bakerstreet | The cat came back...

_{[He's allergic to cats, but..animals. He loves animals to bits and pieces and can't stand to push them away when they're coming right up on him and being sweet and nosing in his face and sleeping on his feet and why oh why had he chosen kennel duty for the shelter on a day when apparently EVERY LAST KITTEN IN THE CITY had been turned in to keep them out of the cold...

He really should have expected this.

Guess he'll just have to hold his breath as long as he can manage and hope someone else that won't break out in hives comes to help him.]}

There's at least one intrepid young cat-lady in the making who, luckily, is not allergic to the fluffy little beasts in the least. Since her lovely friend once told her that she might as well voluteer at a shelter already and be done with her tendency to dote on and adore feline creatures to the point of it being a Thing, and without the hastle of winding up with more faces to feed that she would know what to do with, she had wound up here.

She was in the process of speaking with the shelter marms about doing the rounds, ensuring that the animals were attended to and their basic needs kept an eye on. She was just here to do some association work on those cats that wanted company so that they might better adjust to prospective pet owners in the future. Little did she know that the feline magnet was already on the job.

Walking in on what she first assumed was a costumed young man surrounded to the brim with sweet little cat bodies and faces mewling and purring, Fa had to laugh. "You look like you need an avalanche beacon," she said by way of greeting. Strange that his face was starting to turn that shade of brown? Orange? Brorange?

Looking around at the unfamiliar voice, Tavros blinked and let out the breath that he'd been holding, starting two of the cats that were closest to his face. The one that had taken to sitting in the crook of his left horn dug its claws in and left pale yellow scratches in the surface in its effort to keep from falling off.

"Uh...Y-yeah I think I might," he replied with a quiet wheeze, then went back to trying to quell the rush of mewling, squeaking fuzz.

"Here, lemme help." Fa kneeled nearby, gently but inexorably removing the worst tiny kitten offenders from the horn-pronged fellow. She couldn't help but cast him a curious glance now and again as she settled the kittens within the low wire barrier that kept them from dispersing amongst the shelter's adoption room altogether. Trying to fish them all out from their piteously spartan metal cages would be a torture to all parties involved.

Getting close enough to hear Tavros wheeze, the young woman was distracted from the more vanity-driven question of 'what are you' to something more practical. "Are you okay?" Just because she didn't have allergies did not mean that she wasn't aware of them. One had to be when inviting friends home... she'd taken to keeping a pack of antihistimines, though unfortunately none were on her person just at the moment.

He would have pulled his shirt up over his nose, but now it was covered in cat hair and dander and everything that would make his throat close up that much faster. He stood carefully to avoid whacking her or any of the tables or cages with his horns, one of them already slightly cracked from earlier happenings. He had to get out to where the air was purified and then he'd be fine but much more exposure would not end well.

He stood fairly tall, broad in the shoulders but not so much in the waist. He moved carefully, always keeping slow around other people to keep from concussing them with the massive horns sprouting from the sides of his head.

"Yeah, I just...need some air." He brought his arm up in time to catch a sneeze, his eyes watering badly.

"How about I take over for a while," Fa replied, smiling up sympathetically his way. Poor dude, he looked like he was going to die, possibly. It was hard to tell. The kittens had already begun their Transformer-esque reforming, though this time they were swarming the blonde and leaving the troll relatively alone. One little orange tabby had begun to make head-way up his pant-leg, but, seeing as he was close enough and desperately needed a breather, Fa made no means of scooping it from him with minimal cat-claw stickage.

"Phewf! make your escape while you can, curious grey man!"

_{((It's actually a pretty interesting thing, but it's gotten convoluted as shit.))}

Tavros laughed at that, a gaspy little thing given the tightness of his throat, and waved a bit as he made his way out the door to the waiting area where there were air filters working full-time so that allergens and smells from inside the kennel didn't get to anyone potentially coming in. He glanced down at the tugging sensation on his pantleg when the kitten got high enough toward his hip. He huffed quietly and pried it away from his jeans, cradling it low against his stomach and going to find some tissues to clean up before he had to go back in there. He was gonna be a little puffy and brown for the rest of the day and probably into tomorrow.

After a quick inhaler pull and a moment outside, he was able to go back in and resume what he'd been doing before the new lady had shown up, pulling the large bag of kitten kibble from under one of the tables. "Uh...could you get those big bowls out of the pen there?" he asked, handing the little one he'd taken out with him over to her.

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((FUCK ME. Ha ha ha. I didn't even realize that i had the wrong journal on. So sorry! If I copy/paste would you mind terribly? That was my fuckup!))

((Ahahaha I wondered if you'd notice that before I replied before actually x3 It's all good.))

It had become difficult to perform that simple task -- taking the kitten, stepping out over the guard to grab the bowls -- if only because the felines sensed food, and suddenly the drifts of wee baby kittens turned into seething inferno of tiny, urgent mews and giant, adorable eyes and pricked up, swivelly ears.

Fa never the less did her best to put the squirmy feline back with its cohort, careful to dislodge any would-be escape artists from her own tight, pale, cat-hair covered jeans before she dragged out the plastic bowl setup. "Who's getting fed?" she wanted to know, voice high-pitched and non-direct in only the way that someone within close proximity to the lovely little bastards would appreciate.

Funny that they hadn't properly introduced themselves... but... well, kittens. Fa stood back once the bowls were in plae and ceded the floor to the wide-horned fella to do his job. Partially, she did not want to get whacked in the head. Partially, it was a one-man job up until he was done pouring or any of the kittens had concocted a brilliant escape strategy!

Tavros had done a decent job keeping a portion of the kittens occupied with a handful of food poured onto the ground at the opposite side of the pen, and when Fa moved off he rounded the outside of it to fill the large plastic bowls in a careful sweep that filled all of them in one straight motion across the line with minimal mess. Soon the mewling was mostly silenced, replaced by crunching of many tiny mouths. He was finally able to straighten up and brush off at least some of the hair and actually face his impromptu helper.

"So, hi, finally. Thanks for the help there...probably would have blacked out after a while otherwise. I'm Tavros. Full timer here." He held out a hand for a polite shake, offering a rather nervous smile.

Fa's hand in his grip was gently firm, long fingers just on this side of slender rather than bony. She wondered if he looked so nervous because of the obvious clash of interests versus bodily tolerances, allergy-style, so she replied, "no problem. Isn't it always the way: those with the allergies tend to want to be around animals the most."

Not strictly true, as was Fa's case, but she wasn't going to look a gift-horse in the mouth! "I'm Fa. Or Fara, if you prefer. Some people do!"

Out of curiosity (and to forestall the inevitable question of species differentials, jeez, she asked, "what would you have done if nobody had come around just now?" It was a tone of sympathetic concern he was hearing, not morbid curiosity.

Returning the squeeze, Tavros dabbed once more at his eyes thanks to the irritation from the allergies, and straightened up to hold himself a little more casually. Mostly it just made him look like he was trying too hard to make it look like he wasn't trying at all. "Thanks for coming along when you did, Fa." It was easier to remember.

"Uh...probably passed out and stayed there on the floor covered in cats until someone found me." Which had actually happened once before. Waking up in the hospital had not been the highlight of his week, obviously. But he'd also had so much worse happen up to now, so really he wasn't going to complain. Much. "Don't worry though, this doesn't happen very often. Usually I'm up front so it's not really a concern."

The very prospect of being buried under kittens so unpleasantly dredged a moue of sympathetic despair from the blonde. Luckily, there were enough cats to take the brunt of her 'poor baby'ing to spare mohawk-sporting fella; probably a good thing, as Fa could be somewhat overwhelming at times.

"Well I'm only glad that I chose today to show up," she replied, bypassing the pity since he seemed intent on smoothing things over. "Must have been a good case of fate!"

"Or just some very good luck on my part," he replied cheerfully, crouching briefly to scratch at the head of one of the stragglers that had apparently taken more interest in the two of them than in the food. He was just glad that his allergies had faded as he'd gotten older. When he was a pupa he'd be lucky not to have had his throat close up on him just being in the same room with a cat.

"So what brings you to volunteer here? Just nothing to do and really like the animals?" he asked, giving Fa a more casual smile now.

"I guess you could say that... my friends have all been terribly busy lately and I've been on a vacation." Alright, she ccouldn't help it anymore. She didn't so much as point, per say, but she did ask apologetically: "I don't think I've seen anyone else like you. I... I'm sorry if I'm being rude, but may I ask what you are?"

She was persistent, but she was also blushing in advance, expecting awkwardness. That was one thing that Fa tended to do; she preferred to get that blasted out of the way straight up if she couldn't help herself to glaze over it.

Tavros paused a moment at that, then shrugged some; He supposed that sometimes new people just happened and hadn't seen trolls before. It certainly wasn't the first time that someone had been baffled by his...everything.

"Don't worry, a lot of people are a little...confused, when they first see me or one of the others. I'm a troll but not like a traditional human's idea of a troll? I'm not from around here." He grinned awkwardly at that, scratching some at his hair. "Not all of us look like me but you can generally tell the ones that are by the skin and horns. So uh. Yeah, it's ok."

It seemed as though this was quickly becoming more awkward than even the acting of any well meaning Michael Cera side character, which probably wasn't helped when Fa replied, after a pause fit to burst, "Oh, okay. That's neat. I mean, Where I come from people tend to look like whatever they want, but it's been a while since I've been home. Everyone else just looks sort of like, you know." She flapped a hand around her mid-section-to-face. Clearly, 'human'. What memes has this girl even been in, right?!

Now that there was less likelihood of the charges here escaping, Fa stepped over the thin cage of defense and settled herself in a clear patch to gather a few kittens her way. Those that had fed already looked ready to curl up on or about someone, and the urge to be that someone had finally defeated her.

"Yeah, I've noticed a lot of..." He copied the gesture, sweeping a hand at her in a general sort of way, "Human-shaped people around. Which is kind of weird because before I got here I'd only ever seen like...a few humans in my life. Suddenly I'm swamped with all kinds of...pink people." He shrugged a little and stayed there outside of the enclosure with just the one kitten nosing at his fingers, figuring that even if his allergies were still acting up, as long as the others were over there with Fa, he'd be alright. He'd have to take a very long, very thorough shower later though just to recover from how she'd found him.

((I've gone and forgotten if Tavros is sitting down again or standing outside of the enclosure?))

Fa looked up at him, then let out another laugh at his comment. "I guess some of us are pretty pink, aren't we?" She tended not to lose a blush very easily when it came about, and she was still reacting a bit sympathetically to the troll's slower than average cadence -- like maybe he was on eggshells, which to her at least felt like it was generating a strange magnetic field of potential embarrassment.

She had to keep telling herself that it was only her. The kittens, at least, didn't seem to be reacting to it. Certainly the one that was attempting to lick the tips of his fingers wasn't!

"Hey, so I've been in the market for apartment hunting. You work around here... so I'm guessing you live around here, too? What parts of the city do you like?"

_{((Tav's crouched down on the outside of the enclosure to prevent another kitten pile.))}

"I live in these kind of colorful apartments like fifteen minutes' drive from here. I know they've got a lot of places open right now but I don't know how long that'll last. It tends to fluctuate. People come and go, y'know?"

The kitten that was enamored with his hand seemed content to keep trying to get to him without actively climbing the barrier, rubbings its face on his fingers and purring softly. Animals in general really seemed to like him, no matter where he was and for that, he was grateful even though it was occasionally hazardous. He was honestly surprised he hadn't started breaking out in hives, as long as he'd been there. But the allergies, like the nervousness he'd always carried with him through the years, had backed down at least enough to where he hadn't gotten much more than a little itchy and puffy around the eyes.

Edited 2014-01-06 11:26 (UTC)

"Colourful as in brightly rainbow, or colourful as in... you know... sort of sketchy?" Fa grimaced in what looked like she meant it partly for show, but also partly because she didn't really want to say anything that might be construed as a mark against Tavros' character.

At this point, she was snowed in but did not seem to notice it any more than it took to keep kittens from attempting to find purchase on her chest (not really much there to rest on) or shoulders, though none were really that intrepid at this point. She'd picked up a sort of silver tabby that seemed to have a case of hiccups, granting it a place of honour in her lap as she attempted to soothe it with endless pets.

That reminded her. "What's the rest of the routine for the little ones?" She'd been aware of a clock on the periphery of the room, now she wondered if she could do Tavros a favour of handling the lot of them to put them away -- as sad a prospect as that might be!

"Uh...both?" Tavros said of the apartments. "The outsides are painted kind of bright so they're pretty visible. My neighbors keep to themselves pretty well at least." He straightened up with a quiet groan, leaving the kitten to squeak at him from the ground until he gave it a look, maintaining eye contact for a moment then smiling faintly as it trotted over to Fa's side instead to hop into her lap. It started to groom the hiccupping one as Tavros continued, "I need to check if any of them have been vaccinated and chipped so we can either find the owners, or else just put that in the information for if they're adopted." As sad as it was, they couldn't keep the animals here forever and make sure they were out of harm's way.

"Do you happen to have experience with that? I mean...I really would rather do it myself, but I'm pretty sure I should be breaking out like...well, now." He scratched a bit at the back of his hand, then grimaced at the slightly swollen patch of bronze that had popped up while they were distracted.

The march of the friendly kitten had held Fa entranced for a while, and she was caught off guard when the helper settled on her lap to groom her hiccuping friend. She wasn't sure if she was having a heart attack or if she was just extremely easy to sway with regards to cuteness. Either way, she crooned out loud for a moment before she returned her attention to the troll.

Well, she certainly had experience with organizing and finding homes for people, but that was a very different situation: usually those under her responsibilities had recently died and had requested that their memory backups be conglomerated into a virtual identity, the better to enjoy the prospect of an afterlife. Not exactly ID chipping, but one had to ensure that the recently and not-so-recently deceased did not have access to the virtual at large -- laws and policies both religious and secular.

In the end, she said, "I've got some experience, but I'd probably need a refresher with the equipment." She had no especial powers of her own, outside her own small sphere of influence as an AI. It was somehow a little freeing and a little humbling to do things as a mundane!

Tavros Nitram | Homestuck (post-game AU)

((Did someone say drip of a troll that needed company?))

((!!))

((*^_^*))

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((Robo-legs in this char or alt-version? *curious*))

((Robo-legs. Leettle older like Dave. I have this whole setting for Tav and my other troll muses.))

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((The problem of having used a PB based off of a model: ALL FACES THE SAME))

((Tempted to offer to sketch you some faces for her but I still have to do my own icons for an OC))

((15 icons is really a lot -- I should bite the bullet and draw 'em myself. X3))

((But, alas. Effort.))

((Hey now, I finished Agate's; I just suck at making anything consistently!))

((^_^))

((Robo-legs in this char or alt-version? curious))