A man and a Beast

Chapter 2 - Who let the cats out?

Colin

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Sleeps nice

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BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!

I slam the snooze button on the alarm so hard I hear a crack noise. I groan as rest some more. I see Ember was startled from her sleep. Looks ridiculous. I loose focus and fall back asleep. 

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My eyes shoot open. I suddenly remember why I had the alarm set and run into my closet. Ember is probably so confused. I mentally chuckle. I dash back out of the closet with proper cloths on. I chuck all of my homework into a folder and hurl that into my bag. I grab the Dell Chromebook from my desk and chuck it in as well. I pretty much fall down the stairs. I absolutely wolf down some Fruit Loops and jump out of my door yelling, "Bye Ember!"

I jump headfirst into my car, get seated and speed off to campus. Another day of suffering. One week left at least.

Felicia (Ember)

I blink. Having no clue what just happened. Well he left. Very fast too. I snap myself out of confusion and walk to his door. I could easily leave, walk back home and never come back. But I think I should wait until I can turn back into a dragon before I go. So I'll lay low. From the back of my mind another reason surfaces. The human is growing on me. He seems nice, unaffected by the greedy human world. He would also be very helpful. Since us dragons have no clue what the humans are doing in their heavily guarded isolated facilities. Though I doubt he will know much.

I make up my mind. I'll stay. But for now I'm going to explore the town more. I see that, in his rush, the human left the door cracked. So I snuck through. I looked around as I stepped on the wet ground. Looks the same from the day we met, except brighter out. 

I just walk around for an hour or so before I decided to head back after some incredibly young humans try to pet me. When your main life is that of a dragon a bunch of human younglings trying to pet you is not the most... dignified thing that can happen. With that aside I made it back to the humans house.

I thought the walk was nice. But once I saw the humans car in the driveway I instantly regret it. He must think I left him. The back door was left open, again. So I slipped through. I hear the human talking to himself on the sofa. I look over and see him slouched down.

"Heh. Should of expected something like that from a cat," He mumbles, "Of course she would run away first chance."

He says all of this while staring at a metal rounded rectangle in his hands. 

"I still don't understand why you decided to enroll in the military," His face looks more and more saddened and tone more desperate, "Why does everyone in our family always leave. Grandpa died of old age, Mom got cancer and you, brother, In Ukraine."

This hit hard. I now knew what he was holding. It was his brothers dog tags. Now before you ask why I know what those are let me tell you: Just because we aren't human doesn't mean we will never get info on humans. We can infiltrate basic towns and cities. Nothing federal though. 

I let out a meow to get the humans attention. His head shoots around.

"Your here!" He cries

I can barely process what hes doing before I find myself embraced in what humans call a 'hug'. We dragons can't really do this. You know the whole 'walking on 4 legs' thing, though we can walk on 3 just its tricky. Very skilled dragons can walk on two for a moment, looks hilarious though.

Gotta be honest. Humans got some nice ways of greeting each other. Hugs felt great. At least until it was a bit tight for the small cat body.

He loosens up the hug then plops down on the couch, letting me out of his arms. I lay down next to his knee. The human begins to slowly stroke my back. Due to me being a cat I began to let out purring noises. 

"You have no idea how much this means to me," He says

I, of course, do know what it means. I feel sorry for him since I'm going to have to leave sometime. But for now we enjoy the moment. 

After a minute or two he lets go. Still carrying me in his left arm, he grabs his bag and slings it over his shoulder. Then he uses both hands to carry me up to his room.

"Now I have some work to do my friend," He says, half talking to me and half to himself, "Don't worry it won't take as long as yesterday."

I just jump onto his bed and rest there till he is done.

A painful amount of minutes later

The human gets up from his chair, finally finished with his homework. He threw on some        bed-wear in his closet and practically faceplanted onto the bed. I would laugh at that if I could.  After turning off the lamp next to him and folding himself in the covers he just lays on his side. Even though the covers are heavy for the small cat form I manage to crawl my way up to the humans chest. He mumbles something too quiet for me to hear (And that's saying something) and then throws an arm around me.

We both fall into unbreakable sleep...

(*BEEP* BEEP* *BEEP*)

Almost unbreakable sleep...