Disclaimers: What? You don't understand yet? Ouih...

Warning: *points up*

Hanamichi grumbled as he put on his sneakers. In the locker room, he was alone - except for a certain raven-haired boy who was his CAT pet.

"I can't understand why you hafta follow me now, of all times!" said Hanamichi to the blue-eyed boy standing beside him, "I mean you always ignore me and only when I..."

Kitsune picked up the basketball on the floor and rolled it a few times with his long fingers, and when he picked it up with one hand Hanamichi hmphed. "It's because of the ball is it? Goddamit Kitsune! I've already got you a ball at home ... alright so it's too small for you now but I could've bought you another one..."

"Sakuragi! Get your butt out on the court and join the practice!" yelled a very tall, big and very angry boy, who suddenly appeared in the doorway. Hanamichi jumped a good inch from his seat on the bench and even Rukawa?s normally cool slanted eyes widened, startled.

"Who's this?" demanded the large boy of Rukawa.

"He's... uh... a transfer student from... from Tokyo to watch us play basketball," lied Hanamichi.

The large boy looked at Rukawa suspiciously, but to Hanamichi's relief his captain only said, "All right. Just don't disturb the practice and I'll let you watch. Now Sakuragi, get a move on it!"

"All right! All right!" shouted Hanamichi back, and muttered under his breath, "Bossy gorilla."

"What was that?" the large boy asked lowly.

"Nothing."

~~~~~~

It was a tough session that afternoon. Akagi drilled them to exhaustion and the game practice against the year two and threes was difficult. Mitsui was being particularly harsh that day, especially to Hanamichi. Maybe it's because of the redhead?s continued insistence on calling him Micchy? Nah. Hanamichi always calls him Micchy. Then what?

Hanamichi nearly did a double take when a thought occurred to him. Did Micchy's cat change like his did? Hanamichi made up his mind to speak to Micchy later, but first...

Hanamichi growled as he ran towards Mitsui, making a grab for the ball. The year three deftly evaded his attack and Hanamichi twisted around to chase the senior, but putting too much weight on one side and, combined with the force of gravity, he fell on his behind as Mitsui scored one of his famous three-pointers.

Hanamichi made a move to stand up but fell back down again when a sharp pain shot up from his ankle. Ayako blew her whistle and everyone stopped the game at once. The manageress, along with her assistant, ran up to him and did a quick check-up before ascertaining that the redhead had sprained his ankle. Hanamichi wanted to protest but was brought up short when Ayako carelessly poked his ankle harder than necessary to make a point. Aided, he made his way to the side of the court to join Kitsune, who was watching the continued game with interest. Hanamichi grumbled and complained to Kitsune at first, but since the boy-turned cat ignored him (as usual), he grumbled and complained to no one in particular so that anyone else near him sidled away, nervous.

The whistle sounded again and everyone took a much-needed break where Hanamichi was sitting near the cooler. Mitsui was last, dribbling the ball along the way and stopped short when a tall raven-haired, blue-eyed boy stepped in front of him.

"What?" asked Mitsui, cautious.

The boy merely took the ball from Mitsui's hand and shoved the ball to Mitsui's chest, making a motion towards the court and himself.

"Oh?" said Mitsui understanding, "You want to play a one-on-one, eh?"

Kitsune didn't reply but Mitsui didn't take it into offence. Instead he grinned.

"Alright, let's do it."

The two stepped on court, eyed by the rest of the Shohoku team, interested at how the transfer boy from Tokyo would be able to handle their top scorer. They didn't have to wait long because after a while they saw that the two were a perfect match against each other. Soon the court was noisy with cheers rooting for Mitsui and some changed loyalty, cheering Rukawa with sincerity. Beside the cooler, Hanamichi scowled. That - That CAT managed to match up to Mitsui where he couldn't ?

No! No! the redhead denied, shaking his head, Kitsune is not better than me!

His mental turmoil was suddenly broken off by a soft, concerned voice. "What's the matter, Sakuragi-kun?"

The redhead looked up and his world seemed brighter. "Haruko-san. What are you doing here?"

"Just came to see the team play. And look, I've brought Kimi," said the brown-haired girl, lifting up a cute little kitten in front of Hanamichi. Hanamichi's anger instantly melted as the girl smiled at him. He accepted the kitten and blushed when Haruko leaned near him to stroke and pet the animal in his arms.

Back at the court, Mitsui called for a time-out, since he was already worn out from the earlier practice. Kitsune didn't seem to understand at first, until he saw Mitsui walking towards the rest of the team, where they congratulated the senior for a well-played game. The raven-haired boy followed and received his own pats-on-the-back, when he suddenly saw the redhead holding a kitten and a human girl standing beside him. People were making gibberish noises around him but he didn't listen as something tugged at his heart when he saw his owner pet and coo at the kitten and the girl giggling at his actions. A cup of cold juice was thrust in front on him but he ignored it, walking towards the redhead, the kitten and the girl. When he reached there he hunched on his heels beside Hanamichi, who was still sitting on the bench, and glared at the kitten in the redhead's arms.

"What're you doing?" hissed Hanamichi to the raven-haired boy. The boy just glared and glared, and probably by some unknown feline silent communication the kitten started to get uneasy, struggling to get out of Hanamichi's embrace.

The girl lifted the kitten from the redhead and stared at the strange but handsome boy. Then she smiled and introduced herself. "My name is Akagi Haruko."

The boy didn't respond.

Haruko tried to think of something else to break the ice, and when she remembered how the boy had looked at her Kimi just then, she lifted the kitten towards him and asked politely, "Would you like to hold her?"

To her surprise, the boy quickly edged back, and tugged at the back of Hanamichi's collar to pull the redhead with him.

"Kitsune! Let go!" choked Hanamichi trying to reach behind him to swat the boy's hands off of his t-shirt and also trying to keep his now precarious balance on the narrow bench.

Mitsui's hands stopped in the action of lifting the cup filled with juice to his lips in surprise. Did he just hear Sakuragi calling the transfer student Kitsune? The name of Sakuragi's cat? Right away he knew he had to make sure.

"Yo," greeted Mitsui when Hanamichi came limping towards him with the raven-haired boy in tow.

"Yo," answered Hanamichi, disgruntled.

"You don't have to be so snappy," grinned Mitsui.

"After spraining my ankle and having to take care of this blasted cat I do!" said the redhead angrily.

Mitsui's heart started beating in his excitement. "It happened to you too?"

"What? I didn't see you sprain an ankle."

"I meant the cat, baka!"

"Oh..." *piku* "OH!"

~~~~~~~

The two boys looked in wonder as the two cats who turned into boys acquainted themselves with each other. After a couple of sniffs from Kitsune and some playful head butting from Nobu, Kitsune walked away to find a nice spot to sleep. Nobu, seeing that his new playmate had left him, walked towards the kitchen and disappeared inside.

Hanamichi still couldn't believe that the spectacled boy was a cat, seeing how human Nobu acted when the redhead first saw him in that form.

"What happened to them?" asked Hanamichi, watching in amazement as Nobu appeared with a glass of milk and put it on the table in front of the drowsy Kitsune, who was lying curled up on a couch. Kitsune didn't even budge.

"I don't know," sighed Mitsui, "Maybe they're part of an experiment gone wrong."

"That's sick," said Hanamichi.

"Your cat sure is tall," commented Mitsui.

"Yeah... Hey! That means that I have taken better care of my cat than you did of yours! I win!" crowed the redhead.

"No way!" said Mitsui, "We don't know what happened to them. Your cat being taller than mine might mean a lot of things. Anyway, look at my cat. He's more intelligent than yours!"

"Hah! He has glasses like a geek, so that means that you didn't take care of his eyes!"

"He's not a geek! Compared to mine your cat is a lazy slob!"

"He didn't look like a lazy slob when he beat your ass on the court today!"

"He did NOT beat me!"

Fortunately a loud knock interrupted them before a full-fledged fight could start.

"Mitsui-san!"

Nobu got up before Mitsui could and opened the door.

"Uh, is Mitsui-san in?" asked the person outside. Mitsui appeared behind Nobu and saw Sendoh standing outside, looking relieved when he saw that the Shohoku player was at home.

"Mitsui, you won't believe what has happened," began Sendoh, walking right in with a shorter boy behind him.

"Let me guess," said Mitsui, closing the door and shooing Nobu inside the living room, where Hanamichi and Kitsune were, "Koko is it?"

Sendoh's eyes went wide, "How did you know?"

When they reached the living room, Mitsui pointed to the sleeping boy on the couch. "That's Hanamichi's cat and this," said Mitsui, patting Nobu on the shoulder, "is mine."

Sendoh sat heavily on the extra couch beside Hanamichi, "This is just weird. What happened?"

"Hey, we're just as psyched as you are," said the redhead, running his fingers through his unruly hair, "How did you know... uh, he was your cat?"

"Huh? Oh, it was that look, y'know?" said Sendoh, trying to find better words to explain it, but Hanamichi and Mitsui were already nodding excitedly.

"Yeah, I know," said Hanamichi, looking at Kitsune.

"Those eyes..." Mitsui said as he watched Nobu watching at him with those soft golden-brown eyes.

"Yeah!" nodded Sendoh, "And then there was the attitude."

Hanamichi snorted. "Uh-huh."

"And I remembered that Koko doesn't like to be cuddled..."

Mitsui laughed loudly. "You didn't! Any guy would've been scared shitless if he got cuddled by another guy!"

"Yeah, I figured it out," said Sendoh, gingerly touching his cheek, which seemed to have a nail-like scratch. "So I gave him chocolate milk and he lets me cuddle him after that."

The two boys gave him an odd look.

"Oh, c'mon, he's Koko, right? So there's no harm in cuddling him!" pointed out Sendoh.

"Yeah, but he's human now." Hanamichi pointed back.

"I was doing a test." said Sendoh in defense.

"Yeah, whatever," said Mitsui carelessly, "I was pretty freaked out when I saw Nobu naked in the kitchen, making me breakfast."

"That was nothing," said Hanamichi, blushing, "Kitsune was also naked in my bed when I woke up."

"You saw them naked?!" exclaimed Sendoh, gazing at the scowling Koko in disappointment. "Aww, shucks."

Mitsui and Hanamichi gave him that odd look again.

"What?" asked Sendoh innocently.

~tbc~