away from him after their eye contact was broken, officially giving his undivided attention like Minseok wasn’t even there.

“I think it looks a lot better like this,” Yixing praised. “At least all the matted bits are gone. I’m sure it feels a lot less heavy now, too.”

Even Jongdae’s smile seemed to harbor warmth as he offered one to Yixing in thanks.

The two of them discussed selfcare for a little while longer, Yixing giving Jongdae instructions on where to find his hair dryer and some of his other products if he felt like using them, before he excused himself to head into the kitchen. Minseok couldn’t complain, he was getting hungry, and he knew Jongdae must have been, his frame seeming much smaller than his own despite being taller than him.

The only complaint he had was the awkward silence that had bloomed immediately between the two of them as soon as Yixing left the room.

Jongdae was the one to break it in the end, his long brown tail curled almost protectively around his own waist. “Sorry about earlier.”

“About what?” Minseok asked, confusion painting his voice.

“Scaring you. Outside, I mean. I didn’t think anyone would find me back there,” Jongdae elaborated. His voice still had a hoarseness to it, but the steam of the hot shower must have helped, because he sounded less congested compared to earlier. He was rummaging around in the cabinet for Yixing’s hair dryer, awkwardly squatted down towards the floor with practically all of his weight on his uninjured foot. “I’ll have to find a better spot next time, once I’m back out there.”

Wait. What? He was already planning on leaving? Minseok’s head tilted sideways, but apparently the confusion showed enough on his face for Jongdae to elaborate.

“Why are you looking at me like that? Don’t play dumb,” he complained, his head emerging from the depths of the cabinet with the hair dryer in hand. “I heard you guys talking about me. Your bathroom wall doesn’t seem to be very thick.”

Minseok swallowed. Despite being Korean himself, he and Yixing almost always spoke Mandarin together when it was just the two of them. It was Yixing’s heritage, and something Yixing had taught him back in his kitten days. “You speak Mandarin?”

“No, but the look on your face tells me all I need to know. I was right,” Jongdae told him, not even bothering to spare Minseok a glance as he plugged the dryer in and switched it to a low setting. “Then again, it’s been pretty obvious that you haven’t wanted me around. But it’s whatever, I don’t need you to like me.”

“You talk a big game for somebody who got his beat by another cat,” Minseok countered. He internally winced. He hadn’t meant to say it; it had just slipped out in his annoyance.

But Jongdae didn’t seem offended by the sudden comeback, instead turning towards Minseok with a wicked grin on his face that could put Baekhyun’s to shame. “You wouldn’t last a day out there. You’re just a pampered housecat who hasn’t had to work for anything.”

Minseok immediately bit down on his tongue to stop himself from saying anything cruel in response to that insult, no matter how badly it stung. Attacking Jongdae’s status as a stray would just be an unnecessary low blow. He may have been petty, but he was better than that. He had some standards at the end of the day.

He didn’t have much time to stew on it though, instead nearly jumping out of his skin when Yixing’s head popped around the corner of the doorframe.

“Oh, good, you haven’t killed him yet. Dinner will be ready in a few,” Yixing commented, his voice nonchalant as he glanced over from Minseok to Jongdae. “Sorry, I know Minseok and I like spicy, but I probably should have asked you first.”

“Anything is fine.” There were telltale signs of a smile that did not reach his eyes on Jongdae’s lips. “Beggars can’t be choosers.”

Despite the brief glimmer of concern in his eyes, Yixing didn’t comment on that statement, instead leaving the two of them alone to go back to tending to the food. It left the two hybrids, once more, in an awkward silence that seemed to stretch on for ages.

But before he could think of anything actually constructive to say, Jongdae had already changed gears for their conversation, watching his reflection in the mirror as he dried his hair before setting the dryer down on the countertop. “Seriously, though, don’t worry about it. The outside may sometimes, but I’m used to it now.”

Minseok couldn’t help but ponder that sentence in silence, watching Jongdae scrub some of Yixing’s cream onto his face. Now he was used to it. Minseok didn’t know if that meant he had adjusted to his surroundings after a lifetime of experiencing them, or… Perhaps Jongdae had, once upon a time, also had a home to come back to?