Cats – a story piece/outtake/worldbuilding from my Camp Nano novel

[personal profile] rix_scaedu asked for cats. Here’s some cats, with my camp nano protaganist.

This ‘verse really needs a name.

Jen liked cats, always had.

Face families weren’t allowed to have cats. They weren’t allowed to have pets at all — it was a point of change, a point of interest — but sometimes if the “host family” had kept a dog, they would have a dog for a little while.

If you used magic around dogs for too long, you ended up with a dog who was a lot more… dog. They were cleverer, more loyal, the sort of dog that waited weeks for their masters or learned how to open the doors and fetch the beer.

If you used magic around cats for too long, they ended up… strange. They were the sort of cats that slipped outdoors when no doors were open, seemed to be talking back to you (and sometimes were), trailed good luck or bad behind them like a flag and waved it at anyone who annoyed them — or sometimes at random passers-by.

Sometimes, she’d heard, you ended up with cats who would eat up a sign or a design, just rub against it and it was gone, and then spit it out later on a whim. You had cats who really, really liked their person, and those cats just vibrated with magic.

Jen wanted a cat.

The Stepford Angels didn’t have regulations the way Face families had, but they still had pragmatic rules. She was on the road more than she was “home;” she spent much of her time blending in, being invisible, much like she had when she was a Face. There wasn’t a lot of room for any sort of pet, much less one that might suddenly set off fireworks.

But it didn’t stop her from wanting the cat, staring every cat that wandered by, and, sometimes, leaving good-luck charms for the cats to rub against and take with them.

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