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A ball of grey fluff wandered under the bottom edge of a sofa, exploring the potential hiding place and sniffing at forgotten trinkets. The kitten sneezed.
Within ten minutes, the little animal had made its way to the other side of the room, having explored a tabletop or two and licked clean the crumbs on a forgotten dinner plate. It was happy that the falling teacup hadn't made the loud sound teacups were known for making when they fell, and only mildly noted the papers under its paws as they slipped to the floor. The small animal wondered where it might go to relieve itself.
The kitten didn’t notice it had a visitor until it saw a bit of movement in the corner of its eye and looked up to see a tall human man standing in the doorway. It froze. The human man also froze, arms at his sides, tracing the path of destruction with his eyes.
The bright eyes finally stopped to rest on the grey ball of fluff huddled by the unlit fireplace. The kitten looked back for a moment, then lost its courage and glanced away, almost nonchalantly. It ambled over to one of the nearby seats, hiding itself from view for a moment before reappearing on the other side and looking up at the human male again.
“Miaow?” the small cat asked hesitantly, eyes wide.
“What, are you hungry or something?”
—
It was a few minutes after stepping back into the flat before John noticed anything out of the ordinary. His flatmate was sitting at his usual seat by the fireplace with John’s stolen laptop, and as always the desk and coffee table were both a scattered mess. It was the clean plate sitting on the other seat that finally tipped John off.
“Sherlock, what is this?”
His flatmate looked up from the laptop to see what John was talking about. “She was hungry,” he said with a shrug, turning his attention back to the screen.
“She? Who is she?”
Sherlock tilted his head towards the sofa; on the side cushion, nestled into a discarded shirt, slept the tiny grey kitten. John stared at it in disbelief.
“Is that - why is there a cat in our flat?” John asked after a moment of stunned silence. Sherlock looked up in surprise.
“Isn’t she yours?”
“No - why would I bring a cat in our flat?”
Sherlock didn’t answer, and gave the sleeping kitten a contemplative look.
“If you didn’t bring it in,” John suggested, “did Mrs. Hudson--"
"--She wouldn't have given us a cat," his flatmate shook his head dismissively, "she'd be too worried about us killing it. I thought you were still going out with that girl, the one with the shelter.”
“I - No. I haven’t seen her in months."
Sherlock nodded, but there was a touch of confusion in his eyes. John stepped closer to the sleeping animal to get a better look at it.
“Could it have come in an open door?”
“Possibly, but the stairs are too steep for it to have climbed up, and it was up here when I found it.” Sherlock's eyes had slowly wandered back to the computer screen, and he was typing away again as he talked.
John reached down to see if the cat had a collar, and inadvertently woke it up. The animal yawned, revealing its bare neck, and gave him a perplexing look, sniffing at the offered fingers and trying to get them to rub its head.
“You fed it?” John clarified, resisting the urge to scratch the kitten’s ears.
“I though it was yours.”
John started to say something, but stopped himself and shook his head. “OK, so what do we do with it now?”
Sherlock shrugged at this question, eyes not leaving the screen. “Are we doing anything with it? It hasn’t gotten in my way so far.”
“You want to keep it?” John asked in disbelief. The kitten was disappointed with the lack of attention it was getting and jumped off the sofa, heading towards the fireplace. As it did so, John noticed a clump missing from its otherwise furry hind leg.
“Oh, OK, I see. You’re willing to feed a strange animal if you think it’s mine, so long as you can experiment on it anyways?”
Sherlock said nothing, pretending to ignore both the question and the small animal now sniffing at his toes.
“We have to get rid of it - you’re gonna kill it. It’s inhumane to take in a stray just so you can kill it.”
“I’m not going to kill the cat, John. Look, it slept for two whole hours and it’s perfectly fine.”
John sat down on the clear side of the sofa, taking a deep breath to calm himself, and stood up again with a jolt.
“Did your cat pee on our sofa!?”
“It’s not ‘my’ cat, John, and I already cleaned it up.”
“It’s - this is your responsibility, Sherlock! If I find pee on anything else - you're taking care of that thing, or I’m finding it a home where it isn’t going to killed, by either of us. And make sure it doesn’t pee on any more furniture!” John added, storming out of the room.
Sherlock looked down at the little animal now pawing at his feet for food or attention.
“You’re not my cat,” he said again to the kitten, turning his attention back to the computer screen - but not before showing the animal the small saucer of milk that he'd already had prepared.