Chapter 9: Chapter 9: The Tiger Necessities

[What is this “Bare Necessities” wisdom you speak of?] My new buddy Demos asks this question.

Lumbering along, our bellies full to bursting, we trot behind Kaline and Vedette. The two sisters walk beside each other with an attitude I recognize from my own life. Getting along because Mom and Dad Said So.

Tomas follows us, along with a thin, bespectacled, pasty-faced man with a pad of paper and a stylus. This pasty-faced man has a badge made to look like a howling wolf. Maybe he is some kind of beast taming official?

[Beast Taming Steward: A member of a household who manages the daily activities of beast taming and keeps records of the beasts’ progress. Beast Taming Steward of the House of Riddlehoeven: Roon Maartenwitz.]

Roon Maartenwitz has a big name for a man who looks like he’d fall over if you sneezed on him.

“Ser Maartenwitz, see how healthy our beasts are,” Vedette says in a charming way.

[Is he kind or cruel?] I ask Demos.

[Indifferent.] My bruin buddy seems bored by the question. [What are the “Bare Necessities”? How do I learn them?]

I try to recall the Disney song.

[Well, they’re ways you can forget about your worries. Hakuna Matata. It means “no worries.”]

Yes, I know I completely mashed up two Disney movies, but Demos doesn’t know that.

He leans in closer, and I suspect I might have converted my rival to an ally, at least for the moment. After the equivalent of a schoolyard fight where parents and teachers got called in, we made up over lunch.

[No worries? How can that be? We have to show up and do our best for our masters.]

[Of course we do. It’s our purpose. But…that doesn’t mean that we can’t relax and let our animal natures out. We can rest at ease. Enjoy the simple things that people can’t.]

His fuzzy brown ears twitch. I don’t want to insult him by calling him cute, because he’s snaggle-toothed and has a wicked scar on his snout. How’d he get that, anyway?

[I like the things that the humans enjoy.]

I’m trying not to let the irony of that statement blow my mind. [But they need all this.] I swivel my head around at the marble walls. [All this stuff.]

{You know, Kaline’s room is in the same wing as Vedette’s. Right next door. I heard you snoring in that HUMAN girl’s bed.]

Shoving him with my shoulder, I snarl, [I didn’t say ALL this stuff was unnecessary. It’s just that off duty, we don’t have to strive as hard as the humans do. We can enjoy the human beds in exchange for giving Vedette and Kaline love.]

[MISTRESS Vedette. The most beautiful mistress. The brightest star in all the Nine Heavenly Realms. You should be so lucky to have her dainty hand on your fur.]

Oh boy, he sounds like he’s got a crush, which, when I think about it, is all kinds of weird. Maybe it’s this bond between beast and master.

[Mistress Vedette should be included in these “Bare Necessities” you speak of.]

I detect common ground here. [Aye! And Mistress Kaline, too. Along with eating crunchy exotic fruits and swimming in rivers and lagoons and not looking around desperately for things we will never have.]

Like a human body again, for instance.

[Those sound more like the “Tiger Necessities” to me.] Playfully, Demos shoves me, and I shove back. Almost like…

No.

Demos. Damon. What beast was Damon playing before? Was it a bear? And who was the beast tamer that bonded him?

Gaps in my memory from my real life.

[Well, the “Tiger Necessities” also include working hard and doing our best when we’re supposed to.] I feel a desperate need to level up again. Maybe if I level up, I’ll regain all my memories of my life. There are a few that are missing, mostly from the last year when I felt so under stress. I really wasn’t myself.

When I leveled up, my mind seemed clearer. Before I died, I would absolutely have recalled instantly what kind of animal Damon was playing. I’d have rattled off a list of the beast’s stats anytime, anywhere, until Mom and Dad told me to knock it off.

I need to get overpowered to remember.

You can level up quickly if you work hard with your master and complete several mini-games. I just have to find them.

A wicked thought enters my feline mind.

I venture: [Damon?]

[Who are you talking to? It’s DEMOS.]

Why does he sound as if I just tried to use a bear trap against him? [Oh, sorry. IWrong name.]

He stomps ahead of me. [Jerk. I already apologized for the fight.]

I’m baffled. [I said I was sorry.]

My bruin friend ambles on, evidently believing that I’ve become befuddled. And maybe I have. After all, it’s impossible that Damon is still playing his same beast, right? For all I know, he might have deleted that character out of grief. But no, this game was and is Damon’s outlet. He wouldn’t just give it up, would he?

Sometimes, people engage in activities that they used to do with a lost loved one in order to feel close to that person or remember the good times. On the other hand, sometimes people want nothing to do with anything that reminds them of their loved one when the loss is fresh. Damon and I used to love lollipops when we were kids because our grandpa always gave us lollipops.

Then, suddenly, he died in his sleep. Heart attack.It might seem crazy because we were nine and seven, but Damon and I couldn’t even stand the sight of lollipops for several weeks.

I hope to God the game is not like a lollipop to Damon.

But hold on. Let’s be reasonable about this. Even if Damon is playing Demos, how does that help me? What can I say? [Oh, hello, bro, I’m trapped in this video game, help me level up. By the way, sorry I traumatized you, Mom, and Dad by having a heart attack in the middle of an exam!]

Yeah, no. That would not go over well.

“Oh look, they were getting along before, and now they’re not,” Vedette says in a sweet voice.

Kaline circles back to me, her golden-brown hair flying everywhere and glistening in the sunlight in the marble hallway. “Blaze, what do you think? Have you forgiven Demos? Or is Demos still angry that you attacked back?”

My answers to those questions are 1) yes and 2) no, but he’s got his fur in a twist about something else. My fault, really.

Surging ahead of Demos, I rotate around and reverse until I’m facing him, nose to nose. [I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to call you by the wrong name. It was an honest mistake.]

His brown eyes bore into mine, and my newly heightened sense of smell can’t detect any hostile smell. Can you actually smell when someone is about to attack? Because I didn’t get a whiff of anything resembling bear before he blocked the agility tunnel.

[Who is Damon?]

Come on, Charisma score. Come on. I can’t give him a real answer, but I can’t lie. Maybe I can cause a diversion?

Roon Maartenwitz sniffs, “I’m going to have to mark them both down for being ill-mannered.”

Mark us down? This guy looks and talks like the teacher you always dreaded in school.

[Follow my lead.] This curt command comes from Demos.

[Sure, whatever you–]

All of a sudden, WHOMP.

He knocks me on my back, and breathing normally is a distant memory. He licks my face. Not in a mating way (ew, we’re both kids), but in a brotherly way. His rough tongue cleanses any specks of food in my fur. I bathe his face, because honestly, he stinks of fish. His fur is soft, though.

Talk about “kiss and make up”! But it’s the kind of thing that you’d do after a really brutal sports match to show no hard feelings. Hugging it out in the locker room. Going out for a drink after.

“Awww,” Kaline sighs. “I think they’ve become friends.”

[Blaze Charisma Increased to 14!]

Leveling up through being nice. Who knew?

At least I’ve got a buddy in this world that I can talk to.

Disentangling from me, Demos stands up and continues on. I follow him. [Nicely done.]

[Anything not to get marked down by that annoying human. We have to keep our scores up.]

I purr wholeheartedly.

[So, Demos, what do you know about this Beast Taming Elimination Tournament?]

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