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The Cat That Walked By Himself - 1/2
Feb. 2nd, 2013 08:54 amAuthor: Xanthe
Fandom: Suits
Pairings: Harvey/Mike
Rating: PG-13
Category: Slash
Genre: Humour, romance, supernatural - animal transformation
Word count: 9000
Status: Complete
Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. No money is being made from this work. No copyright infringement is intended.
Spelling: I’m from the UK, so I use UK spelling in my fanfiction stories.
Summary: Everyone has a soul animal, but the ability to see them has faded. Harvey possesses not only the ability to see them but also to transform into his own soul animal. Harvey likes to think of himself as the cat that walks by himself, but that changes when he meets Mike Ross, and comes face to face with the rarest soul animal of all…
Author’s Notes: This story was inspired by this picture from Tumblr initially - I saw it and thought it looked like Mike cuddling a cat and then this idea just came to me, and I couldn't resist writing it. It was one of those lovely stories that completely flowed, and I finished it in one day (with extra editing time a few days later!). The idea took on a life of its own and evolved a long way beyond the picture. Harvey-the-cat doesn't look like this one in my story!
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jaccigirl and flyingnorth for loving this fic so much and encouraging me to post it, and a big special thank you to tingreca for beta.Extract:
If Harvey hadn’t had the Specter gift for seeing into a person’s soul and glimpsing the true self within, then he would have sent Mike Ross packing the minute he showed up for a job interview carrying a bag full of weed. The reason he didn’t was because he looked into Mike’s soul and saw something he’d never seen before - and it shocked him to his core.
He’d heard the legends, of course. His grandmother used to hold him between her forelegs and wash his furry kitten head with little rasps of her iguana tongue when he was only a child. It was she who had showed him how one could love a soul very different to oneself.
When they both changed back into human form, she would hold him close, rock him in her armchair, and tell him stories about the world that hardly anyone else had ever heard.
“People with this kind of soul animal are very rare,” she told him. “I’ve never seen one, but I hear they do exist. There are maybe a handful of them out there, with a new one born only every generation.”
“But I don’t understand.” Harvey turned curious eyes to gaze up at her. “How is it even possible? And how does it work?”
“Like I said, I have no idea. I’ve never met one. Maybe you will, one day, and if you do, it will be a remarkable thing. People with these souls are as special as they are rare. They often achieve great things - and those things can be terrible or beautiful, or sometimes both.”
Harvey had dismissed all this as simply myth and folklore, until he met Mike Ross.
Mike had stumbled into his room, all boyish charm, bad suit, and messy hair, and dropped his suitcase of weed all over the floor, and Harvey had been about kick him out when Mike had suddenly looked at him with those bright blue eyes, and Harvey had seen his soul animal… and stopped dead in astonishment.
This scruffy kid was one of those his grandmother had told him about, one of those with the rare, special souls, with the capacity to do great harm or great good.
For Mike Ross’s soul animal was…
( The Cat That Walked By Himself )
