THEY'RE HERE!

Chapter 7: A Surprise in Space

Feral's alarm went off but he barely heard it. Crud he was soo tired but he had to get up. Staggering from his bed, he took care of his personal needs then, still in just boxer shorts, he went to his living room, opened his curtains to allow the morning sun to shine in then began to do some slow graceful movements to warm up his body. The slow intricate movements, resembling a mesh of martial arts, dance and yoga, exposed all parts of his body to the energy of the sun pouring over him.

He was sweating lightly and his body glowed softly when he finally stopped some thirty minutes later and went to shower and dress, feeling much more energized which is what the sun always did for him. Since he was going to be with the SWAT Kats this morning, he decided to opt for a plain, gray, enforcer flight suit. Grabbing his keys, wallet, and weapon, he headed out the door.

Less than five minutes later, he was on the road heading for the salvage yard.

~o~o~o~o~o~

Jake yawned and stretched. Getting up, he headed to the bathroom pausing a moment to bang on his partner's door.

"Chance, time to get up!" Then he went into the bathroom and turned on the shower.

The tabby groaned and tried to burrow into his pillow when he heard the shower start. He thought he could grab just a few minutes more of sleep. He hated the fact that Jake could live on just a few hours of sleep at a time and be fresh while he needed a full eight or even ten to feel remotely rested.

He jolted what seemed like minutes later when another hard bang shook his door.

"Chance, get a move on...now!" Jake hollered.

"I'm up!" He growled unhappily as he pushed his bedding off and stumbled to the bathroom himself. A quick shower later had only woken him up marginally but remembering what they had to do today, he forced himself to be alert. The cup of coffee Jake had made him helped perk him up more.

Jake just gave him a smirk and shake of his head at his partner's irritable mood, as he himself, got some cereal and hurriedly ate knowing Feral would be arriving soon.

Chance had barely finished his own meal when the sound of a vehicle coming into the yard reached his ears. "Feral's here." He announced sighing, getting up and dumping his cup and dish in the sink.

"Yep, its him alright," Jake concurred, having looked out the window to check.

The two of them hurried downstairs in time to open the door to the Chief Enforcer standing outside about to knock. He nodded at them as they gestured for him to come in then closed and locked the door behind him.

"You hide your rig?" Chance asked gruffly, as they made for the rear of the garage.

"Yes...parked it behind a stack of crushed cars...closed and locked the gate too," Feral answered, easily.

"Thanks. I see you're dressed for the trip too," Chance commented, surprised but pleased that Feral had chosen to dress down.

"I'm not here in my official capacity," Feral said, matter-of-factly.

"Good idea. Now give us a sec and we'll be ready," Jake said as he and Chance went to their changing area.

As promised they took only minutes to get ready and were soon armed to the teeth and heading for the Turbokat with Feral on their heels. Jumping onto the wing together, T-Bone gestured for Feral to take the jump seat next to Razor. Soon the jet was zooming through the hidden runway and into the early morning sky.

"What heading are we taking to get to Dark Kat's hideout?" Razor asked Feral.

"East of the Feral Clan holdings."

"Roger, T-Bone head northeast, hug the mountains heading to the Feral spread," Razor relayed to T-Bone.

"Got it." T-Bone turned on all engines and they were soon speeding toward the mountains arriving within twenty minutes.

The pilot slowed their approach and waited for further instructions. Below them was the jagged peaks that made up this section of the Katatones Mountain Range that went from the desert in the south to the far north, ranging past the Tymurr Federation over a thousand miles away.

"You're nearly there. See that tall pinnacle...just right of there and about fifty feet down will be a barely seen cave entrance," Feral told him through his helmet radio.

Following instructions, T-Bone flew the jet closer to their destination then went to VTOL and dropped the required fifty feet until Razor spotted the cave in question.

"So how do we do this? There's no where to land," T-Bone asked as they hovered near the opening.

"The cave is large enough to take the jet, I was told. The decision to go in is yours," Feral said.

"Hmm, let me do some readings first, buddy, then we'll know..." Razor said as he checked his sensors. "Okay, he's right, there is just enough room to park and get back out. Fly dead center and only about sixty feet in."

"Roger." T-Bone said, carefully turned the jet so it was pointed dead center at the entrance then slowly moved the jet forward on its air jets, gliding them along until they were the required distance in and with only fifteen feet on either side to maneuver...a very tight space indeed...but T-Bone managed to get them in safely then lowered the jet to the ground, shutting the engines off.

"Nice flying," Feral complimented, as he took off his helmet and prepared to debark.

T-Bone flashed him a grin, surprised and pleased Feral would make a positive comment at all. He popped the canopy and leaped down to the ground followed by Razor then Feral. They immediately set off to explore the interior.

Where they were was a long, narrow, cavern but off to the right were many openings that lead further into the mountain. They wrinkled their noses as a nasty stench reached their noses, the reason for it came into view as they reached the opening and saw dead creeplings and a couple of ninjas corpses laying shredded on the pathway.

Without commenting, they pushed on losing the light from the entrance and being forced to turn on head lamps. Feral didn't have a flashlight so simply used a small amount of energy to glow like a small lantern.

The SWAT Kats blinked at him in amazement.

"Woah! Talk about being one's own lamp for crud sake," T-Bone finally blurted out.

"The name they gave you guys certainly fits," Razor added, shaking his head.

Feral just shrugged and pushed ahead of them, lighting the way. Eyeing each other and shrugging, the pair shelved their uneasiness with Feral's abilities and returned their attention to the reason they were here.

After some ten minutes of walking over the uneven and rocky ground as well as avoiding slipping in bits and blood of dead creeplings, they found themselves in another large cavern. This one had been made partly habitable with lights strung across the ceiling, equipment mounted or standing against the walls and in the center of the floor and a huge computer console with gigantic screen on one wall. Cables for power were snaking all over the floor adding to the general difficulty of walking around in here.

The smell was worse here with more decaying bodies of ninjas and creeplings laying all over the place. Some damage had been done to the equipment as parts were scattered on the floor. A rather large blood spot could be seen in front of the computer console, the chair trashed nearby. The battle had been really bloody, both SWAT Kats thought, grimly.

By mutual and silent consent, the three split up and began their search for anything that could tell them if Dark Kat had been responsible for the Skulkear's crash landing. But after more than two hours of combing through everything including the omega's computers, they could turn up nothing about a space ship, only a couple of plans he was working on to bring down Megakat City. That information caused them to check out some of the inventions that were laying around to make sure none were operational or nearly so.

"Uh oh! Guys, come over here!" Razor shouted.

The other two rushed over to his side. Razor was standing beside a huge machine that didn't look anything like a weapon...more like a computer bank instead.

"This thing is supposed to direct a powerful energy beam that would have leveled the city once it was hooked up to the Mega Beam Laser Satellite M.A.S.A was going to launch into space. He was going to steal it and attach it to this machine. Looks like you were in time to halt the whole thing Feral when your clan took DK out," Razor said grimly.

"Bastard was a whole lot of trouble," Feral growled. "I think we should simply destroy this whole place so no one else can get the bright idea to become the next big ass omega."

"I agree. Let's get out of here and get this done since we don't have our answer and have to go into space after all," Razor concurred, turning to head back out of the hideout.

Soon they were aboard the jet and T-Bone was carefully guiding it out of the cave. Once in free air, he headed forward some distance until Razor said it was far enough then he halted them and turned around again. Razor sent some powerful missiles straight into the entrance. Moments later the mountain side collapsed with a satisfying boom.

Satisfied no one would find any thing much less get into the hideaway, T-Bone prepared to send the jet toward space when Feral called to him.

"Wait! An elder wanted to go on this trip. I must contact him before we do anything else," he said, quickly.

Razor blinked in surprise. "Well, okay. How are you going to contact him?"

"Tune your radio to frequency 204," Feral said in answer. Razor nodded and did so then handed him the radio mike.

"This is Ulysses calling for Elder Feders...please respond quickly!"

After a wait of five minutes, a voice spoke through the radio. "Going into space?" It asked, briskly.

"Yes sir!"

"Go ahead! Problems here have me unable to join. Report your findings immediately upon return...copy?" His uncle said.

"I copy. See you upon our return, Ulysses out!" Feral responded. "Okay, T-Bone head up!"

"You got it!" The pilot grunted and sent the nose of the Turbokat upward toward the stratosphere.

Once they reached the thinner air, Razor engaged the speed-of-heat shield, which left them blind except for their instruments guiding them.

Razor kept a tight watch on his screens. For more than thirty minutes nothing showed up on his monitors but small meteorites that made many holes in the jet's skin. He hissed in annoyance about all the buffing that would need to be done to restore the jet's body.

"Nothing in orbit, buddy. Time to range a little further out but keep our planet in view as we don't want to get lost out here since I don't have that type of navigation to guide us around," he warned his partner.

Feral chaffed at not being able to see outside. In one of his people's ships he would have been able to see space easily but he couldn't risk them being discovered simply because he wished to see, so he fumed in frustration.

Another hour was spent searching outward from their planet as far as they dared. It wasn't until they and the moon happened to be aligned at the same time that Razor spotted something on its surface.

"Got something! It's not rock and it reflects light. T-Bone move about 100 miles toward the moon and hold our position," he ordered as he fine tuned his monitors to bring in the image his sensors had spotted. Activating a long range sensor he'd been working on, he focused it on the target.

"Is that what I think it is?" He asked, worriedly to himself.

Feral quickly, released his straps and leaned toward Razor's viewer, staring in the scope, he hissed at what he saw. "It's a space ship but it's not a Skulkear. I have no clue what race that could be. Can your radio send a signal that far?" He asked, urgently.

"I'm not really sure but no reason it shouldn't since there's no air to impede it," Razor said thoughtfully. "What do you want to do...say hello? They might not understand you."

Feral snorted. "That may be your planet's problem but not ours. There is a universal language all space faring species use and all Solarians are taught it as kittens. It was insurance against possible visitors to this world. Our elders wanted to make sure we could communicate with them."

"Wow! That's really smart and certainly handy now. Okay then...frequency is open, fire away, Commander," Razor said.

Feral began to speak but Razor and T-Bone could only listen in confused interest as a language like nothing they'd ever heard before, came from the Commander's lips. It had a rather liquid cadence to it and was pleasant to the ear. Feral spoke for some minutes than stopped and listened. Nothing seemed to happen for more than ten minutes. Sighing, Feral spoke again, his tone more persuasive than the originally demanding tone he'd used the first time. Again he paused and waited.

This time, after another ten minute wait, a rather thick, oddly accented, and high pitched voice spoke. The tones sounded angry to T-Bone and Razor. When the voice stopped speaking, Feral answered in a more soothing, conciliatory tone. Whatever the other had said, apparently Feral found no threat in it and was trying to make friends. Well, that was good news...sort of.

When Feral stopped talking again, a note of gentle pleading in his voice at the end, there was silence then the voice of the visitor spoke in a more quieter tone. Feral seemed to relax to Razor's eyes.

His suspicion was borne out when Feral turned to them and said, "its okay, this is someone who has an ax to grind against our unwanted visitor. His home was destroyed by the Skulkears and he's been hunting them for most of his adult life. He's...angry, cold, and revenge filled but I could hear intense loneliness as well. I've urged him to accept the hospitality of the Feral Clan to rest and recuperate. I told him we could help each other. Can you imagine what kind of intel he could tell us on the Skulkears movements?" Feral said, barely able to suppress his eagerness to ask this visitor some pointed questions.

"Well, how fantastic is that? What astronomical odds that is to have found a new ally that might be able to help us," Razor said, amazed and relieved..

"Yes, it's the first break we've had in a long time and...wait...here he comes!" Feral interrupted himself as a small, sleek ship headed toward them from the moon. It was very fast because it took only ten minutes to reach them where they floated in orbit around their world.

"Incredible! That thing really moves!" T-Bone breathed, admiringly.

"Not so special for a space craft," Feral snorted. "Let's lead our friend to my home shall we?"

"You got it!" T-Bone acknowledged, turning the Turbokat toward their planet and engaging all engines to get home quicker.

"Are we going to be welcome, too, Commander?" Razor thought to ask. He didn't want to run afoul of the Feral's in any way even if they were with one of the clan at the moment.

"You are cleared, don't worry," Feral said, easily, aware of what Razor was thinking and a little amused by it.

"By the way, is our guest's space ship capable of landing on a planet?" Razor asked.

"Yes. I asked. You are right, some ships are not equipped to do surface landings which is why I checked first," Feral said, pleased by Razor's concern and knowledge.

Soon they were plunging through the atmosphere then heading toward the Feral Clan's territory.

The trip took more than forty minutes but soon they were within a mile of the conclave.

"Razor, tune your radio to the previous frequency I gave you, please. I need to clear us," Feral said as they came into view of the conclave. Razor gave him the go ahead. "This is Feral, require clearance for the Turbokat and a visitor from space. I vouch my life for both."

Razor blinked in surprise at that addition to Feral's request. 'Wow, they mean business when it comes to security,' he thought.

"Ulysses. Permission granted," the voice that had spoken to them earlier told them.

"Thank you," Feral said then addressed the pilot, "T-Bone, land on that bare area you see to the right and behind the out buildings on the property."

"I see it!" T-Bone answered then piloted the jet toward the indicated area with their alien visitor following close behind.

The two visitors landed nearby each other. The SWAT Kats and Feral leaped out of the jet and began walking toward the space ship quickly. Their visitor had not opened a portal by the time they arrived. From behind them, a small group of Solarians began to approach.

A tom that looked very much like Feral came to stand by the Commander. The other Solarians formed a half circle and waited, cautious and alert...none displayed any weapons though Razor thought they might have some on their persons somewhere, however, their own natural weapons were probably more formidable so he might be wrong about them even carrying a weapon.

Once everyone had arrived and stood quietly, they spent the time waiting for the visitor to come out by studying the ship. The ship itself was as big as a small passenger jet but bigger in the center with no wings. It was an unimpressive oval shape or maybe teardrop was a better description, and was a bluish silver color. It sat on huge thick 'legs'.

Suddenly, there was a brief humming in the air and a flash of light. Once that vanished, it left a person standing a few feet from them.