Authors note - I am going to dedicate this chapter to Nako-Chan because she
is so cool! (she even read my Indiana Jones fic!) She is my favorite
person in the whole world right now because she inflated my (already large)
ego so much.
Chris woke up the next morning around nine, and the two mechanics where already up and about digging through the scrap yard looking for some part or another. She could hear them moving junk around, throwing things and otherwise making a lot of noise. One of them was whistling.
She crawled out of "bed" and quickly dressed in jeans and an old T-shirt, then went outside and threw some hay to Horse. Jake saw her and waved, shouting, "Hey, your awake!"
"And damned ashamed that I'm up before noon!" she yelled back, " I blame you!"
"Me? What'd I do?" Jake was walking towards her now.
"I dunno but it's probably your fault."
Chance appeared from behind a pile of scrap, "What'd Jake do this time?"
"Nothing!" Jake insisted.
"Sure, that's what he wants us to think." Chris joked.
The three of them were now close enough to each other to talk without shouting.
Seeing her clearly for the first time the mechanics saw that Chris was a tall, black kat with long, straight hair. Her eyes where green and she had a series of three silver loops pierced up her left ear. Her right ear was split from the tip to about halfway down the middle of it. Chance noticed her tail wasn't puffy like most she-kat's were, but slimmer like a he-kats.
"Hey your limping," Chris said to Chance, concerned, "That's from when you hit the rock last night huh. I'm really sorry about that."
"Don't worry about it," Chance said, blowing it off, "how about we take a look at your rig?"
"Good plan," Chris agreed, "This poor old truck is on it's last legs I think."
"Maybe," Jake said, "but then again, maybe not. Let's take a look."
The three of them unhitched the trailer from the back of the truck, and Chris jumped into the drivers seat. She turned the key and the truck made an awful grinding and groaning sound. Chance cringed, "that doesn't sound good."
"Try it again," Jake suggested.
Chris tried again, this time pushing the clutch in, and pressing on the gas, then she tried pumping on the gas pedal, then pulling the choke, then pumping the gas while pulling the choke before finally giving up.
"Can I try?" asked Chance.
"Go for it," Chris said moving over on the seat.
Chance tried every trick he knew to no avail.
"Pop the hood will ya?" Jake asked, and when it was up he climbed up and used a wrench to adjust some stuff. "Now try!"
Again, there was a lot of noise but the engine never started. Together the three of them pushed the truck into the garage.
Chris talked to them as they worked on the big diesel truck.
"So have you guy's always been mechanics?"
There was an awkward silence before Chance answered, "We're actually ex- Enforcers."
Jake spoke up, "We had a little mishap and kinda blew up Enforcers headquarters. So we got sent here to work until we paid off the damages."
"That seems harsh."
"Yeah, well you haven't met Feral," Chance said as a kind of explanation.
"He's a poster boy for by-the-book, tight-asses," Jake added.
"That sucks."
"Tell me about it," Chance said, then changed the subject, "What brings you to Megakat City?"
"Work."
"Oh right, the bounty hunter thing."
"Exactly, you know for being the capital city of Megakat, not to mention the largest city in the entire country, the Enforcers around here leave a lot to be desired. I pulled some stuff off of the Enforcer website and you've got a list of criminals a mile long," as she spoke she climbed into the truck and pulled a thick stack of papers off the passenger seat, jumped out of the truck, and carried the papers over to the work bench where she sat down and started flipping threw them, "And most of them have huge bounty's on their heads. I'm obviously new to the city so I've never heard of most of these guys, but most of them are worth looking into. Listen," she started reading one of the papers, "The Metalikats and Hard Drive, are worth $10,000 each, Dr. Viper and the Pastmaster are worth $15, 000, Dark Kat's got $17,000 on his head and-holy shit!" she interrupted herself, "$30,000 dollars for the SWAT Kat's!"
The wrench Chance was holding fell from his hands and clattered across the floor, and Jake hit his head on the underside of the hood. They were only half listening before, all that other stuff was old news, but this was new.
"Who are they, and what did they do to get that kind money on their heads?" Chris wondered.
Jake figured they had bounties on their heads but this was insane.
"Their bio says, 'Two male kat's who call themselves T-Bone and Razor, and fly a high tech jet wrecking chaos and havoc wherever they go. They are dangerous vigilantes. They have caused millions of dollars worth of damage and are a direct threat to the mayor."
Anger boiled up within Chance, was Feral that hell bent against catching them that he would make up lies?!
".They are considered armed and dangerous. T-bone is 5'10' blah, blah, blah. The rest is descriptions."
Jake glanced at Chance, he was obviously about to explode with rage. Jake put his hand on his shoulder and whispered in his ear, "Don't react, we can't let her see us react. This is no big deal."
Chance glared at him.
"Chance," Jake warned, "don't react."
Chance grimaced then nodded, he turned his back and went to find his wrench.
Chris turned to Jake, "Do you know anything about these guys?"
Jake faltered slightly, but quickly regained his composure, "uh, not much, just what I've seen on the news."
"What have you seen? Do these guys just fly around in they're jet and randomly blow buildings up or what?"
"Um, I'm not exactly sure really. I don't pay much attention," Jake shrugged and turned back to the truck. He willed her not to ask any more questions.
Chance found his wrench and walked back to the truck. He tossed the wrench up into the air, it spun a few times before he caught it, "You know, I don't think the SWAT Kat's are all bad."
Jake's hand slipped off the wench he was using to loosen a bolt and whacked into part of the engine. He swore and glared at Chance. Chance threw the wrench up in the air again, and caught it, deliberately avoiding Jake's gaze, "I mean, they haven't done anything really bad."
"Seems to me like blowing up building's is pretty bad."
"I've noticed that they only show up when villains are around," he threw the wrench up, and caught it, "haven't you, Jake?" he said turning to look at Jake for the first time.
Jake shot Chance a look but remained silent. All that was going through his mind was 'Shut up. Shut up. Shut up.'
Chris spoke up, "So they're using the other villains as a cover. While the Enforcers are busy with the other bad guys, that's when the SWAT Kat's attack. It's actually pretty smart of them if you think about it."
Chance tossed the wrench up one last time, but missed the catch and it went clattering across the hard cement floor, "Maybe you right," he said and tuned back to his work. Chris turned back to the criminal file and didn't notice Jake stomping on Chance's tail.
A few minutes later she turned from her file and said, "Hey would you guys mind if I left Horse here with you and went into Megakat City? I'd like to talk to some Enforcers, especially this Feral guy. And I'll check into a hotel too so you don't have deal with me anymore."
The mechanics nodded, "Yeah, go ahead," Jake said.
"Just as long as we don't have to do anything that required going within twenty feet of Horse," Chance added, his foot still hurt.
Chris laughed, "Be nice to him ok? He should be fine. He's pretty much used to being in strange places."
She stuffed the pile of papers into a backpack she found in her truck and walked out of the garage, waving goodbye. When Jake heard her motorcycle start, and then the rumbling sound fade away as she left he turned to Chance, "What the hell was that?!" he couldn't help shouting.
"What am I just supposed to stand there and take it when she offends us like that?"
"She's not offending us she's offending the SWAT Kat's! We are not the SWAT Kat's!" he lowered his voice, "right now we are Jake and Chance, the lowly mechanics. We are not the SWAT Kat's until we are in those flight suits and right now, I don't see any flight suits."
"So we just sit her and let her believe those lies?!"
"Yes, that's exactly what we do! We can't go defending the SWAT Kat's at every turn, if we do some day, some kat will make a connection! That is not something we want to happen."
"There are a million ways somebody could make a connection!"
"Exactly, and we want to make as few ways a possible. There are millions of kat's in Megakat City that will defend us to the end because they know that we're not bad. If there weren't, we would have kat's after the bounty on our tails constantly. So let the kat's who believe in us, defend us," with that Jake turned back the rig and went back to work.
After taking a minute or to let his anger fade Chance did the same. "So," he asked acting like they're fight had never happened, "what do you think is wrong with this thing?"
Chris woke up the next morning around nine, and the two mechanics where already up and about digging through the scrap yard looking for some part or another. She could hear them moving junk around, throwing things and otherwise making a lot of noise. One of them was whistling.
She crawled out of "bed" and quickly dressed in jeans and an old T-shirt, then went outside and threw some hay to Horse. Jake saw her and waved, shouting, "Hey, your awake!"
"And damned ashamed that I'm up before noon!" she yelled back, " I blame you!"
"Me? What'd I do?" Jake was walking towards her now.
"I dunno but it's probably your fault."
Chance appeared from behind a pile of scrap, "What'd Jake do this time?"
"Nothing!" Jake insisted.
"Sure, that's what he wants us to think." Chris joked.
The three of them were now close enough to each other to talk without shouting.
Seeing her clearly for the first time the mechanics saw that Chris was a tall, black kat with long, straight hair. Her eyes where green and she had a series of three silver loops pierced up her left ear. Her right ear was split from the tip to about halfway down the middle of it. Chance noticed her tail wasn't puffy like most she-kat's were, but slimmer like a he-kats.
"Hey your limping," Chris said to Chance, concerned, "That's from when you hit the rock last night huh. I'm really sorry about that."
"Don't worry about it," Chance said, blowing it off, "how about we take a look at your rig?"
"Good plan," Chris agreed, "This poor old truck is on it's last legs I think."
"Maybe," Jake said, "but then again, maybe not. Let's take a look."
The three of them unhitched the trailer from the back of the truck, and Chris jumped into the drivers seat. She turned the key and the truck made an awful grinding and groaning sound. Chance cringed, "that doesn't sound good."
"Try it again," Jake suggested.
Chris tried again, this time pushing the clutch in, and pressing on the gas, then she tried pumping on the gas pedal, then pulling the choke, then pumping the gas while pulling the choke before finally giving up.
"Can I try?" asked Chance.
"Go for it," Chris said moving over on the seat.
Chance tried every trick he knew to no avail.
"Pop the hood will ya?" Jake asked, and when it was up he climbed up and used a wrench to adjust some stuff. "Now try!"
Again, there was a lot of noise but the engine never started. Together the three of them pushed the truck into the garage.
Chris talked to them as they worked on the big diesel truck.
"So have you guy's always been mechanics?"
There was an awkward silence before Chance answered, "We're actually ex- Enforcers."
Jake spoke up, "We had a little mishap and kinda blew up Enforcers headquarters. So we got sent here to work until we paid off the damages."
"That seems harsh."
"Yeah, well you haven't met Feral," Chance said as a kind of explanation.
"He's a poster boy for by-the-book, tight-asses," Jake added.
"That sucks."
"Tell me about it," Chance said, then changed the subject, "What brings you to Megakat City?"
"Work."
"Oh right, the bounty hunter thing."
"Exactly, you know for being the capital city of Megakat, not to mention the largest city in the entire country, the Enforcers around here leave a lot to be desired. I pulled some stuff off of the Enforcer website and you've got a list of criminals a mile long," as she spoke she climbed into the truck and pulled a thick stack of papers off the passenger seat, jumped out of the truck, and carried the papers over to the work bench where she sat down and started flipping threw them, "And most of them have huge bounty's on their heads. I'm obviously new to the city so I've never heard of most of these guys, but most of them are worth looking into. Listen," she started reading one of the papers, "The Metalikats and Hard Drive, are worth $10,000 each, Dr. Viper and the Pastmaster are worth $15, 000, Dark Kat's got $17,000 on his head and-holy shit!" she interrupted herself, "$30,000 dollars for the SWAT Kat's!"
The wrench Chance was holding fell from his hands and clattered across the floor, and Jake hit his head on the underside of the hood. They were only half listening before, all that other stuff was old news, but this was new.
"Who are they, and what did they do to get that kind money on their heads?" Chris wondered.
Jake figured they had bounties on their heads but this was insane.
"Their bio says, 'Two male kat's who call themselves T-Bone and Razor, and fly a high tech jet wrecking chaos and havoc wherever they go. They are dangerous vigilantes. They have caused millions of dollars worth of damage and are a direct threat to the mayor."
Anger boiled up within Chance, was Feral that hell bent against catching them that he would make up lies?!
".They are considered armed and dangerous. T-bone is 5'10' blah, blah, blah. The rest is descriptions."
Jake glanced at Chance, he was obviously about to explode with rage. Jake put his hand on his shoulder and whispered in his ear, "Don't react, we can't let her see us react. This is no big deal."
Chance glared at him.
"Chance," Jake warned, "don't react."
Chance grimaced then nodded, he turned his back and went to find his wrench.
Chris turned to Jake, "Do you know anything about these guys?"
Jake faltered slightly, but quickly regained his composure, "uh, not much, just what I've seen on the news."
"What have you seen? Do these guys just fly around in they're jet and randomly blow buildings up or what?"
"Um, I'm not exactly sure really. I don't pay much attention," Jake shrugged and turned back to the truck. He willed her not to ask any more questions.
Chance found his wrench and walked back to the truck. He tossed the wrench up into the air, it spun a few times before he caught it, "You know, I don't think the SWAT Kat's are all bad."
Jake's hand slipped off the wench he was using to loosen a bolt and whacked into part of the engine. He swore and glared at Chance. Chance threw the wrench up in the air again, and caught it, deliberately avoiding Jake's gaze, "I mean, they haven't done anything really bad."
"Seems to me like blowing up building's is pretty bad."
"I've noticed that they only show up when villains are around," he threw the wrench up, and caught it, "haven't you, Jake?" he said turning to look at Jake for the first time.
Jake shot Chance a look but remained silent. All that was going through his mind was 'Shut up. Shut up. Shut up.'
Chris spoke up, "So they're using the other villains as a cover. While the Enforcers are busy with the other bad guys, that's when the SWAT Kat's attack. It's actually pretty smart of them if you think about it."
Chance tossed the wrench up one last time, but missed the catch and it went clattering across the hard cement floor, "Maybe you right," he said and tuned back to his work. Chris turned back to the criminal file and didn't notice Jake stomping on Chance's tail.
A few minutes later she turned from her file and said, "Hey would you guys mind if I left Horse here with you and went into Megakat City? I'd like to talk to some Enforcers, especially this Feral guy. And I'll check into a hotel too so you don't have deal with me anymore."
The mechanics nodded, "Yeah, go ahead," Jake said.
"Just as long as we don't have to do anything that required going within twenty feet of Horse," Chance added, his foot still hurt.
Chris laughed, "Be nice to him ok? He should be fine. He's pretty much used to being in strange places."
She stuffed the pile of papers into a backpack she found in her truck and walked out of the garage, waving goodbye. When Jake heard her motorcycle start, and then the rumbling sound fade away as she left he turned to Chance, "What the hell was that?!" he couldn't help shouting.
"What am I just supposed to stand there and take it when she offends us like that?"
"She's not offending us she's offending the SWAT Kat's! We are not the SWAT Kat's!" he lowered his voice, "right now we are Jake and Chance, the lowly mechanics. We are not the SWAT Kat's until we are in those flight suits and right now, I don't see any flight suits."
"So we just sit her and let her believe those lies?!"
"Yes, that's exactly what we do! We can't go defending the SWAT Kat's at every turn, if we do some day, some kat will make a connection! That is not something we want to happen."
"There are a million ways somebody could make a connection!"
"Exactly, and we want to make as few ways a possible. There are millions of kat's in Megakat City that will defend us to the end because they know that we're not bad. If there weren't, we would have kat's after the bounty on our tails constantly. So let the kat's who believe in us, defend us," with that Jake turned back the rig and went back to work.
After taking a minute or to let his anger fade Chance did the same. "So," he asked acting like they're fight had never happened, "what do you think is wrong with this thing?"