Hybrid Discovery [SKZ fanfiction]| Lee Felix and Bang Chan

When the cat is away... There's panic.

Why is everyone so calm, Bang Chan wonders the next morning.
When he arrived home -being kidnapped for four whole days by the neighbors grandma- nobody seemed to have missed him. Everyone was fast asleep when he closed the door to their apartment behind him and now, with everyone gathered around the kitchen table for breakfast, no one seems to be bothered with his absence. It's like he wasn't gone.
How?!
He remembered Felix asked him to check if there was any mail in the mailboxes downstairs and when he went back - no mail found- a worried elderly woman grabbed him by his scruff and carried him inside her home where she kept him. He had tried to run away, but the old lady was persistent enough to keep him close and didn't leave him alone. Every attempt to go back home was interrupted with small coos and the wrinkly old hands grabbing him and dragging him back to her. In the end the woman even locked the front door when he got too close. Something her grandson didn't seem all too happy about.
'Let the damn cat wander,' he nagged at her.
'No. She has been gone out almost every evening now. What will happen if someone takes her.'
Like how she took him, Chan had thought grumbly to himself.
She had squeezed his cheeks and Chan had wriggled himself out of her arms to hide under a big dresser full of porcelain plates. After that he had to come out to try and make a run for the front door from time to time. Not once succeeding as the elder woman found him midst escaping every time. She seemed to have sharp senses for someone of her age.
Chan eventually had to get out to eat and drink to replenish his energy from all his failed escaping attempts.. Apparently the grandma and her grandson had a normal cat as there was a simple litter box in the bathroom and a food and water bowl in the kitchen.
He had to eat the funky looking cat food and barfed everything up the same night in the toilet of the humans. It had been some time since he had to survive on animal food but this was a lot worse than he remembered. The murky water in the water bowl wasn't appealing as well, so he had to resort to drinking from the toilet or opening the tap in the kitchen when the humans didn't look. Again, he had worse, but he wasn't planning on letting this become his new life. He felt sorry for whoever the cat of these owners was.
He escaped on the fourth day. The grandson had gone out and the granny fell asleep while watching tv. The sound of the tv would be a big help to cover up the sounds of the front door. Chan transformed after making sure the grandma was out of it. Grabbing a pair of underwear drying on the dry rack near the closed balcony door, cursing under his breath when he only found grandma panties - his only option if he wanted to protect some of his dignity when walking out- and stepped into the floral printed thing. He then carefully opened the front door, looked around to make sure nobody was there, closed the door behind him and made a run to his front door which was already opened as if they were expecting him.

But that is the funny part. His family members are acting like he hasn't been gone for days.
So, after a good amount of thinking and dubbing, he opens his mouth.
'Have none of you missed me?' he asks carefully.
He waits for them to ask questions, but gets surprised with a; 'No? Why?' from Han.
Chan blinks and tries to comprehend the hamster's answer.
'N-No? I've been gone for four days!' he huffs, looking around the table to the hybrids, halting their actions mid way.
'Gone?' Felix asks. He places his spoon back in his cereal and looks puzzled at his friend. 'You mean you've been in your cat form for the past four days? We thought you were stressed or something.'
'N-no... I haven't- I was gone!'
The others stare at him in confusion. Do they think he is lying? He's been kidnapped by their neighbor and none of them knew? He searches for words, opening and closing his mouth in disbelief that his friends - his family- haven't missed him apparently.
'Chan, what are you mumbling? You've been with us all day,' Jeongin says, sharing concerns with Felix.
'Yeah, we watched movies yesterday,' Han says. 'And we ate pancakes. You almost destroyed your previous record with how many you ate.'
All this is new information for Chan. 'Pan- Pancakes? Movies? I've been captured by the neighbor and survived on stale cat food and toilet water. What are you talking about?' he baffles.
Now everyone is quiet. They are clearly not having the same memories or something has happened. Minho is the first to break the silence. Connecting the dots of their different stories.
'If you were not here... Then who was?'
That's when panic breaks out. Felix and Changbin are apologizing to Chan and asking him if he's okay whilst Seungmin and Hyunjin are arguing why none of them haven't noticed anything different, blaming each other while trying to describe all the "obvious" characteristics of their friend. Han has his knees tucked against his chest and overthinks who he has been playing pranks on these past days and Jeongin tries to follow all the conversations at once.
'Shut up!' Minho makes them all shut their mouths and focus on him in an instant. The Russian Blue cat has a big frown and caresses his chin with his thumb and pointer finger, deep in thought.
'Did the neighbor mention anything about a cat?' he asks Felix.
'I think he said something like that. Do you think the granny mistook Chan for her cat?' Felix answers, calming the room down a little with the possible explanation.
Minho nods and Chan tells them about his experiences after that.
'It seems like they have a normal cat. One with questionable living conditions, but it didn't seem like they had a hybrid,' he says, thinking back there wasn't even a simple cat bed somewhere. He had to either sleep in the grasp of the old lady or somewhere under the dusty furniture.
'But, the cat that was here was for sure a hybrid. It was too intelligent and interacted with us like a human,' Han sums up. 'Could the neighbor's cat actually be a hybrid as well?'
Chan hopes it's not true. If a hybrid has to live in those conditions... He shudders while Felix makes a shocked sound. Chan looks at him as his friends' eyes dart around the room and halt at the dishes from yesterday on the kitchen counter.
'Who did I bathe yesterday?' he murmurs.
His ears turn red and he buries his face in his hands, exhales loudly, ashamed of his lack of knowledge. He didn't even recognize his own hybrid! He touched a random person, all while his friend was in distress somewhere else. Even worse, he was at their neighbors'. Right next to them and still Felix didn't notice anything different.
'There's a bigger problem,' Minho sighs, turning the attention back to him again. 'If this was a misfortunate swap, it wouldn't be much. But we know this neighbor cat is probably a hybrid, thus capable of communicating with authorities.' He looks around the table to see if anyone gets the bigger picture.
'You mean, they could rat us out for being illegal pets?' Jisung squeeks.
'Exactly. They've seen almost all of us transform freely-,' Minho confirms their fears. 'Without wearing collars.'
'And naked!' Seungmin yells. 'That's a violation of our privacy!'
The table breaks out in chatter again before Felix shushes them. 'The main issue is, we have to make sure their hybrid won't talk if we want to keep living here. We need a plan.'