A Little Batty

Matthias had stepped out of his workshop for only a few minutes, just long enough to grab the leftovers from the last time he'd been dragged out to a restaurant and scarf enough of it down to steady his hands. He had been spending the last few hours painting a doll, something that he was unwilling to risk messing up.

He was only gone for a few minutes. And, when he swings the door of the room open, it's blatantly obvious that in that time, the room that was supposed to be empty had something go wrong.

The bins lining the shelves near his work desk, previously containing the small assorted materials that he needed to use, had been pulled down, their contents scattered across the floor. Tiny silver S hooks had spilled across a heap of sandpaper, rolls of elastic had hit the ground and kept moving, unraveling the material they held as they went.

And, in the middle of it all, inky black fur lightly dusted from the dust from sanding his dolls, was a chirop.

Mercifully, the porcelain doll parts were still where he had left them, arranged into the shape that the doll would take once completed. Unfortunately, it's obvious that the creature had wandered across the desk, seeming to have walked across the small palette of paint he had mixed up when he started this session of work, leaving a trail of footprints behind it.

As he stared at it, trying to process the amount of clean-up that he'd have to do before continuing his work, the chirop chirped at him. The imp suddenly took off, making Matthias startle as it came unnervingly close to his face before rapidly changing direction. It flew a lap around the room, managing to swoop low enough to the desk's surface to knock over the old mug filled with his sculpting tools, sending some of them rolling off the desk and clattering to the ground.

Wordlessly, Matthias backed out of the room and shut the door to his workshop once more, trapping the chirop within. With that done, he did a quick search of his burrow to make sure all of his prized dolls were accounted for. One recently finished project was resting in his kitchen, on the countertop near the space that had once held an oven and now held his kiln. An older project had been left on the old, unstable table within the same room, having been posed regally to help showcase a new garment that he had finished the details on just the day before. Another had been left in the hallway, a doll much smaller than he usually made or bought posed on a small shelf next to a couple of knickknacks from friends. Another was already resting safely within the cramped quarters of his bedroom, safe from what was likely to be chaos.

Gingerly placing the recovered dolls onto his bed, Matthias exited the room and made sure that the door was firmly shut behind him. With that, he re-entered his workshop, went to the corner where a broom rested, and did his best to locate the chirop that had made such a mess in his usually organized space.

It had settled once more after he had left the room, perched on the top-most shelf, where a small tub of suede leather once sat. The container and materials were now, of course, decorating his floor. 

"Out! Out!" Wielding the broom to extend his reach, Matthias yelled in an attempt to shoo the imp from his shelves, sending it flying around the room once more. Waving the cleaning tool ineffectively at the chirop flying in wide circles around him, seemingly unconcerned with the succubun's actions.

After more flailing and shouting, Matthias finally managed to get the pest out. That meant it was still within his burrow, though he had already moved his more delicate possession out of the way. The burrow wasn't large, meaning that it probably wouldn't be too much longer until he managed to get the imp out of his home, so that he could try to get back to work.

Slowly wrangling the chirop towards his front door, Matthias flinched away as it once more dove towards him, small claws hooking themselves into the half-apron he wore long enough to tug a small pair of scissors free before swooping out the door, making small, gleeful noises on its way out.

Closing the door behind it, locking it for good measure, Matthias let out a heavy sigh. He had a lot of clean-up to do before he would be able to start work again.

--

The next day, Matthias woke late in the morning, after staying up nearly until dawn, engrossed in his work. As he made his way back into his workshop with a mug of water held in his hand. One of his projects had been able to come out of the kiln last night, which meant that he would be able to apply the next layer of paint to it. He used china paints for his dolls, the translucent material meaning that one doll could required seven or more coats of paint before it was finished.

He opened the door, paused to groggily rub at his eyes with one hand before kicking the door shut behind him, and he was once more greeted with a mess.

This time, most of his materials resting on the shelves were untouched. It was his sculpting tools and paint brushes decorating the floor this time around, with the chirop standing in one of the free spaces on the top shelf, attempting to make a nest out of suede that had been pulled back out of its bin. Matthias grit his teeth, placing the mug of water on his desk, and bent to pick up the dropped tools.

He kept an eye on the pesky imp while he worked, moving slowly and deliberately while watching its reactions. Seeing that it had little to no response to his presence, Matthias approached carefully and reached up to tug the tub of sandpaper, resting directly next to the imp's nest, off the shelf. It froze, locking eyes with him.

Matthias opened the lid carefully, sliding it off before dumping the sandpaper onto the floor without looking. The chirop was looking tense now, wings positioned to take off. Matthias was tense as well, preparing himself to try and get the now empty bin over the imp before it could go swooping around his workshop again.

He was not going to be cleaning up the type of mess he had to the night before. Matthias was going to catch the chirop and get it out of his burrow.

As soon as Matthias twitches, trying to get the bin over the chirop before it takes off, the imp attempts to take to the air. It ends up hitting the translucent plastic, landing back on the shelf below it, unharmed. Creature contained, it was time for Matthias to figure out his next step.

Which... he hadn't thought about.

He could try to wiggle the lid underneath and close the container around the imp but... would that hurt it? It was only now that Matthias was realizing that he hadn't ever interacted with imps much beyond cursorily greeting someone's pet. It hadn't seemed important to know before, but knowing if imps needed to be able to breathe or not had suddenly just become extremely relevant.

After a moment of hesitation, Matthias places an unopened box of air dry clay on the container before darting out of the room. It was better to be safe than accidentally hurt the creature, even if it had spent its last couple days endeavoring to make his life more difficult. Slipping into his bedroom, he rummaged around until he found a sizeable piece of cardboard that had once been part of a box, long disassembled. Returning to the workshop, he shifted through a container of random supplies, eventually fishing out an old roll of painter's tape.

Supplies secured, he returns his attention to the trapped chirop. It seemed to realize it had been caught, sitting still on the shelf and watching Matthias with wide eyes. As he slipped the cardboard under the bin, gently moving it back, the imp shies away for a moment, before stepping up onto the cardboard.

Carefully, Matthias held the cardboard in place and lifted the container off the shelf and movesdit to the ground. Once in an easier to reach spot, he taped the cardboard to the plastic container. He hesitated from a moment, before gently tipping the container, the chirop within making an odd, displeased noise as it was moved with it. Now with the cardboard on top, Matthias considered it for a moment, then he pulled a pair of scissors from one of his apron pockets, carefully making a hole for air on the opposite side from where the imp sat. It wasn't much, but the chirop wasn't a large creature.

Troublesome imp finally secured, it was time to look for help. While Matthias could easy find information online, it would probably be easier to go find the local imp expert if he wanted to make sure that the chirop would leave his workshop alone for good. Course of action decided, Matthias lifted the bin into his arms, and moved to leave his burrow.

--

"You should keep it," the suggestion came as Hutch was bent towards the countertop, peering through the clear plastic at the dissatisfied but ultimately unharmed imp within. "These guys are clever enough that it might make its way back over, anyway."

Matthias winced. He had expected that reaction, considering Hutch's endeavors to get as many buns as possible a pet imp. "I don't know how to take care of it."

Hutch brightened at that, and Matthias could already see where this was going. "A lot of imps aren't high maintenance! And chirops like these," they gestured towards the container resting on their shop counter, "are some of the easiest around. And training isn't as difficult as some people make it out to be. You just need to be consistent, and make sure to offer a reward as an incentive for good behavior."

Matthias eyed the chirop somewhat skeptically. "And that will stop it from making a mess?"

Hutch hummed a bit as they thought, considering how best to phrase this. "It's likely that it will take some time and work," they allow, "but then you'll also be getting a lifelong friend out of it!"

Maybe if he took the creature back home with him for a couple of days before bringing it back, Hutch would be more open to helping Matthias figure out how to make it stay out of his workshop. It would mean that he would suffer more delays in being able to return to his doll making, but it could be the easiest way out. If releasing the chirop would just mean it would come back, then he would just make a token effort at caring for it before foisting it off on someone else. The little beast would be their problem then, and Matthias could return to his imp-free workshop in peace.

He lets out a heavy sigh. "Fine, just tell me what I need."

Hutch was smiling at him again, Matthias noted, before the other succubun launched into an in-depth discussion on the best training strategies, common behaviors, and how best to pet a chirop. A little stunned, though relieved that he apparently doesn't need to remember to feed a pet imp as well as himself, Matthias did his best to retain at least some of the information.

It would be difficult to make a convincing attempt at caring for an imp if he didn't do any of it right.

Matthias left the shop with his new pet chirop, now in a proper carrier, and weighed down with a book on training, a generously sized bag of treats, and a small clicker. Watching Hutch lure the unfamiliar imp into an unappealingly small space had been educational, the slow movements, soft words, and the offer of a treat resting at the back eventually persuading the chirop into clambering in all on its own, without Hutch having to chase it around with a broom. It had felt undignified in the moment, but the confirmation that it was unnecessary still stung.

As Hutch had worked with the imp, they had been pointing out small changes in the chirop's body language, explaining how to tell if the creature was afraid or playful. They hadn't seen the latter in the shop, with the chirop unhappy at being released in an unfamiliar room with two unfamiliar dolls, but now Matthias knew what he would need to look out for, and that he should redirect the imp's attention towards an appropriate toy.

It would be a long day, having to clean up the mess Matthias had left in his workshop, and trying to convince the chirop to work with him rather than against him. Maybe it would be a good idea to let it out of the carrier in the bathroom, to let it grow accustomed to his presence before letting the little beast loose around the fragile items dotting his home.

The idea felt a bit like a waste of time, but Hutch had assured him that it would be helpful. Matthias would just have to accept that he'd have to try to work more later, to try and make up time lost today. Hopefully the chirop would be trained within the week, and Matthias could return to his usual workflow.

Matthias never did end up taking the chirop back to Hutch to deal with. 

Instead, the first time that the newly named Pepper carefully lifted a paintbrush from the floor and deposited it back into Matthias' hands instead of knocking over the mug of brushes again was when he knew that Hutch had been right. When he had returned to the shop, looking for a new pack of treats, Hutch had a knowing look on their face.