Dec 30, 2012

So this was my most popular story on FF before they began enforcing their no MA rule. I was devastated to leave it behind with over 1400 reviews. Since YFF has gone under and I continue to receive so many lovely PMs from people looking for and requesting this story, I am now moving it back and hope that people will enjoy it and not report it for adult content, though in actuality, this fic is mild compared to some of the other stories that are posted here on FF.

If you read and reviewed before, I would love to hear from you again. If you haven't reviewed before, please do.

For all of you who were with me on that first wild ride and faithfully followed the evolution of this neko tale, I am going to post the Author's Notes in their original form, as you were all so much a part of the original story.

May 12, 2012,

So this story is finished. Hooray! If you are just joining, Welcome! Hope that no matter when you start this fic, you'll consider leaving me some feedback. Just so you know, the first twelve chapters are hurt more or less and then the story slides into comfort. It goes back and forth from there, anyway. Hope you enjoy it!

Disclaimer: I do not own Junjou Romantica or any of its characters.

Note: Some occasional OOC... Well, yeah, it's Neko land. Adjustments had to be made.

Neko-Hiro

Chapter One: Master

Hiroki burst through the door, panting. He looked at his watch again for about the fiftieth time in the last ten minutes.

Shit.

He was going to end up being unprepared and late again like he had been the day before if he wasn't careful. Remembering the consequences of that, his tail began to twitch nervously and he felt his ears droop.

After taking off his shoes, he hung his things up by the door. Then he slipped into the bathroom and in there, slipped out of his clothes; putting the dirty ones in the hamper; carefully folding the others and putting them on a hanger and returning this to its holder on the back of the door.

As he shrugged off his shirt, he still felt stiff, though thankfully not as bad as he had that morning. The pain in his shoulders and his backside had almost affected his ability to give his lectures and that would have been terrible. Although there were times that his students annoyed him with their thick-headedness, he really enjoyed teaching and was immensely grateful his new master still allowed him to do it.

Sometimes, when his pupils were particularly obtuse, he wished he could reprimand them properly, but he was only a neko after all. He was really quite lucky actually that he had as much control over his class as he did. That they were so well behaved spoke highly of him as a teacher. Not many hybrids got to teach, especially at a college level, and even more particularly, mixed human and hybrid classes. He'd known a number who'd tried and had to give up because their human students refused to respect them.

He'd even heard of one poor hybrid professor who had been beaten and then gang raped by his class. The thought made Hiroki shudder.

Yes, he was fortunate indeed, at least in this one aspect of his life, even more so recently. The manager of the Languages and Arts division at M University, Dean Takatsuki, had called him in for an unexpected meeting yesterday afternoon and he hadn't dared refuse.

It turned out to be a good thing too. There the Dean informed him that he been selected for promotion. Next semester he would also be leading more than just the introductory classes and would be able to finally teach in an area of his interest. Not only had he been promoted however, but he was also going to be an assistant to a senior professor as well. This meant he would be much more secure in his job at "M" University and safer too.

That is, if master allows me to accept the promotion.

Perhaps unwisely, he had already accepted a meeting with his new supervisor next week, Miyagi was his name. Hiroki hoped Miyagi was agreeable.

Though he had been at his post for two years, Hiroki spent so much time on his classes and at his home (like most hybrids who were allowed to work) he'd never socialized much. For this reason, there were many faculty at the large University, even within his own department, like Miyagi, he had never met. Still, he had heard many students speak highly of the senior professor, so he knew Miyagi was a good teacher.

Unfortunately this didn't offer him any clues as to how the man felt about nekos, or how he would respond to having a hybrid junior.

Hiroki turned and looked at his back in the mirror. The sight of all the red welts on his bare shoulders and the angry bruises on the cheeks of his backside made his ears flatten even further.

The professorial neko still didn't feel he'd deserved such a beating. He wished he'd had a chance to explain to his master why he'd been late with dinner last night but the man had been so mad he had forbidden him to speak at all.

Realizing he was wasting time with this reverie, and not wanting a repeat of the previous evening, Hiroki set these thoughts to the side. He had only been with this new master for a few months and had been almost constantly in trouble. It didn't help that the man was difficult to please.

Hiroki began hurriedly preparing himself. He took two enemas out of the cupboard under the sink and used one after the other to make sure he was clean on the inside.

Then he jumped quickly into the shower being careful that every other part that his master specified was attended to correctly. Once he was out, he put in the nipple rings that he'd been instructed to wear and replaced the lighter piercing in his cock with the heavy ring that had been laid out for him on the counter of the sink.

The piercings were relatively new and they were still painful. It didn't help that his owner had a penchant for twisting them. Still, Hiroki supposed he should be grateful that his master did not demand that he wear the nipple adornments or the weighted cock ring outside of the apartment, since they would have been visible under his clothes.

That would certainly wouldn't help me maintain the respect of my students... having my pupils know so clearly that I am someone's 'sex pet.'

Looking at himself in the mirror again now, a hot blush of humiliation rise into Hiroki's cheeks. He despised the body jewelry. He reminded himself his master hated it when he blushed. Unfortunately, this just made his color intensify.

Dropping his gaze from his reflection, Hiroki replaced his lighter work collar with the uncomfortable heavy, stiff, black leather one he was forced to wear whenever he was at home. It rubbed the base of his neck fiercely and he knew that eventually the chafe marks it was making on his sensitive skin would scar.

Perhaps this will remind me of how stupid I was for running away.

The shame of his disgraceful past actions filled him. Hot tears well up in Hiroki's eyes and his tail wrapped itself sadly around one of his legs.

Before this new master, Hirokihad lived for yearswith the heir to the multinational Usami Corporation and novelist, Usami Akihiko.

Akihiko had bought him when he was just out of kittenhood. Actually, they had first become friends when they were both ten years-old after meeting one day in a secret place on the wooded Usami estate where they both went to hide. Hiroki's breeder's own estate was nearby and he was always slipping off to escape his rambunctious litter-mates.

They had bonded with each other, too young at the time to fully understand how truly different they were and how society had its paths for each of them already immutably established. Despite, or perhaps because of this, Akihiko had bought Hiroki as soon as he was of legal age to be sold, which for individual hybrid ownership was age eighteen.

There were many illegal operations that trafficked in hybrids at much younger ages, however. And common breeds of the genetic human/animal mixes, for low skilled labor positions, could also be purchased for work at the age of twelve by factories and corporations. Though these purchases were generally made from large commercial breeding operations.

Usami had brokered the deal with Hiroki's breeder sometime before his companion came of age, to ensure that no one else would buy the cinnamon-haired hybrid. Actually Hiroki's breeder had been only too happy to sell the Kamijou kitten then. She had been worried that she was going to have a hard time placing the incredibly intelligent neko, as he was moody in his brilliance and given to periodic tantrums.

He also didn't socialize well and liked reading entirely too much. And while the Kamijou breed was known for its pride, Hiroki's pride as he grew had become a precarious thing.

Once he'd become officially Akihiko's property, not too much in their relationship really changed. As an owner, Akihiko was always very lenient with his pet. He allowed his curious neko to read as much as he wanted, even encouraged him go to college and have his own job. He honored his hybrid by offering Hiroki the opportunity to proofread his novels for him before they went to his human editor.

In fact, Akihiko rarely treated Hiroki like a pet and only made him wear a collar for his own protection when he went out. Yes, for all the years he'd had kept him, Akihiko regarded Hiroki as he had when they were children: if not entirely as an equal, at least more or less as a friend.

Unfortunately, this was not enough for Hiroki.

Even with all these rarities, he wanted more. He longed to be Akihiko's lover too, to experience the feel of his master's flesh. But more than being a 'sex pet' Hiroki desired above all things for Akihiko to truly love him. Secretly he'd loved Akihiko from the time they first met, but Akihiko never cared for him in that way and instead fell in love with another neko.

For a long time there had been strict rules in Japan that an individual citizen could not own more than one neko, only specially licensed breeders or companies using neko labor could have multiple feline hybrids. A viral outbreak had decimated the population world-wide some decades earlier and so, for many years, there just weren't enough nekos to go around.

During this time Akihiko had seen a Takahashi breed neko named Takahiro in a shop and fell completely in love with him at first sight. Hiroki knew this because he'd had the misfortune of being out with Akihiko at the time.

It had been crushing to witness.

After that, Akihiko went to see the sweet stupid Takahashi neko at the shop every day. Hiroki had worried that Akihiko would take him to a shelter, so he could adopt Takahiro, but he hadn't. Akihiko had been faithful to him. Akihiko had been heartbroken, however, when some woman finally bought the simple-minded Takahashi cat.

He'd tried to help Akihiko get over it. Despite the pain of his unrequited love, the cinnamon hybrid wished to please his master/friend, far more than he knew had been already programmed into his genes, somewhere under his recalcitrant temperament.

This time of grief for Akihiko had coincided with the start of a neko heat season. Hiroki convinced his owner not to lock him up as he usually did when his pet was going through one of his "heat" cycles. (Though they could not conceive, there was a genetic quirk that caused uke, male nekos to go into heat once a year like a female, though lady nekos cycled twice.)

After persuading Akihiko be blindfolded and assured his master/friend he'd pleasure him as well any skilled sex pet. He even offered to pretend to be the Takahashi neko so that Akihiko, in his sightlessness, could pretend he was touching the neko he loved.

With this arrangement, Hiroki had been happy too that he would not have to go through yet another agonizing celibate heat alone and unfulfilled. He'd also had held the egotistical hope that this plan might entice Akihiko to finally love him.

But it didn't work.

And in the end, it only damaged them both: Akihiko, because he longed for his real love even more and Hiroki because he knew at last Akihiko would never love him.

Now the virus had been under control for some time and in Japan, nekos were mandatorily vaccinated for it yearly, along with their rabies and distemper. Due to a swing in the Nippon neko population pendulum as a result of the virus's containment, the one neko rule for private citizens had been lifted just two years before.

Though he knew this, Hiroki had been shocked six months ago to come home from work and find that Akihiko had, without telling him, brought home a kitten. A lovely young chocolate neko with huge green eyes.

Its name was Misaki.

Misaki vacillated between states of brashness and shyness that seemed to entrance Akihiko. Hiroki secretly thought the kitten was nothing more than a terrible tease. Still, he'd supposed he might eventually get used to the horribly cute brat, until he found out that Misaki was also a Takahashi neko and, in fact, Takahiro's younger brother. Then he discovered Akihiko had also made a similar arrangement to buy Misaki as he had him, paying for Misaki before he came of age, even before the one-neko ban had been lifted.

That his unrequited had planned this secretly, devastated and Hierki lost the control he'd been holding on to so desperately. Finally, in a heated argument with Akihiko about this, the professorial hybrid had actually lashed out and scratched his master and then attacked the chocolate kitten who had been standing frozen next to him.

He had bitten Misaki badly before Akihiko finally pulled him off and ordered him in to room. There Akihiko locked his first pet away to cool off. Incensed by this further humiliation and at the same time overcome with his disgraceful loss of control, Hiroki decided then and there to run away and he had.

He'd left the collar with his hybrid registration number on it on the bed, took just a few of his things in a bag, climbed out the window, crawled onto the apartment balcony, and then, let himself out from the inside while Akihiko was taking Misaki to the vet.

Though his pride would never allow him to admit this, being a runaway neko was very frightening. Hiroki had never lived on his own before and it was illegal to be a stray. He'd kept going to work despite the fact he was a runaway, terrified each day that Akihiko would call Dean Takatsuki and tell his boss what he had done or show up at one of his classes to drag him home.

Akihiko never did.

This hurt Hiroki far worse than if Akihiko had done these things.

Out on the streets Hiroki made himself a collar and passable forged tag for going to work. He'd had some money, because Akihiko had always let him keep his paychecks, but he'd been forced to live on the streets anyways. It was rare for even emancipated hybrids to find independent housing and no one was going to rent to an illegal runaway neko.

Hiroki had managed for three months on his own.

It was hard having to grade by the light of street lamps and he'd almost been caught and beaten by true feral nekos a few times, but he been surviving. Then one night, there was a raid on the park he'd been camping out in and he and about fifteen other wild and runaway hybrids had been caught.

At the processing station at the Hybrid Humane Society, because he was still wearing a collar, even if it didn't have ID (fortunately his false tag had come off as he'd tried to escape), Hiroki been allowed one phone call.

He could have called Akihiko and his master would have probably come and picked him up, but the neko had his pride.

Instead, foolishly, thinking that he could somehow resolve the situation on his own, Hiroki had called and left a message for Dean Takatsuki, telling him that he had gotten a rare breakthrough heat cycle and would not be at work for at a week. Fortunately, it was almost spring break, so he would only miss a few classes.

Hiroki had thought this would give him enough time to clear up the mess he was in without anyone having to know. What he hadn't realized, however, was that he and the other captured neko hybrids were up for quick auction three days after being caught, after a checkup and vaccinations, because now there were so many nekos all of the hybrid shelters had reached their capacity in term of neko quota. Hiroki had been shocked to learn this, but by then it was too late. He was not allowed any more phone calls.

Being put on the auction block had been a horrible experience.

It was standard for pets at auction to be naked so that their potential owners could see what they were buying. Coming from a private breeder, and purchased as he was, the cinnamon neko had never had to endure such a degrading experience before.

Despite his animal ancestry, Hiroki had always been rather private about his body. To be revealed in this way and then openly scrutinized dealt a severe blow to his pride. That most of the people there to buy the bargain nekos were a rough lot didn't make things any better.

While some of the other runaway nekos had tried to act cute and submissive despite this, in the hopes of brokering favor, Hiroki found he could not help but scowl and hiss. His ears pinned back, his tail fluffed.

Seeing this, the auctioneer declared him a true feral, who would need someone with a keen interest in training/taming to control "the fiery Kamijou cat."

Hiroki's pride had fallen further when only two people bid on him. But he tried to rationalize that, in addition to being labeled feral, he was also well into his twenties, far past the point when nekos were considered cute. Not to mention most people preferred getting kittens so they could train them to fit their specific needs.

But under these rationalizations, Hiroki had also secretly come to believe during his time with Akihiko that there was something essentially flawed and undesirable about him. Otherwise wouldn't his master/friend have come to love him or at least wanted to use him properly, given the number of years they had known each other?

Having his suspicions affirmed in this way at the auction had been particularly painful.

In the end he was finally sold and Hiroki had been relieved that it was the nicer looking of the two men bidding on him who bought him. Things seemed even better when helearned he was to be the man's pet and was not being shipped off to work in a brothel or some dank factory.

On the way home, the man had told him that he was training to be a doctor and worked in the children's ward at a nearby hospital.

Hiroki was rather impressed as the man seemed young to be already so involved in such a demanding career track. When he'd told his new owner in exchange that he was a Junior Professor of Literature at M University he was delighted that the man immediately declared that he could keep working.

Hiroki had felt his spirits rise for the first time in months.

His new owner had laughed and teased him all the way home and while it was slightly annoying, Hiroki thought that this new arrangement might not be too bad after all. It also offered him some hope that, since his new owner seemed to be an agreeable man, he might still be able to find a way out of his terrible situation and back to Akihiko.

It had not taken Hiroki long, however, once they reached his new master's apartment to realize just how premature that hope had been.

With his heavy collar on and his piercings in place, Hiroki undertook the last part of his nightly preparation.

He took the tube of greasy lube out of the bottom drawer of the vanity and prepared his orifice for its nightly abuse. He winced as his finger went in, he was still so sore from last night, despite uke nekos fast, natural recovery abilities for this passage.

Even so, he was glad that he was finally being allowed to slick himself before entry. Kamijou uke nekos, unlike some other neko breeds, only self-lubricated near or during their heat cycles and when his new owner had first started taking him, the only lubricant he'd had was the man's spit and the blood from his own torn tissues.

Finally ready, Hiroki went out into the kitchen to begin making dinner.

Naked under the apron he wore, the neko trembled as he waited for his meal to finish baking. He had prepared every dish that his master had ordered. Still, he wasn't a very good cook, or housekeeper for that matter. These qualities were expected to be standard in pets, but he'd never had to do those things when he'd lived with Akihiko: the author had a maid service he used periodically so that he and Hiroki could focus on their work and they had eaten take out almost every meal.

Hiroki's tears welled again and this time, begin to fall. He wiped them back with the oven mitt.

Ever since he was a kitten, he'd been accused of being an overly-emotional hybrid but it seemed like he cried so much more now. He knew he had to stop or he would have red eyes and a red nose when his master came home and that would make the man angry. His owner said when he looked like that he was even uglier than normal.

It was hard not to weep though. He had been punished every day since arriving in his new master's home for all his perceived shortcomings.

While, as a neko, maintaining his confidence had been a constant battle and his fierce pride was often a show, over the last few months, what little true self-esteem he'd had had been all but beaten and fucked out of him. The result of this was a very different Kamijou cat than Akihiko had known.

While he was desperately working to keep the horror of his new situation from becoming apparent at work, Hiroki was also trying very hard to be good and please his master. The places his new owner promised to sell him too if he didn't was more than enough to see to that.

No matter what he did, however, he always seemed to fail. Just the previous week, in fact, the man had yelled at him for being too submissive, for not being the challenge to break that he had been promised by the auctioneer and had threatened to take him into a shelter and have him put down. Hiroki had been curled into a ball on the floor at the time of this threat, absorbing the man's angry kicks as this was shouted this at him.

One might think that in such a situation, Hiroki would have simply called Akihiko and asked his old owner to forgive him and come and buy him back. In fact, there were numerous times at the university that his fingers had hovered over the buttons of the payphone in the hybrid lounge at the University.

However, the original Kamijou cats had been the pets of samurai and Hiroki held this fact in high esteem.

For this reason, he could not bring himself to beg. Likewise, in his mind, since he had dishonored himself and fled his true master, he believed he must endure the fate he now had. And when his new master had threatened him with death, he almost felt relieved. He had actually begun to wonder if death might not be preferable to his current situation. Accepting such a fate could almost be interpreted as a form of neko seppuku.

Instead of taking him to a shelter, however, the man had beat Hiroki severely and then done some other unspeakable things to him. As Hiroki took the last dish out of the oven, his hands trembled at this recollection. He forced them to steady and went to finish setting the table.

He set it for two people.

His stomach growled at him and he had to remind it that neither of these plates was for him. He only got to eat if he was fed by his master's hand or from his cracked dish on the floor if the man was too busy to take the time to do this, which seemed to happen often.

Though he had always been on the slender side, the professorial neko was much skinnier now after three months with his new owner. His master taunted him about this and said his thinness too made him unattractive, but that didn't mean he felt moved to feed Hiroki any more.

Tail swishing nervously, he studied the tall Western-style table, the two two place settings increasing his unease.

Everything was done, Hiroki took off the apron and put it away.

Maybe master is going to make me perform for one of his 'friends' like he did last week. Or even worse, sell me for the evening to someone again.

He was already giving his owner all of his paycheck, but the man said he needed more and had started pimping him out lately. Hiroki's empty stomach was suddenly too full with a heavy lump of fear.

Moving over to the ring by the door where his lead was attached, he clipped it on to his collar. Hiroki knelt down on the floor to wait for his owner to arrive home. The apartment was cold and Hiroki was chilled, as usual, but that was not the only reason that he was shaking.

Whew, so much background information. If you made it through this, I promise, the rest of the story reads much more easily.

Thank you for reading and reviewing!