Specialty Snacks

“-and that’s when I realized that my special treats had crazy effects on these little guys!” Quince was saying. She patted Mademoiselle on the head as the Stroodle pawed at her leg, unheeding of the attention and instead begging for the treats that Quince was carefully packing into decorative bags and tins.

“Mm-hmm,” Yoshino said, barely paying attention themselves. Quince was… fine. She was good at what she did, and they couldn’t really blame her for charging and arm and a leg since she was the only one who could do it. But she loved to talk, was highly resistant to any attempts to cut to the chase when she had a story to tell, and Yoshino wasn’t that resilient in social combat when it involved anything more strenuous than sitting and looking pretty. They had an easier time if they just let Quince talk. And talk. And talk.

All told, Yoshino was pretty sure that they had heard Quince’s entire life story about 17 times, give or take, plus however all of her tangents and verbal meanderings added up. It was more interesting than corporate boardroom talk, they’d give her that. A million times more bearable than CEOs who thought they were good at flirting. (Everyone wanted to be Angora, and far too few of them understood that nobody could be Angora.)

Still. It was a lot, and they had actually come here for a specific purpose, which didn’t seem any closer to being achieved then it had when they first walked in the door.

Their impatience might have begun to show on their face, or more likely, they had been in Quince’s shop often enough that she had developed the ability to pick up on their aura. Yoshino was not a bun of varied expressions and body language. Mostly it was slight variations on the same expression, with a slight perk of the ears, lash of the tail, or flick of the wings here and there.

Either way, Quince chuckled and wiped her hooves off on her apron before turning her full attention to them. “Well, now that I’ve talked your ear off, what did you need hon?”

With a faint sigh of relief, Yoshino reached into the messenger bag that had been slung across their body, and withdrew the imp that had been comfortably resting inside. Gigi chirped, blinking its bright little eyes in the sudden light after being nestled inside their bag for so long.

Yoshino carefully deposited Gigi onto the countertop, right by the sweets. Ordinarily, they might not have done something so careless, but as they’d more or less expected, Gigi made no move for the treats like most imps would have.

“This guy eats batteries,” they said shortly. “Is that normal?”

“Oh, yeah!” Quince laughed, taking their comment and Gigi’s presence so close to the treats in stride, as she did with most things. “I call that breed Tomodigi! They’re all like that- they just go wild for batteries. I’ve been trying to come up with a way to incorporate that into more standard imp food, but you wouldn’t believe how battery acid curdles most batter-”

Privately, Yoshino thought that they could believe it just fine, but they kept it to themselves. There was no point interrupting when Quince went off on another tangent, and this one was at least informative and related to what they’d come here for.

After lecturing Yoshino at length about the merits (or rather, the lack thereof) of trying to cook with objects that had no business ever touching food, Quince zeroed back in on Gigi. She patted the little imp on the head, earning another pleased chirp. “Now, where did you find this one? I’d have gone over proper care and feeding with you if you picked them up directly from me.”

“Gift from a client. I guess he thought it would be a cute thing to do, but of course he didn’t tell me anything useful about actually taking care of it.” Yoshino rolled their eyes. Mister… ah… well, they’d forgotten his name. Must not have been important. They’d figure it out if he hired them again and asked about the Tomodigi.

On the scale of annoying things rich people who hired escorts did, giving cute but thoughtless gifts at least ranked higher than telling them that they’d be prettier if they smiled more.

Back in the present, Yoshino continued, “Would you mind going over it with me now? It doesn’t move around or anything, so it’s hard to tell if it’s doing okay. There’s nothing to go on but the chirping.”

“Of course! Here, grab a bag and come into the back with me - it’s feeding time, and the active ones will mob you anyway, so you might as well have food. I’ll show you the stash of watch batteries I’ve been building up for the Tomodigis!” Quince picked up one of the treat bags that she had just packed and deposited it into Yoshino’s hands without waiting for them to agree. They simply shifted the bag into the crook of their arm for stability while they retrieved Gigi and placed it carefully back in their bag, before following Quince to the back of the shop where her fancy imps awaited their food and potentially interested buyers.

The kennel area, or whatever it was called, was much quieter in Pedigree Pets than in the Imporium. While Hutch collected all sorts of imps, only the rare breeds specially created by Quince’s efforts held residence here. There was still plenty of noise, primarily the shuffling, rustling, skittering, or otherwise, of the various imps taking notice that someone with food had entered their area and rushing over. A rare smile did cross Yoshino’s face as they paused to pass out treats and pat the ones that vied for their attention.

Other buns got on their nerves a lot of the time, but Yoshino had to interact with other buns in order to make a living, and all that jazz. Imps just wanted food, shelter, and care, and they didn’t ask anything complicated of you alongside the necessities. Unless they were spoiled like Mademoiselle, but Yoshino couldn’t really throw stones when it came to spoiling imps.

“Now here-” Quince huffed and dropped a sizable bin in front of Yoshino, its contents rattling. Peering into it, they saw that it was indeed full of packaged watch batteries; they felt their bag rustle as Gigi seemed to sense the desired treats nearby and vibrated with excitement.

“Did you know that you can buy watch batteries in bulk?” Quince asked brightly.

“I’ve never thought about buying watch batteries in my life, much less in bulk,” Yoshino replied in perfectly honest deadpan.

“Well you’re going to now!” Quince laughed.

“...Great.”

“Don’t sweat it. I got watch batteries specifically because they’re small and easy to store. I haven’t determined which brands are best yet, but the Tomodigis don’t seem too picky aside from wanting to eat them instead of regular food in the first place. Now, if there was just a way to melt batteries down without making them explode…”

Yoshino zoned out again, this time to stare into the middle distance for several seconds in pure concern at the implications of that statement. Quince continued rambling without a care.