"Notebooks?"

"Check."

"Pens?"

"Check."

"Textbooks?"

"Check."

"Walkie talkie upgrades?"

"Check."

Each item was placed carefully in their book bags as Dennis listed them off. There wasn't really a reason to list off their school supplies, but the simple activity did give them a small sense of control.

Coop wasn't sure about how he was supposed to feel about going back to school after... well, all of this. It felt weird having to go back when he had so many other things to worry about. Having alien body parts stitched onto you really makes things like class and homework seem inconsequential.

On the other hand he also craved the normalcy of it all. It's been another few days since he'd started staking out the explosion sight and he hasn't seen a single person, robot, or alien drone near the place. It was just as barren and inconspicuous as the last time he and Dennis had been there and the lack of results was driving him crazy! At least with school he'd have something to do! He couldn't stand all this waiting around.

And while it wasn't bothering him as much, Coop could tell Dennis was feeling antsy too. He kept checking and double checking their plans like he'd somehow forget something in the 5 minutes since the last time he'd looked at their list. On top of that his dad had been installing some new solar panels to their roof and Coop could tell by the bags under Dennis' eyes that the new ears were making that a painful process for him.

"Uh, Dennis? You sure you don't wanna take a nap or something. You look dead tired."

Dennis shook his head.

"I'm fine, Coop. I just wanna get everything done before I head home. We've gotta start dividing our time between helping the cats and our school work now, so the first day has to go off without a hitch!" He started pacing the small area between Coop's door and his desk. "I mean, for all we know the people who took the cats' ship could be watching us! We have to act as normal as possible so no one suspects anything!"

"Well... normal for us, anyway."

A blush spread across Dennis' cheeks.

"Well, yeah, but still!"

Neither of them had been considered the most normal kids in school. Even before Kat came to Earth, Dennis had always had a thing for the supernatural. Cryptic hunting was one of his and Coop's favorite things to do as kids. Exploring the woods, looking for pretend monsters and evil creatures. Sure, Dennis might have believed a bit more of it than Coop, but that didn't stop them from having fun together.

Looking back on it, maybe some of those things could have been real after all. It wasn't any weirder than what was happening to them right now, was it? Hell, he'd take mothman and sewer gators over alien cat invaders any day.

Despite that, Coop had always been considered the more "normal" of the two of them. Usually the other kids would leave them alone but he knew Dennis was teased more for his belief in the supernatural than he was. Despite that, or maybe because of it, Dennis never stopped being himself and Coop always thought that was really cool of him.

Plus, now that they've gotten themselves thrown right into a science fiction movie, he was glad he had a best friend like Dennis to help him through it. His almost nonchalant attitude about their bodies might be frustrating, but it also helped Coop not lose his mind when everything around him felt like it was spiraling out of control.

Coop couldn't say for sure but Kat seemed to be acting… odd lately. Well, acting odd wasn't the strangest thing to be in this situation, but he was acting weird even for him.

Since Coop and Dennis were getting ready to head back to school they ended up having two meetings with the cats in order to get everything squared away. They'd have a lot less time to come see them now that class was starting up again, so they needed to make sure the cats didn't need anything important before that happened.

Anyway, they had their meeting and Kat hadn't said a word to them. The other cat, Megan, was the one explaining everything, meanwhile Kat just sat there and said NOTHING. The rat barely acknowledged them other than to expand on something the other cat had said or to give updates on how the new tech was going. He didn't say a single sarcastic or snide comment to Coop or Dennis the whole time they were there. Coop had expected him to at least bring up the whole Millie sneaking out thing, but he didn't! So by the end of the meeting Coop and Dennis were both waiting for the other shoe to drop.

But it never did. They just left and Kat had hardly said anything to them.

So yeah… They were sure the little shit was up to something.

As soon as he and Dennis were out of earshot they both looked at each other and nodded in agreement. At this point they couldn't really do anything until they got done with class tomorrow. They already had two consecutive meetings with the cats and with the cats' detection shield thing not up yet, they didn't want to take any chances of someone getting suspicious.

Honestly, Coop doubted they were being watched like the cats warned, but he also didn't want to bet his ass on it if everything went wrong. Better safe than sorry and all of that. Besides, the less time spent dealing with them the better.

That being said, school brought on a whole different headache to deal with. Their spring break had been extended due to one of Kat's less dangerous stunts. Kat had thought it'd be funny to wreck all of the school's computers with some sort of virus that somehow made a computer set itself on fire. The damage was so bad they had to get a whole computer room replaced. So their spring break had been extended while the school hurried to clean up the damage.

To say Coop was relieved to have been sick that day was an understatement. There was no way he was gonna get blamed for that one, and being home sick was a pretty good way to avoid Kat based punishments.

And apparently the school had ended up getting a last second donation from some new teacher, so they were able to replace all of the computers that were damaged. That teacher also happened to be replacing their grumpy old science teacher, so the guy already sounded good in Coop's book.

Well, hopefully. Since high school started Kat had been particularly eager to embarrass or harass him during school hours. The little rat had heard his dad nagging him about the importance of scholarships and getting good grades, so he took it upon himself to make Coop's school life a living hell.

Putting itching powder in his gym clothes, changing the school menu to every food he was allergic to, shredding his homework, etc. The whole virus thing had been the most destructive thing he did to mess with Coop's schooling. So while Kat wasn't a danger to anyone with the earlier pranks, he sure was a huge pain in the ass.

Thankfully, Coop wouldn't have to deal with any of that for the last 3 months of school. Hell, he might even be able to keep his grades at above a C for the rest of the year.

He already had two tense conversions with his dad this month. He really didn't want to have another one about his grades…

So yeah, whatever weird shit Kat was planning could at least wait until the end of tomorrow. He already felt like he was juggling a dozen different things at once so this could sit on the backburner. Besides, he still had to do one more round of handing out flyers with Millie today. He could deal with his little sister's problems before he dealt with whatever Kat was cooking up.

About half an hour away a man sat in front of a computer screen and chuckled.

Apparently their little friends had just set up some sort of cloaking device. They figured they'd do something like that eventually, but it was pretty impressive that they had gotten it up so fast. They had been monitoring Bootsville's alien energy outputs since they got here. Their scans had turned up a few small traces of energy they had been meaning to look into, but now they just seemed to vanish from the map entirely.

It was kind of funny. Erasing their energy source from the map, as little as it was, made them look even guiltier than before, but now that there's no way for them to track how much power they were using they were completely in the dark about just what their little friends were working on.

A bit of a double edged sword if you think about it. They now have a pretty good idea of where they were, but without any way of seeing just what they were doing, they didn't have enough info to just go storming in to capture them.

Oh well… guess the easy way is out.

The man stood up from his desk and did a little stretch. His bones ached as he tried to rub at his sore back. He groaned as feeling started to return to his legs and lower back.

"I guess a bit of reconnaissance won't hurt… At least then I won't be sitting in this crappy school chair for another hour."

"Hello, students." Coop heard the teacher say as he looked through his bag for his notebook.

Today had gone surprisingly well for his first day back to school. He had expected something shitty to happen like his hat getting knocked off his head, or his tail somehow slipping out of the loop he had it in, but so far nothing bad had happened all day. Their classmates had figured their new style choices were just part of their normal brand weirdness, and if there was any time that Coop was happy to be seen as the weird kid, it was definitely now. All he and Dennis had to do was make it through this last class and they were set!

Finally finding his science notebook he pulled it out and looked up at the board where their new teacher stood, his back to the class as he wrote his name on the board.

Something about the man's appearance nagged at him, and when he finally turned around, Coop's jaw nearly hit the floor.

"My name is Dr. Dib Membrane, and I'll be your new science teacher." He said, a bright smile on his face. "I'll be teaching you about the scientific wonders of our world, along with my assistant, Dr. Mandisa Abebe."

Just as he'd finished, a small black woman in a black and yellow sweater came bustling in. She immediately grabbed a lab coat sitting on one of the hooks at the doorway and moved to stand in front of the class. Her lab coat, like Mr. Membrane's, was white, but hers had what looked to be a little bumblebee design stitched onto the front pocket. She smiled brightly at them, and Coop felt his stomach drop.

Those were the two people who broke up his and Millie's fight with Lorne and Harvey. The one where he accidentally slammed Harvey into a window hard enough to crack it and had accidentally scratched Lorne with his claws.

He had nearly revealed his little 'alien condition' in front of two scientists.

And now those same two scientists were his teachers.