Chapter Text
For the third time in as many hours, Kylo questioned his own intelligence. He generally did not mind life as a vampire - even enjoyed it most of time - but this evening he was doubting the choice he made almost a decade ago. It was only days ago that he had learned the extent to which he’d been manipulated into that choice, which led to his poorly thought-out decision to kill Snoke without any sort of plan whatsoever .
To some this made him the clear choice as a new leader, to others an obvious target. He’d never managed to make many friends, so there were far more of the latter. When he arrived home earlier that evening, he noticed immediately that someone had disturbed the subtle traps he kept in the entrance, but instead of turning around as soon as he noticed anything was amiss, he decided he could take whomever was waiting for him. It turned out that several someones were waiting for him, and though he fought well, he took a beating.
In the end, he made the questionable choice to shift into a bat and fly out the open window. On one hand, it worked; not many vampires could shift, so he escaped unpursued. On the other hand...he had misjudged his own injuries and how much strength he had left so he found himself trapped as a bat - unable to shift until his injuries healed.
All of which brought him to his current predicament: hobbling near the entrance of a dark alley, too weak to fly, pursued by a mangy looking cat. Kylo Ren, vampire prince, was about to meet his end as dinner for an underfed stray.
“What are you after over there?” A woman’s voice called above him, “Is that...a bat?” The voice came again, scaring away the cat. “Oh run off and find something else for your dinner.” The woman’s voice was much closer now, as she knelt down while he hopped awkwardly away from her. “You’re hurt aren’t you?”
His left leg was injured - possibly broken - and he could tell he had at least a couple of broken ribs, some cuts and scrapes, and on top of it all he was exhausted. He struggled, moving slowly, trying to make his way further into the alley until he found himself suddenly wrapped in cloth of some sort and being lifted uncomfortably off the ground. The cloth trapped him and the woman’s hands aggravated his injuries painfully, as he thrashed and screamed - well, squeaked .
“Look I’m not very well going to leave you here hurt, for the next cat or dog or whatever that comes along, so you might as well accept that you’re coming with me and cut this nonsense out or I’ll have to make you a burrito like I did when I helped trim BB’s nails.”
He calmed a little. She had a point - in his current form she was considerably larger and stronger - he really had no choice but to let her carry him wherever she was planning. In any case, she seemed to be making an effort to hurt him as little as possible. Hopefully she planned to release him somewhere safer.
“BB-8’s a cat though,” she continued, even though she had no reason to think he could understand a word, “so we called him a purrito when we wrapped him up. I guess you would be a bat-rito?” She laughed a little to herself and Kylo tried his best to muster a withering glare at the gall of this woman, a total stranger, picking him up without permission in what appeared to be her jacket and comparing him to someone’s pet.
He must have dozed a little as she carried him, because he woke in an unfamiliar place. His leg had been wrapped inexpertly, and he was in a dimly lit room lying on some threadbare towels in a shallow box. He must have been more out of it than he realized earlier, to have slept through being bandaged and moved around.
The woman’s muffled voice came from another room, he noticed, so presumably this was her home. Her bedroom, he thought, observing his surroundings in a bit more detail: a modest room in light colors with a few photos and a couple of tiny succulents on the dresser, some clothes thrown across a chair, and a large bed piled with more blankets than any human could possibly need. A light floral scent lingered throughout the room, and he vaguely remembered her jacket smelling the same.
Kylo took a moment to think about his predicament. He had only ever been stuck as a bat twice before, but it was enough to know what to expect. His injuries would heal on their own but it would take an entire week, and in the meantime he needed to be careful. As he was reminded earlier that night, he was more vulnerable as a bat, but at least this gave him an odd reprieve from looking over his shoulder. It was unlikely his enemies knew his situation, and even if they did it was hardly feasible for them to hunt down every bat in the city.
He tested his limits a little, trying to move around in the box, but was still in considerable pain, especially from his ribs. There was no way he was going to be flying until he was a little more healed. Footsteps coming into the room snapped him out of his thoughts as the woman approached him slowly.
“Well it’s good news from doctor Google, my tiny friend!” She reached for him as she continued, “Looks like bacitracin is probably safe for you, so we’re going for it.”
No one had ever called him tiny in his entire life as far as he could remember. More concerningly he absolutely did not need or want any more amateur medical care from strange women. He tried to squirm away, squeaking his displeasure, but she got around that by picking up the whole towel and wrapping him up gently with a sigh while he carried on.
“This would all be so much easier if you could just understand that I’m only trying to help. I can look after you for a little while and then when you’re better, I can take you out to the park one evening and you can go back to your happy little bat life.” He stilled.
Now that was a thought. He was going to be stuck as a bat for the next week one way or another, and it would mean more pain and more hassle to escape. Wouldn’t it be easier to just go along with it? Whatever medicine she wanted to put on him wouldn’t really help or hurt so it didn’t matter much that she didn’t know what she was doing. The window in her room was tiny, and at an angle that wouldn’t let in much in the way of direct sun, so as long as she didn’t sit his...box...right beside it he should be safe on that front. He would have a safe place to recover, then he could slip away as soon as he was healed, leaving her none the wiser. Just as he was mentally applauding his own cleverness, he was placed on a countertop, towel and all. He forced himself to be still while she bustled around near him.
“You may not like this, but it will help! At least it should,” the woman said. As she began to dab at his scrapes with a cotton swab covered in ointment, he pondered the indignity of this whole situation.
“Oh you have no idea,” He couldn’t speak in his current state, but he hoped his squeaking conveyed just how much he did not like this .
For the third time in as many days, Rey was walking to the bus station in the dark. She was exhausted, and her eyes burned from reading, but the sense of accomplishment she felt outweighed the discomfort. This week, she’d had not one, but two late submissions from authors and Kaydel Connix, the production editor, had insisted on a quick turnaround. Tonight, she’d finished the last one with minutes to spare, sent a check-in email to Connix, and bolted out the door to catch her bus home.
It was while she was rushing down the sidewalk that she stumbled upon a tiny black nugget of fluff hobbling its way across the sidewalk, pursued by a wiry grey cat. Her deep affection for all things fluffy led her to stop in her tracks, curious about what this hungry thing could be after.
“What are you after over there?” She walked closer, hovering over the cat, who was too distracted by its prospective dinner that it didn’t even notice her approach. The tiny fluff-ball moved, unfurling a set of equally tiny wings. “Is that...a bat?” Her voice, louder with her nearer proximity, must have been enough to scare away the cat, because it bolted across the alley, leaving Rey with the seemingly injured bat. “Oh, run off and find something else for your dinner.”
She knelt down next to the bat, watching it struggle to claw its way farther into the alley and away from her. “You’re hurt, aren’t you?” Poor thing. She sat back on her heels and pulled off her jacket, tentatively reaching down to wrap it around the bat before tucking it into her chest. The bat squeaked in distress, attempting to squirm out of her arms, and she rolled her eyes.
“Look I’m not very well going to leave you here hurt for the next cat or dog or whatever that comes along so you might as well accept that you’re coming with me and cut this nonsense out or I’ll have to make you a burrito like I did when I helped trim BB’s nails.”
The squirming ceased at her words, almost as if he - she? What pronouns do you use for a bat? How can you tell what...gender they are? - were calmed by her voice. She decided to continue talking, hoping to keep the little creature calm as they walked down the sidewalk towards the bus stop.
“BB-8’s a cat though,”she continued, “so we called him a purrito when we wrapped him up. I guess you would be a bat-rito?” She chuckled to herself. Damn. I crack myself up. She looked down to see a pair of deep brown eyes staring up at her from the nest of fabric in her arms. If she didn’t know any better, she’d think the bat was rolling its eyes at her. Well little friend, get used to it. You’ll have to deal with me for at least a few days. It was a Friday evening, so she’d be home for the weekend and hopefully able to get the bat mostly patched up before having to leave it to go to work.
As she approached the bus stop, the squirming ceased entirely, and she looked down to see the bat dozing in her arms. She wrapped him up a little tighter as she took the steps onto the bus, flashing her pass that was hooked to the pocket of her slacks.
She looked around conspicuously, hoping that no one would notice the small animal bundled in her jacket. She locked eyes with an elderly woman sitting towards the back of the bus and quickly looked away. Shit. She knows. I’m gonna get kicked off this bus. Shit. She hurriedly sat down in a window seat, and took a deep breath. Chill out, Rey. It’s not like you’re smuggling drugs. It’s literally just a bat.
She sat still for the entire ride to her building, hoping that the bat would continue to sleep and absolutely not move. The ride was blessedly short, and she was able to hop off the bus and into her building without waking her tiny companion. She shifted it to one arm gingerly while she unlocked the door and threw her keys on the counter.
Rey’s apartment was nothing special, but the relief of being home after a long (and relatively shitty) day, washed through her as she wandered into her bedroom to find a shoe box for the bat. After a few minutes of fishing through her closet with one hand, she pulled one out. She stuffed some towels in the box and fluffed them around for the little creature until she felt satisfied that it looked comfortable before she lowered the bat down, making sure it was nice and cozy. His wounds were still bleeding a little, so she did what she felt made the most sense, and grabbed some gauze from her bathroom.
He was still fast asleep as Rey walked back into her bedroom and held his little body while gently wrapping the bandages around his injured leg. When she was satisfied with her haphazard nursing job, she wandered back to her living room to consult with Google.
A few minutes later, she had figured out that her bat-friend was in fact male, and that it was probably safe to use bacitracin on the tiny scrapes that were visible. The only problem was she could not for the life of her remember where she had placed the only tube she had in her possession.
As she searched through the cabinet under her sink, she heard her phone start to trill from the other room. Wow. That’s a sound I haven’t heard in a while. She’d been drowning in work lately, and since most of her close friends had moved away after college, most of her evenings had been spent with The Voice and Survivor as her main source of company. Rose’s name flashed across the screen and Rey’s heart rate picked up just a little. It had been a while since she’d talked to her friend, and the prospect of company, even digitally, was exciting.
She tucked her hair behind her ear as she answered the call, smiling hugely as Rose’s face flashed up on the screen.
“Hey Rose! How are you?” She was practically squealing with excitement.
“I’m great! LA has been FABULOUS. The weather is great, the new job is great, but I miss you! How are things back home?”
Rey rolled her eyes a little at the thought of how absolutely unexciting her life was right now. “Well, you know how it is. You have to start at the bottom to get to the top, so I’m currently drowning in grunt work. It’s fine though.” She shrugged noncommittally, not wanting to worry Rose with her general anxiety about the future of her career.
“Is your boss still kind of a jerk?” Rose asked knowingly.
“I wouldn’t say she’s a jerk ,” Rey replied, “but her deadlines have definitely kept me working late.” Rey’s eyebrows raised, as she attempted to change the subject. “OH! I did a cool thing today!” Maybe it was sad how excited Rey was about her “bat adventure,” but hey, it broke the monotony of the day-to-day routine. She walked down the short hallway to her room, and turned her camera around to face the shoe box that held the bat. “Look how cute he is!”
Rose did not match Rey’s excitement. Instead, her expression bordered on disgust. “Oh my god, Rey is that a bat ?” Her nose crinkled, and she shook her head.
Rey refused to be phased. “Yeah! Isn’t he adorable? I found him on the way home, and he was hurt so I…” She stopped talking as Rose cut her off.
“Rey, that thing could have rabies ! What the hell?”
“Oh, shit, I didn’t even think about that.”
“Yeah! I mean, it’s great that you rescued him and all, but don’t you think you should take him to a vet or something?”
“I’ll look into the rabies thing, but he’s so cute! And he looks so comfy! I don’t want to move him yet. I looked it up, and I think bacitracin should be okay for him.” Rey felt confident in her ability to handle his injuries. How hard can it be? Plus, she was not exactly in a good enough financial spot to foot a vet bill for a bat.
“You always were into the whole ‘Good Samaritan’ thing. Just be careful.” Rose’s eyes focused on something off-screen and her eyebrows raised. “Oh, hey. My food just got here. I’m gonna go scarf down some lunch before I meet my afternoon client. Talk soon, okay?”
Rey knew that “soon” probably meant a few weeks, but she couldn’t blame Rose for being busy. She plastered on a smile, and said, “Yeah, totally. Talk soon.”
She looked at the blank screen for a moment after Rose hung up before throwing her phone on the bed. Well, back to my search . The promise of a distraction drove her to fish through her junk drawer in the kitchen where she finally found her nearly empty tube of bacitracin. “This should do it,” she muttered to herself as she walked back to her room to tend to the bat.
“Well, it’s good news from doctor Google, my tiny friend!” She reached down to pick him up, noticing that his eyes were finally open. “Looks like bacitracin is probably safe for you, so we’re going for it.”
He wiggled in her hands, clearly attempting to get free. This was all so much easier when he was sleeping, but it was good to see him conscious. “This would all be so much easier if you could just understand that I’m only trying to help. I can look after you for a little while and then when you’re better, I can take you out to the park one evening and you can go back to your happy little bat life.” He went still in her hands. Oh, okay then.
She held him with one hand while she felt around for the cotton swabs that she’d brought in with the tube of bacitracin. “You may not like this, but it will help. At least it should,” she said, hoping that continuing to speak would keep him subdued and still while she worked.
Except it didn’t, because the squeaking started up again the second she touched a cotton swab to the wounds on his body.