#done.

"I can carry Kuu if you want!" Rock volunteered, craning his neck around to look at Kuu.

"She likes Jyugo best, so he has to do it," Uno insisted. "We can't let any slip-ups happen."

Their escape had been going far more slowly as everyone's attention was fixated on the cat.

Yes, because cats were cute. And also because Kuu was now bright yellow.

She'd gotten caught in a paint trap Uno had sprung in their latest breakout. And now Cell 13 were truly running for their lives, Hajime right on their tails.

"You little shits, get back into your fucking cell!" Hajime shouted after them. They took a turn. Then another turn. Trying to block Hajime's line of sight as much as possible. So far, he seemed to have not noticed Kuu's strange new coat. Now if they could just make it to the laundry room to clean the paint off-

"Gotcha!" a vice closed down on Jyugo's shoulder. He was being spun around before he even processed anything. "What the hell happened?!"

"It was Nico!" Uno lied. "He's gotten that color-change thing again."

Nico pouted angrily at him. "I don't even have Hair-Color-Change Disease during this time of year."

"Then why's your hair suddenly so stiff and wiry?"

"Because-"

"Anyone with eyes can see it's paint," Hajime sighed, reached for Kuu. "You're lucky I install the non-toxic kind. Let's get you washed up-"

Kuu yowled, digging her claws onto Jyugo's uniform and refusing to let go.

"You put paint cans in trap doors for us to be hit with, and you make sure the paint is non-toxic?" Rock said, possibly feeling left out by not having said anything.

Jyugo, trying to dislodge Kuu, stumbled back a step and bumped into Nico. Their heads knocked against each other.

"Uwah!" Nico squeaked. A cloud of smoke went up. As it cleared, Jyugo's head felt weirdly heavy. Kuu looked up at him, fur on end.

"What?" Jyugo asked, his tongue clumsy and brushing against now-sharp teeth. Kuu hissed and scrambled away. Traitor, a part of him mourned.

The rest of him was focused on whatever Nico had inflicted on him. Everyone was also staring at him, so it must be bad.

This felt similar, actually.

He brought a hand up to his face. Prodded his cheek. And found a furry snout.

Cat Head Syndrome.

"Hajime! You need to take me to the medical office right now!"

Hajime looked at him blankly. "No. We're taking you all back to your cell first."

"WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU. I NEED TO BE FIXED RIGHT NOW."

Jyugo squirmed uselessly as Hajime grabbed him by the scruff of his neck, adding insult to injury.

"Nothing's fixing whatever's wrong with the inside," Uno snickered. Then yelped as Hajime knocked a fist into his head.

----

"So, what do you think about your Supervisor?" Mitsuru prodded, sitting opposite them for the New Year's Tournament interview. This hadn't been there last year either. They really were pulling out all the stops here.

The others' responses were quick:

“Boo! A cheating brutish gorilla.”

“1 out of 10 stars, do not recommend.”

“He’s so annoying!”

Jyugo inhaled, and thought.

Hajime was many things. A pain in the ass, easy to mess with, irritating beyond belief. But between it all, he was ... reliable.

Reliable in the way that he was fixated on one task. A Sisyphean task that Jyugo intended to oppose at every turn, even as he trusted Hajime to always be there to fall back on. Because no matter what terrible thing Jyugo found himself trapped in, Hajime would pull the tone away from being oppressively bleak, and take Jyugo back to Building 13's Cell 13.

Not that he would say anything lame like that in this interview.