Arrested Development

Damn it! I can’t believe those two got arrested! But who am I to talk? I look down at the chains around my hand for confirmation. Yep, we’re in the same sucky boat together.

I wonder how it happened? Did Jet and Spector try to steal a horse? That’s not exactly an easy thing to get away with. Did they lose a bet? Regardless, we’re screwed. As we cross paths with our familiar prisoners, I try to ask Spector a question discreetly.

“Hey Spector! Can’t you just do the moth thing and get us out of this?”

“He can’t.” Jet chimes in loudly, answering the question for him. “Yeah he can only become a moth flurry if he isn’t being held down by an enemy or in magical suppression handcuffs. Like these! Bye June!”

God, he’s too cheerful for his own good. We quickly split ways as the guards rush us off to our respective facilities.

Eventually we get to the place. It turns out, Fodder is a lot bigger and more fleshed out than I thought. The guards take us further into the city to the coliseum where Fern the fearless faced the terrifying Minotaur. Then, the guards locate a set of stairs hidden in a dark alleyway beside the arena. I read a crudely made sign above the stairs that says, “femails ownly”. Well, education has never been a priority in Fodder.

As we descend down the stairs I slowly realize how desperate our situation is growing. Spector and Jet were sent to the dungeon cells for guys and we are going to a female only prison. Both of which are temporary facilities meant to house us before we enter the tournament of champions. Y’know the death games.

The guards take all our equipment away from us to put into a small holding room. This includes our bags, weapons, and the resonance stone from my cloak pocket. Well, guess they don’t do free phone calls for the prisons here. Man, the judicial system in Fodder sucks!

“You two better get some shut eye. Or else-” The taller of the two guards continues to talk in a thick indistinguishable accent. I swear, if there’s one thing I didn’t like about the Emperor of the Lantern series, it’s that P.L. Tokken never came up with a consistent voice for these characters. The thugs in Fodder constantly switch accents as evident by his writing style. Oh, and don't even get me started on the movies! Eli Redwood couldn't do an accent to save his life!! Otherwise, great actor though…

Anyways, after zoning out thoroughly, the guard finally gets to the end of his yapping and we arrive at our temporary holding facility.

“Tomorrow you’ll be fighting for your life in the arena above ground. Sweeeet dreeaams...” The guard says in a low husky voice. Creepy.

They rather aggressively toss us into a tiny prison cell that we’re expected to share. It’s damp, cramped, and smells terrible. Azuki clearly doesn’t like small dark places like this and I don’t blame her. Definitely one star accommodations. If I could leave zero I would. I look over to the corner and she doesn’t look so good. I should try to cheer her up.

“Well at least we’ve got a cozy spot for the night huh?”

I tried to make a light-hearted jab, but clearly it didn’t work on Azuki. In fact, she seems to be panicking quite a bit. She’s breathing really heavy and her body slumps to the ground. Her pupils dilate rapidly. I’ve never seen her like this before.

“Hey Azuki. Now’s not the time to be joking around…”

She lets out a noise that sounds like a pained hiss while clutching her chest. Her breathing only gets worse. She’s not joking. She’s having a panic attack.

“Hey. Hey. I’m here for you! I’m coming down to the ground.”

I lower my body to the floor to join her. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do, but I’ll try to help in any way I can. What I didn’t expect was for Azuki to grab my arm. Her hands were shaking horribly, but I think my arm steadied her. Her claws dug into my skin a little, but I didn't care. I am going to help her get through this.

She’s not trembling as much, but she’s still hyperventilating. Okay so let’s work on breathing. I don’t think I can talk to her now, so I’ll change my breathing instead. I slow it all down. I take deep inhales. Then long exhales. My stomach rises and falls. The rhythm is slow and it takes some time. After a few minutes Azuki’s heart matches my pace. I know this because Azuki’s head tenderly falls into my lap. I’ve never seen this part of her and for her sake, I hope I never see her experience something like this again.

We lay like this for a while. I ask if I can stroke her hair while she lies down and she nods. It’s something my mom used to do to calm me down when I was little. Usually it was during thunderstorms and she would sing to me. I have a feeling Azuki wouldn’t like my singing voice. So, I keep stroking her hair gently, paying careful attention not to get too close to her ears.

“...Thank you.” Azuki mumbles between soft tears.

“You’re welcome.” I pause for a moment, I’m not sure if now is a good time. “Hey Azuki?”

“Yes…?”

I really don’t want to bother her, but she does seem like she might be up for a little talk. “If you don’t mind me asking, why didn’t you keep running? You could have left me back there to fend for myself. I’m sure the guards would have never caught up to you... you would have made it out of Fodder.”

“I… I don’t like to leave people behind.”

“Then it’s I who should be thanking you Azuki.”

I just don’t get it. She’s clearly scared of places like this, but she still risked getting caught to try and save me? I just don’t understand how someone can be self reliant, but also so empathetic. I totally misjudged her character. When we get out of here, I need to apologize. Hopefully I can find a way to thank her properly.

I continue to stroke her hair with my thumb and through my tears starting to well up in my eyes, I see her form start to change. Her ears begin to blend into her hair and her hair starts to turn into fur? What?! No way… This whole time I never knew. I guess I just assumed it couldn’t be possible. Azuki isn’t an isekai’d human. In the real world, she’s a cat.

And she’s certainly a pretty cat at that. It looks like she’s a calico with gorgeous black, orange, and white fur. Her expressive eyes sparkle in a gentle shade of olive. Aww! And her hands appear to morph into itty bitty paws with the tiniest, most adorable toe beans.

All of a sudden all the pieces of the puzzle come flying into my head. Azuki said she had a hard time getting used to her body. Well off course she did! She isn’t bipedal. She also sleeps for twelve hours a day and is still tired from her cat nap.

But then, the sad parts of the story cross my mind. Azuki says she doesn’t believe in adoption. That they kick you to the curb when you’re no longer “cute”. Azuki said she nearly drowned before getting isekai’d here. Azuki said she doesn’t have a home to go to. She later laughed it off and claimed that she was lying, but that was wrong. This is the truth. She’s a stray.

“I hate places like this…” Azuki sighs.

Yeah, I don’t blame her. This cramped dark cell is enough to make anyone lose it, let alone someone with a past like hers. Time to make a move and quick. I think I have just the idea.

“Alright, then let’s get out of here. Do you think you can use this to pick the lock?”
I pull out the hairpin holding my curly mane in a messy updo. The guards took everything from us save the clothes on our backs and the pin hidden in my bush of a hairdo. Haha suckers.

I’m usually not one to try messing with my hair too much. I mostly just used that pin to keep my hair back when trying to learn fire related spells. Unfortunately, I haven’t had any luck with those. Or any cool spells for that matter. Just basic levitation. Yay.

Azuki nods and takes the pin from my hand quickly getting to work. As she attempts to pick the lock of our cell, I press my face against the bars and try to keep lookout. My heart is pumping in a sudden rush of adrenaline. I hear the sound of the hairpin clink as it falls to the ground. I look over to Azuki who leans down to pick up the pin she fumbled.

“Sorry, I’m not very good with my hands…” Azuki still seems shaken up. I didn’t even consider how long it must have taken for her to get used to human-like hands. It’s alright, I know she can do it! Azuki just needs to lock in and press on. Once we break out of this prison cell, we’re home free to Mount Calamity.

“It’s okay, take your time.” I say this to reassure her. Unfortunately for us, I do hear footsteps approaching with the light of a torch not too far behind. “But if you could take your time faster that would be great, a guard's coming!!”

Just as I say that I hear the click from the hairpin I gave Azuki only to realize she swapped the tool out for her own claws instead. She is such a cat. I can’t believe it took me this long to figure it out.

As we turn the other way we realize that this hall is a dead end, but we do reach the room where they kept all our stuff. Azuki grabs a small knife of hers and I pick up my staff from the weapons rack. The guard I saw earlier eventually catches up. He approaches us from behind and shouts, “HEY!”

Oh crap! We can’t go back to jail, we just got out! Without even thinking, I accidentally cast the levitation spell on my hairpin and sent it flying towards the guard’s hand. It went straight through his palm and came out on the other side. Oh my God. There’s a hairpin-sized hole in his hand.

“AAARGHH!” The guard starts screaming.

“AAAAHHH!” I start screaming. Eww, ew, ew! God, I can totally see bone too.

“I think I’m gonna be sick.” Oh great and Azuki starts dry heaving. That’s going to make me sick too. Luckily for us, the guard runs up the stairs screaming in pain as he is too afraid to mess with us. Unluckily for me, I’m going to have that image burned into my memory for the rest of my life.

“Well that was disgusting. I’m sorry you had to see that.” I say to Azuki.

Azuki stands up and wipes her mouth. “Eh don’t be. I’ve seen some pretty bad stuff anyways.”

I’m sure she isn’t wrong. God, I can only imagine the things she’s seen.

My eyes widen and I realize I must have been staring at Azuki. Her posture straightens and she looks at me directly, “So you finally figured it out about me huh?”

I nod. She could sense my behavior changing, though my stupid face has never been the most subtle. That and I think word has spread to the other isekais about this power of mine. I feel bad, I don’t want people, or cats, to get all cautious around me because they think I’ll reveal their deepest secrets.

“I don’t want that to change things between us though. Okay?” Azuki says with a wink. I’m glad she feels the same.

“Well,” Azuki begins, changing the subject. “Now that we got all our things back, let's get out of here!”

I start to get going, following behind Azuki to head up the stairs, but then I stop in my tracks as a thought dances around in my head. It’s just a hypothetical question, but I’d like to hear Azuki’s answer, if she’s up for it.

“Hey Azuki. Before we go, this is going to be the last deeply personal question I ask, I promise. If we find a way to go back to the real world, would you take it?”

She pauses before answering, the hesitation evident in her wandering eyes. It’s clear that this is a lot for her. I don’t know all the details, but I’m sure Azuki’s old life must have been so rough, I don’t think I’d want to go back to it.

“I don’t know… do you think it’s going to be an all or nothing kinda deal? Like if one of us goes back to the real world, we all have to? Because I wouldn’t want to be selfish. I kinda miss my old body, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have it better here than back there. But if me staying here means that no one else gets to go home, I wouldn’t want that. I… don’t have a home on Earth, but that’s okay. I’m used to that.”

I don’t know what to say. I don’t want Azuki’s outlook on returning to the real world to be completely hopeless. She deserves to be happy.

“I promise,” My voice rises in courage. “If we ever escape this world and go back to the real one, I’ll try to find you”.

“Ha good luck with that!” Azuki flashes a wicked little grin. “You’d never catch me, I’m a wild stray June.”

“I’ll just have to chase you down then!” I reassure her with a smile of my own. She may not want to be part of an adopted family again after what I can only gather was an unthinkably horrible experience for her, but I want her to know she’d always be welcome at my home. I have to let her know that.

“Hey Azuki… the door is always open at my place.”

Aah I made it too awkward. Quick, think of a joke!

“...Do you like catnip?”

“Shut up…” Azuki laughs.

“Fine then. How about fish? My mom is a pretty good cook. We could make you some grilled salmon. Oh and we have plenty of nice cozy blankets to stay warm when the winter comes. How about it?”

“That sounds nice..” Azuki says with a coy smile. Her ears relax sheepishly then immediately perk up to the clamoring sounds of excitement directly above us. From the fervor of the cheers, I’m reminded that we’re directly below the arena and a new tournament must be starting soon.

“Let’s head back to the others as quickly as we can, Azuki. What do you think the boys are up to?” I ask.

“Uh.. did the guards hit your head or something? They got arrested just like we did.” Azuki chides. I’m not sure what she’s getting at here. I remember them passing by us. We just have to find our way over to the boys’ side of the prison to break them out like we did for ourselves just now. No biggie. I’ll just explain this to Azuki.

“Yeah but-” Ooooh. Just as I open my mouth it finally clicks. If they got arrested just like we did, that means they’re probably competing in the death games above us. And it’s starting. Like right now. Crap.