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Morgana hadn’t known what to think when Akira had started to get sick, but Ryuji’s concern had started to get to him. So he had been glad when she had finally gotten time to go to the doctor.
He hadn’t expected Akira and Ryuji to come home, a little pale for both of their parts but smiling. Hanging onto each other with nervous excitement tugging at his fur. He hadn’t understood how someone so sick could come home looking so bright.
He certainly hadn’t expected Akira to say that she was pregnant. Very nonchalant. Sometimes, Morgana thought, they forgot that he wasn’t a real cat. Pregnant! Sure, he could guess what they got up to in their spare time when he was kicked out of the bedroom, but pregnant! There was going to be a baby?
He hadn’t been sure, but he didn’t think he liked babies. They were loud, they were annoying, they slept so much and still managed to attract all the attention. He didn’t want to say that he liked having Akira and Ryuji’s attention. He was just saying that, even after Akira had gotten married to Ryuji, it had been a weird adjustment. A baby? No, just no.
How would they even have time to take care of a baby! And what if, somehow, the Metaverse ended up coming back? (It was a conversation he had wandered in on them having. Every possibility planned for.) (Would their son or daughter have the power of Persona, too?) (Hopefully they never had to find out.)
And when Goro was born– Goro, yeah, after that Goro; Morgana had liked the name better than Ryuji had, it had been a source of argument between the two of them for awhile, both him and Akira and him and Morgana– Morgana was proven right: lots of crying. Lots of annoyance. There was really nothing like being jerked awake by a shrieking cry in the middle of the night; it was the sort of noise that put his fur on end even from the other side of the house. No thanks.
And Goro did get all the attention. It was… difficult not to be bitter, really, but he tried. Akira was happy. Even Ryuji was happy. Stressed and looking overly tired and even more forgetful– and once when they’d forgotten to feed Morgana, he hadn’t let them forget it– but happy. So that was what mattered. Right.
Still, giving up his spot in Akira’s lap while they watched movies once a week was kind of a bad deal, wasn’t it? It wasn’t like he was going to sit in Ryuji’s or something.
He wasn’t immediately introduced to Goro and he hadn’t been offended by it. From the crying, and how… delicate they seemed to think he was, Morgana wasn’t sure he wanted to be near the kid. What if he hurt him or something? He didn’t want to, infringing on his territory asides, but what if he accidentally did ? Again: no thanks.
A few weeks on, though, when the crying had lessened maybe a little and Goro was sleeping through most of the night (Akira said it was a miracle, and Morgana didn’t know how to gauge it so), Morgana jumped up to the dresser and padded to the edge closest to Goro’s crib. He still hadn’t met him, not properly.
And he was so small . Was he supposed to be that small? If he was this small now, how small had he been when they had first brought him home all swaddled in blankets? He really did look fragile. No wonder Akira and Ryuji spent so much time taking care of him.
“Must be nice to be a baby,” he muttered. “Joker didn’t even fuss over me that much, and I’m a cat.” Goro didn’t wake from his nap, and Morgana stretched forward to put his paws on the side of the crib. “You don’t have to do anything and you get all the attention. Huh.” A little more understandable now that he was actually looking at him, though. It would be a long time before this kid would be able to do anything for himself, he was just too tiny. Seriously, did all babies look like that?
Goro had Akira’s hair color, just a little bit of dark hair with equally dark eyes. Although he guessed that was Ryuji’s hair color too. As for anything else Goro might have gotten from Ryuji… he couldn’t tell. Maybe it’d become apparent as he got older. Maybe he would end up looking like neither of them. Kids were weird.
But cute.
… yeah, okay, really cute. He wouldn’t tell anyone he thought that.
He leaned in a little closer, and then he paws slipped right off the side and he went falling into the crib. “W–Woah!” He still managed to land on his feet, nowhere near landing on the kid but his heart was still pounding. Goro hadn’t even moved. Morgana glanced towards the bedroom door and then inched forward, shoulders low and head outstretched.
Everything smelled overwhelmingly like baby powder, but it wasn’t necessarily a bad smell. And he could hear Goro’s soft little breaths as he napped, and maybe he could start to understand why they paid him so much attention… small and fragile and soft and warm… Morgana sat down next to him and wrapped his tail around his paws. Maybe he’d watch him, just for a little bit. God knew this kid needed it right now, and who was better at protecting people than he was? Come on, he’d started the Phantom Thieves! He was reliable! He could handle this! Definitely.
“Hey.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothin’, just look.”
Akira hummed a laugh as she joined Ryuji at the crib; Morgana was curled up and asleep, his tail draped neatly around a sleeping Goro.
“So much for being jealous, huh.”
“He was just nervous,” Akira clarified. She reached down to smooth down Goro’s blanket, and to pass a hand over the ruffled bits of Morgana’s fur. “I knew he’d be okay with him once he gave it a chance.”
“He’s a bit like a kid himself, really. Just… with fur, and ears.”
“Our two children.”
“Don’t let him hear you say that.”
Akira laughed and motioned Ryuji out of the room, taking his hand as they went.