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This, was one of the few times in her life when Felicity felt glad that she had grown up in Las Vegas. While Felicity’s mother who was a cocktail waitress in one of the big casino/hotels/restaurants and general all round tourist traps, she had been incredibly careful to encourage Felicity into having dreams of her own. Donna Smoak made sure that her daughter knew that even though she loved her daughter, that Felicity shouldn’t feel trapped and remain at home. Strangely, though, Felicity had picked up some of the gambling tricks, she had found that probability had been her strong suit. Felicity made sure to employ her use of statistics and probability when she snuck into the casino's inevitability getting banned when she bet and won so much money against the house. Felicity never thought that these skills would be of much use to her outside of the desert city.
When Felicity had answered the call and fought at the Battle of Sunnydale, she had never expected to have to use her skills again. She liked to think that you could take the girl out of the desert but don’t expect her to go back again! When Felicity had first heard about Kitten Poker rings, she had found herself quietly pleased that it seemed like her skills wouldn’t go completely to waste. When Felicity had found out how the Demons used the Kittens they won in their illegal poker games; she had found herself incandescent with rage once she found out exactly the demons used the kittens she won. Because damn it, if she hadn’t struggled for years with trying to find decent makeup that was not tested on animals!
Using some of her (friends or allies) from her years fighting alongside Buffy Summers (seriously, there were just some things that Felicity couldn’t put with for much longer), Felicity knew when to call out for help. Which was what had led Felicity reaching out to Spike to see if he had any decent actionable intel on what her next move should be, or at least where she could begin searching. Ugh, she was going to have to ring the mischievous vampire.
“Hello pet, it’s been a long time since I heard from you, now what’s up?” she heard the sardonic voice greeting her.
“Hi Spike, how’re you doing? Listen, I’ve got a problem, I’ve heard of a Kitten Poker Ring operating here in Starling, have you got any tips as to where I could find that ring? I need to shut it down?”
“Ooh, a Kitten Poker Ring, I haven’t run into one of those in a long time, you want me to come down?”
“Nah, it’s not too big, but do you have any idea of where they’d be hiding?” Felicity quickly tried to put off the pale vampire, not wanting the prickly he-man thing (how did she correctly refer to a male vampire?) to come down. She wasn’t in the mood to put up with him.
“Right, right, Kitten Poker Rings are usually found in the small underground or back rooms, are there any demon bars currently operating in Starling?”
“Yeah, there’s Slugger O’Toole’s, it’s not listed online because it’s a politically based website on Northern Irish politics. Do demons even use Google? Maybe they used Ask Jeeves or Bing!? But the demon who runs that pub was originally from Ireland, or at least their human was. Do you know what happens to those kittens when they win them?”
“You don’t want to know love. But go to the bar, the Kitten Poker Rings are more likely to happen in the basements of these pubs, most likely at night. How's your poker game?”
“Oh, you know Spikey, you can take out of Vegas but can’t take the Vegas out of the girl, at least not completely. I should be fine, thanks for the intel.” Felicity had spoken before she hung up her phone.
That was last night, and Felicity had put the lessons she had learned in Sin City to good use. She had gone into rescue those kittens. Which left her to this point, with a box of five kittens all ready to go to new homes. She had completely glad that the ring wasn’t as big as she feared it was going to be because she could take in one or two kittens. Felicity knew that if any of her friends came, her friends that didn’t already know about Felicity’s hum extracurricular activities, she would have to come up with a brilliant excuse.
If one even existed that was.
Felicity is waiting in front of her printer, snapping her finger and tapping her feet along to the tune of Proud Mary by Tina Turner while she waited for her flyers to print out. Once the sheets were all completely printed out, Felicity took the sheets and made sure that she held her staple gun, in her work bag, made her way into work.
Walking up to the security desk, she smiled as she one of the regular security guys sitting there.
“Hi Bill, I found a box of five kittens, and I can only keep two, can I leave one of the flyers here?”
“Sure, but why are you keeping two kittens? Wouldn’t you be better just keeping the one?” Bill laughed leaning back in his seat.
“I would, but can you really say no to these guys? I’ve read it’s better to keep two together from every litter anyway” Felicity laughed self-depreciate, she knew she had a problem. But in her defence, those little guys were so cute.
“Won’t be a problem, are you putting any of the rest of those flyers up?”
“Yeah, I’ve gotten in early so I should hopefully be able to get some of these flyers up in some of the staff break rooms. Say you don’t want any do you?”
“No, I’m afraid if I took one in, Doris would be completely over the moon for about a week or two then forget about looking after the little guy, looking for the next shiny thing to capture her interest leaving her Granddaddy to look after the kitty cat.”
“Alright, worth a shot, thanks, Bill!”
Felicity had climbed the steps higher and higher into the building, stepping out at every floor to affix the flyers up. This had continued for some time until she was stopped by Mr Steele, who had stopped her in his impeccably polite manner.
“Ms Smoak, what have you got there? Are you supposed to be sticking those flyers up?”
“Yes, Mr Steele, they’re only going into the employee break rooms, you wouldn’t like a kitten, would you? I came across a group of five last night, and I can only keep two, I don’t want to bring them into the pound because I’m not sure if the pound has a no-kill policy in place.”
“Come by the Manor tonight, I think I would like one, maybe Thea will want one.”
“Very well, Mr Steele, I’ll be by the manor tonight at about seven, I’ll just need to pick up the box and bring it over.” Felicity smiled at her boss, before making her way back down to her floor. Ready to get some work done for the day.
Felicity looked up at the imposing façade of the manor; she would probably be even more intimidated if she hadn’t been to the Slayer Headquarters in the Scottish Highlands, now that place had been massive. Raising her hand to ring the doorbell, she tried to calm down her nerves before she started to consider running away as being a good policy of action.
Scooping the box tighter against her chest as a sort of defence mechanism, Felicity smiled when she saw the door being pulled open in front of her.
“Hello, yes? I don’t think I’ve ever seen you around here before, how may I help you?”
“Oh right, hi! My name is Felicity Smoak, and I was told to come here by Mr Steele, he seemed interested in my box of kittens earlier? Wow, that sounded like a euphemism, I’m so sorry about that.” Felicity blushed as she heard the Russian accent of the woman standing across from her.
“Of course, Ms Smoak, please come in my name is Raisa, I’m the housekeeper. If you’d like to step in out of the chill, I’ll go and get Mr Steele.” The woman introduced herself as she beckoned Felicity into the house.
Stepping in through the door, Felicity glanced around her and looked back down into the plaintive meowing coming from the box. Only looking up when she realised that the large hallway she had been brought into had suddenly gone quietly.
Normally Felicity knew she would probably take the chance to at least peer into some of the photo frames on the large round table in front her.
“Well, who are you and why do you have a massive box of kittens is that?” Felicity’s head snapped up at the greeting. The voice belonged to the young teenager descending the stairs, peering inquisitively into the box Felicity still held.
“Hi, my name is Felicity Smoak, I work in Queen Consolidated in the IT department. I came across these kittens last night, and I’m not sure if the animal shelter has a no-kill policy. Aren’t they so cute?” Felicity ended on a squeal as she looked back down at the box held securely in her arms.
“Hi, I’m Thea Queen, oh those little guys are darlings, may I?” Thea gestured into the box wanting nothing more than to get a little bit closer.
Felicity nodded and watched as Thea Queen gently lowered a hand into the box, pausing to allow the small kittens the chance to sniff her hand before she pulled the biggest one out. Listening as Thea began giggling as the kitten sniffed at her hand, Felicity smiled, who could say no to one of these little guys?
“Oh, they are just adorable what did you say happened to them? Are you taking any?”
“Yeah, I’m planning to take two or three, it just depends on whether or not someone else wants any of the little kittens. I just couldn’t bear to give any away.”
“Hello, Ms Smoak, I see you brought the kittens out, would you like to adopt any Thea?” Mr Steele’s polite tones cut through the air of giggling as the little kittens all tried to climb over one another in the box, each of them trying to peer balefully out.
“Oh, can we Walter? Did Mom say that was okay?”
“Yes, she said that hopefully, these little guys might teach you responsibility, do you know which one you want?”
“Is there anything we need to be aware of about these little guys Felicity?” the speed at which Thea Queen’s attention was shifting was disarming and enough to make Felicity’s head spin.
“I don’t know a lot about the little kittens, but they haven’t been microchipped, you’d probably be able to feel it in them, they’re so skinny. But I reckon that soon they’ll be finished with the shots, so just feed them on a diet of wet and dry food and be careful if you feed them regular cow milk.”
“Really? Don’t cats usually drink cows milk?”
“These little guys are lactose intolerant, so unless you want to clean up diarrhoea, then I’d avoid straight milk. Which one do you think you want?”
“Ooh, this little guy in my hand is so cute, he’s not going to anybody is he?”
Felicity peered down at the little pure white cat in Thea’s hands and shook her head “no, that’s a little female kitten, so maybe unless you want to be overrun with cats, I’d think about getting her spayed. Otherwise, have fun with her, she doesn’t have a name yet, at least none that I could work out. You know where the nearest pet shop is, don’t you? You can get food for her in there. And they should have information on reputable veterinarian surgeries in the area.”
Felicity smiled as she watched the two, making her way back to the door, Felicity stepped out into the balmy night temperatures and made her way over to the front passenger seat. Opening the door one handed, Felicity carefully slid the box in and securely fastened a seat belt.
Once she had gotten into the car herself, Felicity pushed down on the accelerator as she pushed away from the Manor, pausing only to allow the Black Town Car make its way in through the large gates before she left.