"I think I may just have a teensy weensy problem..."

He'd seen a litter of pups outside of the base, a few miles down on a lonely stretch of road almost nobody visited. And after making sure that everyone in the base was either too busy to notice what he was doing or asleep, Junkrat grabbed the biggest box he could find inside of the storage area of the base, then went off to the highway to find the pups.

He had a crazed smile on his face the whole time.

After a few weeks of sneaking around with Kookaburra, the small kitten had become more of long kind of animal. He was much bigger than before. But just as dirt stained and adorable. Although he was restless and didn't like being left alone for too long.

It had been a miracle that McCree had not found the kitten when it had decided to venture out by itself. Luckily for both of them, Junkrat had found the critter before it could have tried to steal the man's food. And, fortunately, he had been reading the newspaper while all of this happened. Even though he had questioned Junkrat about his sudden appearance and disappearance, along with the gasped scream he had let out, later on in the day.

Kookaburra had been up to no good recently. It must have been because he wanted a friend!

So when he'd found the three small dogs whimpering inside of a cardboard box, he'd decided that he'd found the perfect friends for his kitten.

Not once did he think about how, possibly, adopting more animals would mean that there would be more critters to get caught by Winston and the rest of Overwatch. Nor did he stop to wonder if the saying of 'Fighting like cats and dogs' held any truth. He didn't really think about his plan going wrong. All he thought about was how happy Kookaburra would be with his new friends.

When he reached the highway, he found the dogs right where he had left them. And with an almost crazed smile, he patted the smallest one on the head before picking it up.

"You'll need names, my lil' fuzzies." He spoke softly as he placed the first he had grabbed inside his box, then picked up the one with the different colored eyes. "Somethin' nice an' proper. Can't have ya runnin' 'round with stupid cunt names now can I?" Finally he picked up the biggest pup, one who looked at him with distrust and narrowed eyes, but still let himself be grabbed. "Ye're all just too cute!"

Bringing the box back into the base had not been difficult. Not with how early it was. All members of Overwatch were asleep and if not, were much too sleepy to do anything against him.

With barely contained cackling, Junkrat almost hopped into the storage room he had grabbed the new box from. It was a barely used area. And because not many people frequented it, he was sure he could use it for himself. Especially after Roadhog had just about kicked him out of their room because of constantly (accidentally) waking him up with his midnight experiments.

(It was all Kookaburra. The cat didn't like being kept inside for too long. And the little shit knew that Roadhog could not be woken up. So he did his best to wake the Enforcer up to make his point to Junkrat: He wanted out.)

"Now, 'fore I give ya yer names," He placed the box down on the floor, patting the largest pup's head to then have to quickly take it away before he was bitten. "Ooh, a feisty one... I love it!"

The black dog with white spots all around its body growled at Junkrat, but didn't make any further aggressive moves. Territorial he was. Junkrat could understand and respect that.

"Anyways, as I was sayin' 'fore I was so rudely interrupted; place needs a little livening up." He continued with a broad smile as he looked over the large room before him, "I'll get my bombs!"

~/~

When Jesse McCree woke up, all he had wanted was some coffee and delicious breakfast before he had to think about anything that wasn't food. But the loud and slightly worrying explosions coming from the lower levels of the base worried him. And because he was the only one awake at five in the morning, he took off running to make sure nothing had gone wrong and Jamison hadn't hurt himself.

"Jamie!" He called out as he slowed in his running, nearing the storage rooms that weren't all that used because the new members of Overwatch were still becoming adjusted to their new realities. "Everythin' okay?"

All of the units had their doors closed. But one had smoke coming out of the cracks of the door, which immediately alerted Jesse as to which one was being used by the Junker.

"Fine! Fine! I'm good!" The Junker called out with a bit more energy than Jesse would have expected at getting caught using explosives outside of the training area, although Jesse swore he could hear whimpering coming from inside the room.

"Yuh sure? Yuh don't sound so fine, kid." He called out as he neared the room, only to suddenly have the younger male run out of the room and slam the door shut behind him, then just about mold himself to it. All the while he wore a clearly guilty smile on his mug.

"You've got ta trust me, mate!" The man was all jitters, body fidgeting all the while his eyes flitted around the hallway they were inside, landing on Jesse for only a fraction of a second before moving on to something else. "Everything's fine! Just doin' some decorating is all."

Jesse knew there was something up with Junkrat. He was being even more fidgety than usual. And it was five in the morning. Nothing good happened between the hours of two and eight, and the blonde Australian being awake at this ungodly hour could only mean he was getting up to no good.

But it was five in the morning, he had yet to drink or eat anything for his breakfast, and the kid was supposed to be Roadhog and Jack's headache. Not his.

"Alright. I'll believe yuh this once, kid." McCree relented with a sigh, then frowned when he let out a mix between a squeak and a cheer. "Just don't keep blowin' stuff up. Yuh know Winston don't want yuh causing any more damage ta this 'ere base."

"Yup, yup, yup." He nodded wildly before saluting with his right hand, "You can count on me, cowboy!"

There was a voice at the back of Jesse's head telling him that he could not count on Junkrat. But it was too damned early to deal with this. So he just walked off with a tired wave towards the other male.

~/~

"Supper time!"

Kookaburra, Kangaroo, Pitbull, and Steve all ran out of their individual hiding places when Junkrat entered the room with a large plate filled with food he had taken throughout the day, eyes bright and begging for food. And when he placed the tray down on the floor, they all began to greedily eat what they could, even though they were civil enough to not fight over who got more.

The last time they had, he had expertly set off an explosion to terrify them into cooperating. And it had worked marvelously, for no further fights had broken out over food. Even though Kookaburra still didn't like Pitbull too much...

After having fixed up the storage space to be more of a home for him and his animals, Junkrat had just about moved into the space. It was now littered with all of the mess that had previously taken up all of his space in his shared room. And it was beautiful.

He'd assigned the dogs names with much thought. Kangaroo was named as such because, even though the different colored eyes were an interesting feature, his energetic ways and love for jumping around reminded Junkrat of the almost extinct critters he'd only seen in the pages of dusty books he had sometimes found while scavenging while still back in the Outback. Pitbull because, even though he wasn't really sure which type of dogs they were, the aggressive animal was mean and rude, but could also be loveable and adorable. And from what Hana had told him at some point- apparently, her name was Hana-, pitbulls could be pretty nice when they weren't being annoyed. And finally, the smallest of the pups had been named Steve. Good name for him. Nice and proper and shit.

As the animals ate, Junkrat filled up their individual bowls of water, all of which he had taken from the kitchen without permission. And once that had all been finished, he grabbed the plush toys he had stolen from Hana and Lucio so that the four animals could have some play time.

The two dog females known as Steve and Pitbull immediately jumped on their favorite toys and began to play with them. The only male, Kangaroo, was a bit slower and chose to try and jump onto Junkrat before the man shoved the toy into his snout and told him to go off and play. Kookaburra clawed his way up Junkrat's body to settle himself on his shoulders, then began to lazily swat at the last toy left.

He wasn't sure which breed the three dogs were. They weren't pitbulls, though. Nor were they Kangaroos. And he was pretty sure that Steve wasn't any kind of species... But they had manageable enough short fur, pointed ears, and were mostly black. Pitbull had white and brown spots, even though her siblings had only brown ones.

As he giggled at the way Steve tripped over herself while trying to drag her toy towards her favorite corner, which was quite the feat seeing how the stuffed lion was a good inches taller than the small pup, there was a knock on the storage unit's door.

Immediately they all froze. Then with a sharp whistle from Junkrat, the four animals shot away and out of sight. He had trained them for occasions like these. And they were rather good at following his instructions.

Once he was sure there was no possibility of any of the animals being found, the Junker made his way towards his door. And he opened it just a little bit, so only his face could be seen from the outside.

"Jamison, I've got a mission for you. Roadhog said we'd find you down here." The stern face of Soldier 76 met him with a no-nonsense voice attached. And when Junkrat looked to the side, he found the large and extremely happy looking Reinhardt smiling down at him. "You are to go with Reinhardt and two others on a mission to defend a small payload. It's simple, but your knack for explosions and traps will be invaluable."

"Uh... Hmm..."

This posed a new problem for Junkrat.

What was he supposed to do with his four animals if he wasn't around to take care of them?

..~..~..

Hope y'all liked it! And thank you for the support on 'A Rat for a Cat'! Brought a smile to my face to see that people actually read and liked it!

Please review.

And if you're feeling up it, check out the continuation of this series! 'Helping Hand (And Two New Friends)' is out and ready to be read! Check it out.