The Animals Who Got Bigger
I drove home at a speed that stayed just shy of a traffic violation, and what waited in front of the wall was a box truck. The logo of the event company I'd hired for the day was plastered huge across its side.
Beside it stood two of the staff whose faces I'd caught, off and on, through So-eun's first-birthday party.
"Oh, you're here!"
I stopped the car in front of the house and stepped out to that welcome. I sent Noona and So-eun on inside, animals and all, and only then walked over to the staff.
"They in there?"
"Yes. We thought they might make a run for it, so... we shut them in for now."
I nodded, left Noona and So-eun with a word to go on into the house, and headed around to the back of the truck.
When the staff opened the door, three pigs lay sprawled across the floor inside, wallowing in how full they were. Not pigs. One cat, and two raccoons.
"You three..."
I shook my head at the wreckage they'd made. The baby snacks people had pressed on us for So-eun, and the animal treats they'd packed because we kept pets—all of it had been ransacked. Baby crackers and pet snacks alike, the plastic packaging was shredded to ribbons, as if someone had taken a knife to it, and whatever was left of the contents lay scattered across the floor of the truck. Those same crumbs, of course, were lodged in the fur of all three.
"Now's the time! Run for it!"
"We get outta this alive, hear!"
I was still standing there with my mouth open, too dumbfounded to speak, when the three animals flopped on the floor moved as one. Fast.
"And where do you think you're going!"
But my body had already been drilled by animals. I'd built speed just to keep up with Maru when she ran like something possessed, built the strength to haul Hanmu—a weight even a hardcore gym rat couldn't easily lift—and, thanks to cats forever lying in wait for a chance to torment me, I'd even picked up the reflexes.
I caught both raccoons in my arms as they kicked off to flee, and snatched Namcat by the scruff as he leapt like he meant to take to the sky.
"Gack!"
"Leggo! Let go!"
Stop!
Every target locked in place.
The three thrashing to escape my arms went still at a single magic word.
I let out a breath and shut them straight into a carrier. Turn them loose, and they'd run. That much was obvious. With the three secured, I turned at once to the event company's staff. They had started unloading the moment I caught the animals, and in no time the gifts piled in the truck were set down in front of the entryway.
"Thanks for the work."
"Oh, not at all."
They waved it off, and I paid them the amount we'd agreed on. Beaming, the staff were gone in a moment, and I was left staring at the carrier sitting there by itself.
"Out."
At my word, a tiny hand shot out from inside the carrier and started fiddling with the lock. A few twitches of those fingers, and the latch that had held the carrier firmly shut gave way with a click, utterly defeated.
"Run, and from here on it's a snack ban and nothing but bland kibble."
"Nnngh..."
At that, the three who had been about to bolt again sat themselves meekly on the ground. I looked over the ones who had given up on escape, then fetched the evidence and gave it a shake. The snack bag, slashed as if someone had taken a blade to it, rattled, and the few crumbs still clinging inside scattered into the air.
"Who did this."
I shook the tattered bag, and the three quietly averted their eyes. More precisely, one of them looked away, and the other two turned their gazes on him.
"Namcat. You little—"
"You traitorous bastards!"
Namcat sized up the situation and, just like that, drove a Nyangnyang Punch into the two raccoons. But these were raccoons who stole his snacks even while taking his hits, so they didn't look particularly shaken.
"We gotta stay alive first, don't we!"
They took the Nyangnyang Punch with their whole bodies—no. They blocked it, and they talked back. Naturally that only stoked Namcat hotter, and he tried to load more force into the next blow. That, however, remained nothing more than Namcat's hope.
"Mrow!"
Scruffed tight in my grip, Namcat licked the bridge of his nose and started reading my mood. He might have been the cat who could take down even an owl, but even he couldn't move properly with the scruff of his neck caught.
"What did you go all the way in there for? If you'd asked for something to eat, I would've given it to you."
"..."
At the question, Namcat rolled his eyes every which way and dodged answering. I had no intention of letting that pass.
"Be honest. Were you hungry, or did you just want to eat? I couldn't look after you while So-eun's first-birthday party was going on, but I stuffed you full before it started."
"..."
"Stay quiet, and you're banned from going anywhere near So-eun."
"Wasn't so much that I was hungry. I just wanted to eat..."
He wasn't Cheongho, but Namcat loved So-eun plenty in his own right. Told he'd be kept away from her, he spilled the truth without a moment's hesitation. I let out a small sigh at the sight of him and turned my eyes on the raccoons.
"W-we wanted to eat too, we did!"
Terrified they might be banned from So-eun as well, the raccoons confessed on the spot.
"What am I supposed to do with you."
At that, they turned their heads aside, as if they knew perfectly well they'd done wrong. And then something caught my eye.
"...What is this."
I couldn't believe I was seeing it right, so I reached out at once.
"Gyah! Where you grabbin'!"
"Mraaaow!"
Namcat and Daepodong, their belly fat suddenly filling my hands, startled hard. Namcat in particular let out that high scream only a cat can manage.
"...You've gotten fat."
Namcat's belly and Daepodong's were incredibly soft. No—that wasn't the point. There was more of it. Where I used to catch skin, I now felt as if I were gripping a wobbly water balloon. Looking closer, I'd been wrong to think their coats had grown in and made them look fuller. The fur hadn't grown. They'd put on fat, and it only looked as if the fur had.
"This won't do. You lot need to lose the weight."
Obesity was bad enough for people. There was no reason it should be any better for animals. On the chance the others had gotten fat too, I went straight into the house and started checking, pressing a hand to each belly in turn.
"Hm. You guys are fine."
Not a single dog had gone obese. With how much they moved, that was only natural—but even Natae, who never stirred and only ate, sat within a normal range. Aside from Namcat, the other cats, the geese, and the rabbits all carried a normal weight as well. The birds, who couldn't fly if they got fat, went without saying.
"...What are you doing?"
"Checking for obesity?"
"Hey!"
"Ack!"
Noona didn't have a scrap of extra fat on her either. What she did leave behind was a palm print across my back.
"Papa!"
"Mm. So-eun's cute, so she gets a pass."
So-eun's cheeks were a little full, but that only brought out how cute she was, so I decided to let it go. In the end, the only ones obese at present were Namcat and the two raccoons, Daepodong and Sopodong.
I set the three of them in front of me once more and made my declaration.
"Until you're back to a normal weight, snacks are banned. The feed I give you is going to be the weight-loss kind, too."
"What's that supposed to mean! No way!"
"Yeah! Hand over the snacks!"
"The weight'll come off in no time, so just the Churu...!"
The three latched onto my pant legs with their teeth and wouldn't let go, begging. But I meant to put them on a diet, if only for the sake of their health.
"Namcat. You know you've gotten pretty slow lately, right? Keep this up and you'll lose even to Yubu."
"Even so, me losing to that birdbrain is something that would never—"
"You sure? You used to be airborne. You've gotten heavy. Think you still can? Come to think of it, these days you take the stairs up to the second floor one step at a time, not two. Body too heavy for it?"
At my words Namcat looked as if he'd been physically struck, mouth hanging open in shock. The tip of his tongue had slipped out, and the impulse rose to give it a tug—I forced it back down. It was the raccoons' turn.
"You two can't stay up on your hind legs for long these days, can you? That's because you've gotten fat and your legs can't hold the weight. You're not planning to roll around later instead of walking on two feet, are you? Then you won't even be able to carry So-eun's rattle."
The raccoons looked just as shocked. Though, perhaps because they used their front paws as deftly as hands, they were poking and squishing at their own belly fat. And then the three of them, as if they'd rehearsed it, opened their mouths at the same time and shouted.
"Then we just have to lose it!"
Their diet had begun.
In a diet, controlling what went in mattered. Just as important was moving.
So I set about installing one large structure on the wide lawn of the cafe. A cat wheel—and one big enough that a person could climb inside and run.
"All right. From now on, you ride that every single day. Don't ride it, and there are no snacks."
Grumbling, Namcat, Daepodong, and Sopodong still made their way over. The three drew up to the fairly enormous wheel, climbed on together in rare harmony, and started stamping their feet to turn it. A low rattle rose from the bearings seated inside and beneath the wheel, taking the load and handling the spin, and their diet began in earnest.
"Master! I wanna ride it too!"
"...After they're done."
Maybe endless running simply looked wonderful and fun, because partway through, Maru took an interest. She looked ready to hurl herself at the wheel and run alongside them that very moment. And to the same degree that she found it interesting, the diet began to show results.
Daepodong and Sopodong's, especially, changed enough to see with your own eyes. True to names that all but meant plump, the two had been round and pudgy—and somewhere along the way they were showing off a sleek new line. Namcat, though, hadn't changed much. More precisely, he wasn't on a diet at all. He was simply holding steady, with a diet's name pasted over it.
People had a word for the kind of fighter who needed no special build, because the man himself was the strength. Namcat was that, in cat form. The cat himself was the strength—and for a creature like him, movement at this level didn't even count as exercise.
In the end, I had no choice but to bring out the last resort.
"Cheongho!"
Move them until their breath climbed all the way to their throats, and the effect would show at once. Cheongho had been looking a little bored lately anyway. This worked out.