the owl's wish

chapter 14: the cat cavern

And there, hunched over in the corner of the room, sits another cat spirit. He wears a black kimono and red haori jacket, the silk reflecting light like liquid. His two-toned hair hangs low around his face - a jaw-length curtain from behind which he peers out at the world. His soft ears and long tail are white and colored in splotches of buttery yellow and warm brown. Though he isn't looking directly at them, his face is wrinkled in tight exasperation and wrapped in vague annoyance. He flips a shogi piece over and over in his fingers, apparently itching to get back to the board game.

"Ah, yes. Bokuto, if reintroductions are in order, then this," Kuroo gestures towards the other cat spirit flamboyantly. "is Kenma Kozume. He's the one in charge of making the trials."

"The scrolls!" Bokuto gasps as the memory flickers to life in his mind, the feathers scattered through his hair pricking up. "That was you?!"

One of Kenma's calico ears twitch, but other than that there is no response.

"Yup," Kuroo grins. "Isn't he just something else? Each and every one was designed just for you, my owl friend. It was a noble attempt to try to get your memories to come back." Then Kuroo's face sours and his volume drops. "It probably would've worked, too, if you hadn't wished to forget everything."

The statement hits Bokuto squarely in the chest, an arrow that pierces clean through his heart and pokes out of his back.

"I'm sorry," He whispers, voice hoarse. "I didn't mean to hurt anyone."

"What? No, no, no, Bo, I'm not blaming you!" Kuroo claps him on the shoulder, smiling sadly. "I mean, I understand why you'd do it."

"You do?" Bokuto almost dares to feel hopeful, but squashes that notion down before it can get any further up his ribcage.

"Well, yeah. I don't know if you remember, but you used to have these awful relapses every time your memories would come back. You'd wake up sweating buckets and shaking so bad you could hardly hold a cup of tea. It was awful."

Behind him, Kenma lowers his head in something like agreement. Even with that, Bokuto still finds disgust twisting over and over in his chest.

"But maybe if I hadn't, it would have turned out okay. Maybe he would have still been alive," Then Bokuto frowns. "But Akiko-san said he was dead before I even met him? And she said that you guys might be dead too? Or maybe I'm not remembering right. How does that work? What's going on? Is everyone dead?"

Kuroo shakes his head.

"No, no, no. We all still have our lives. Akaashi was just a soul. I mean," The cat spirit tilts his head thoughtfully. "I guess you technically died, but you got your life back."

"What," Bokuto blinks, mind going blank. "What are you saying? How does that even work?"

"Well, you know," Kuroo continues uncertainly, raising an eyebrow like he suspects this is some odd trick. "the whole, 'there are two parts of every spirit' thing. The soul vs the life. Akaashi lost his life, we lost our souls. Akaashi's dead. We aren't. All that stuff."

Bokuto squints, mouth folded up into a thoughtful frown.

"Right," Bokuto says slowly. "Okay, I get it. Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense."

Kuroo watches him quietly for a minute, then groans and gets to his feet.

"Great Kami," He mutters exasperatedly as he shuffles around the room. "I can't believe he's even made it this far."

"I can hear you, you know!"

"Well now, that's just fascinating!" Kuroo turns back to look at him, propping a hand on his hip and smiling mockingly. "Isn't it wonderful to have such proficient ears?"