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I wasn't doing nothing! I was totally doing something!

[ He doesn't know what time Kido is referring to, which probably says a lot. ]

And it's better being happy than anything else when you're relaxing.

Hm.

[ She doesn't believe for a minute that Terry doesn't just space out and do nothing sometimes. Everybody does, and the fact that one can zone out points to them being comfortable enough to do so. ]

You're right about that, at least. You should feel happy and relaxed in your own home, anyways. Taking time for yourself doing nothing isn't a bad thing either.

[ And so, when Rei and Terry are working, Kido just sort of lounges around listening to her music doing nothing... but happily doing nothing ]

I guess that's true... but it's so hard for me to do nothing. I have to do something, even if it's just sleeping to pass the time--

[ Oh, they're at the hospital now. ]

[ One day Kido can teach Terry the joy of sitting around and doing nothing. But they're at the hospital, and Kido takes the lead to where they need to be, left down the hall past the large windows, second unit on the right. It's not a sprawling hospital with multiple wings and is easy to get lost in, at least, so Kido apparently has the layout memorized. Maybe Terry does too, since he's been here so often. ]

I guess I can take the cats... Call me when you're finished?

Ah, yeah... sure thing. Tell them to put it on my tab for the rabies shots.

[ They'll unfortunately understand what she means by that, since he's done it so many times... but at least his hospital debt no longer exists and it's starting fresh again. He waves over at Kido to go to his therapist... he's nervous, but he should be fine. Probably. ]

[ He has a tab... which is usually reserved for frequent customers...

Kido sighs and waves back, makes sure all the cats are with her and going ahead and sticking two kittens in her hood, one in her jacket pocket, and the last two in her arms before going off to find wherever they give shots. The people here probably think Terry's some nice homeless guy wanting to get all the cats in Hirajiro vaccinated, with how many cats he apparently owns.

She'll wait for his call whenever his session's done. ]

[ The first five had to be forced to be vaccinated because they wouldn't leave the hospital, so... same thing, right??

Kido will get a call about an hour after she left with the cats. The ringtone sounds like some catchy xylophone turn if she didn't change it yet. ]

[ It's still the xylophone because Kido didn't mess with anything else besides the unlock code to make it easy to remember, except I forgot what I said she changed it to so maybe by now she just removed the code entirely and all you have to do is swipe the screen to unlock. ]

Hey. Terrence?

Yeah, it's me. I'm done with my session. Are you waiting for me? Or are you busy?

[ Terry only thought to use pinpointing to see where Kido is, but didn't think to use it to find out what she was doing... either way, it's the call you wanted, Kido. ]

I said I'd be here for you, so it's not like I'd leave and be busy with anything?

[ Shots don't take all that much time, and while it's only been an hour, she'd thought she might have had to wait around longer. But even though it was just an hour, time passes slowly when she's just sitting around with her headphones in and doing nothing but wait. ]

I'm up at the rooftop garden right now, but I'll come down and find you. Stay where you are.

Yeah, sure. I'm in front of the waiting room of the psychiatric ward. See you soon!

[ He'll hang up and wait for Kido... ]

[ It'll take a couple minutes to get down there, most of which was spent herding cats because Kido doesn't trust them to follow after her like Terry's do. One of the nurses gave her two cloth bags to use as cat carriers for the time being so they don't run around and cause trouble in a hospital, so that's what Kido tows them down with, glad that they're still tiny kittens and not full grown cats.

When Kido gets down to the ward, she hands Terry one of the bags full of cat. Shh, they're sleeping inside. ]

[ He's about to greet her when he sees her, until he sees... a bag? He peeks inside to find the kittens there and has a look of realization across his face that he shouldn't be so loud. ]

Should we drop them off first?

[ Kitten sleep more than half the day already, so they'll nod off again even if they're roused; they're pretty forgiving, seeing as Kido doesn't really bother keeping her voice down at all. Having one hand free means she can cradle the bag with the two kittens in her arms instead of having them hang by her side. ]

Yeah, we probably should. Hopefully Ami's around and willing to look after them. Did everything go okay?

Yeah, it went okay. I'd say it was a productive session... mostly anyway. I didn't really feel connected with the therapist. I dunno if that's normal or not.

[ But then, he's not human and the people here just handwave whatever seems weird, so... ]

I wouldn't know either... but as long as it's productive, that's a good thing.

[ She doesn't ask any further questions, after looking Terry over and deciding that he seems just fine. Talking about your problems sounds exhausting, so instead of putting Terry through an extended therapy session the entire way home, Kido points to the five kittens and names them one by one: ]

This is Saki, Kouji, Ren... And these two are Hana-chan, and Aiko.

[ This is how she spent her hour alone, and also she cannot tell any of the five kittens apart yet, so their names are interchangeable until she can, haha. ]

[ Honestly, Terry would have to do pinpointing to tell them apart too. There doesn't seem to be any real difference between the kittens other than how they act. They're technically strays, so it doesn't feel right that they get collars. ]

Those are cute names, Kido... you picked well. But why does one have an honorific while the others don't?

[ ... ]

Is that the one that was really friendly to you?

[ I love that Terry respects his cats' freedoms and lets them be friendly strays, while Mondo is dedicated to building his cats their own beds and getting each a cute collar with studs or ties. ]

Yeah. ...I think.

[ They're all asleep so she can't tell haha but if they were awake, it's the one that bumped her hand first for pets and that's deserving of an honorific. ]

Anyways, Hana-chan is Hana-chan for the same reason you're T-chan.

[ Because it just is, don't question it, Terry. Hana-chan is somehow cuter than just plain Hana, or something. ]

[ It looks like he's come to an understanding of that. He hasn't used honorifics for anyone unless he's forced to at work, so it's been another cultural shift for him. ]

I get it. That's cute though, isn't it? A flower with a flower. It suits you.

[ It's cute and the name suits the kitten, but Kido doesn't really feel that the same applies her, glaring at Terry instead of giving him a proper response, mumbling something about kittens being cute by default, but also that they're Terry's cats and he's responsible, although she'll help him out.

Just not now, because she holds the second bag out for him to take. It's punishment for being embarrassing, even though Terry can handle a couple extra pounds of kitten with no problem. ]

[ At least she knows that he's completely sober this time and not under any other influence when he says such sappy things to her. Terry takes the second bag of kittens, still smiling. ]

If you combine the names, you'd probably get something like "Hanami" and I'm sure you can spell that like "beautiful flower".

[ Maybe his therapist drugged him, she doesn't know!! ]

I guess... Why would you combine the names, though? What's the point?

Because they do that with small groups of pairs, don't they?

[ His logic here is that meshing names is cute anyway, so why not. ]

It's fun making up names... [ If it's not as important, as... say, the hirajiro mystery gang. ]

You mean pairing names, like for your fanfiction.

[ That's a thing she knows of, but not any other time you'd mash two names together, especially not a person's and a cat's ]

I told you I don't write those!

[ KIDO....... this is going to be recurring thing, isn't it? ]

... And what's a pairing name?

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