EPISODE 7

Mayor Manx stood by the window, looking out upon his fair city that he had governed over for so long while Callie reviewed over his day plan. He had to first oversee the clean up of Megakat Bay, that was about an hour and a half of work. Next was the grand re-reopening of Megakat towers (third times a charm), that would run half an hour, tops. Then came the part he was looking forward to, the expansion of Megakat Golf Course. He'd fought tooth and nail to clear out that extra land, but he did it. He would be able to tee off at about three o'clock if everything went smoothly. He could already hear the beautiful sound of a club hitting a golf ball.

As he scanned the sky line, something caught his attention, off in the distance, storm clouds seemed to have been rolling in, but it was the speed of which they were moving that really got his attention. Also, as weird as it sounded, it looked as if the clouds were spiraling, rather then rolling. Almost as if they were moving from one spot outward.

"Callie, my dear. Could you come here for a moment?"

"What is it mayor?"

She looked up from her briefcase which she was holding up with one paw and digging through with the other. Manx just motioned her forward with one finger, not taking his eyes off of the incoming storm. He didn't see her come over, but he did hear her gasp next to him. They stood there, watching as the clouds passed over the building, bringing a veil of blackness around them. Next came the thunder. They watched, awe struck, as a bolt of lightning pierced through the air several blocks away. There was the sound of an explosion and they barred witness as Megakat Towers crumbled to the ground in one swift blow. There came another bolt, this one landing just across the street and destroying another building. Manx and Callie just managed to get out of the way as flying rubble shattered the row of the glass windows they were standing by, showering shards all around the area.

"Callie" Manx said. "If you need me, I'll be doing important mayorly work under my desk."

That said, he dropped to his hands and knees, crawling into the leg hole of his office desk. He reached out once, grabbed his golf clubs and pulled them as close as he could as more explosions rocked the city.

--------------

It was early afternoon when the elderly woman came back for her car. Jake wasn't at all heartbroken to see it go. The vehicle had taken over a day and a half and every time they finnaly thought they'd finish, a new problem would pop up, so watching it drive away was a sweet breath of fresh air. With that out of the way, they could get back to what Ms. Briggs had brought in. There was the basic wear and tear on the car, nothing that either of them haven't seen before. Still, this was the Deputy Mayor's car, so of course they were going to give it an extra close check-up to catch anything that might be wrong. Jake decided that if they were going take their time here, he might as well get something to drink while they were they outside. The heat was starting to pick up again, but naturally this time, thank you.

"Hey, Chance. I'm getting a can of milk, want one?"

"Nah, I'm good." He called while peering under the car's large hood.

"Alright."

Jake entered the home and got something to drink, a routine done before. It was lucky Chance wasn't thirsty, this was the last can. He turned around and closed the door with his foot while popping open the can. As he took a chug to milk their danger alarm went off. Taken by surprise, Jake spit what his was drinking back into the can and over his paw. He put the milk on the counter and raced for the phone. Jake grabbed it with his clean hand and tried to dry the other on his shirt.

"Yes, Ms. Briggs?"

"SWAT Kats! There's a huge storm spreading throughout the city and destroying everything under it! I think Forecaster is back!"

"Already! Alright, we're on our way. Get to someplace safe, Ms. Briggs."

He hung up the phone and raced outside. There should be a law somewhere that stated that all villains had to wait at least one year before they were allowed to start being evil again. Chance was standing by the side of the car now, looking outside.

"Chance! Forecasters back! Come on!"

"I know, buddy."

Chance said dryly and pointed up to the sky. Jake walked next to him and followed his finger. Up above he saw clouds so black that they almost gave off a purplish glow, cover the sky around them. It looked more like it was eating then covering, actually.

"Holy kats! I was inside for ten seconds tops! How did this happen so fast!"

"I'm not sure, but I know we can ask!"

Chance spun on his heels and ran indoors and Jake followed in suit. Again they dressed and ran to the Turbokat, starting it up and flying into the storm.

"Hey, T-Bone. Do you think it's safe to be flying in this weather?"

"Probably not."

Above them the sky flashed with every bolt of thunder. The wind had started to pick up as well. He could hear it moaning outside of their aircraft like the a phantom. Below there was panic as the kats of Megakat City tried to flee before they could be blasted to bits. Several builds were already gone or burning like candles with large puffs of black smoke rising up into the air. It was dark too, almost like night, but it couldn't be later then one, one-thirty at the latest. Was this all really the work of Forecaster? If he could pull something like this, when why didn't he do it the first time around instead of running?

Razor really wasn't likening this. His stomach had tightened into a knot making him feel a little sick. These were the times that he regretted ever finding those stupid Enforcer parts and for ever making the Turbokat. Maybe if T-Bone didn't read all of those damn comics as a kid they wouldn't be risking their necks right now. No, that wasn't fair. He couldn't blame this on his buddy. He wasn't the one doing this. If anything, he was the last line of defense against it. T-Bone could probably handle everything on his own if he had too. He was the strong one. He flew the jet and the missiles could be fired from the front if they needed to be, so did Razor really need to be here at all? When you came down to it, really came down to it, how was he even important to the team? T-Bone could do anything he could do, but the opposite wasn't true, that was a one lane road, it seemed. So what good did he do?

"Got visual." T-Bone said.

"Huh?"

"I've got visual on Forecaster. We're closing in. Get ready, will ya?"

"Yeah. Right, T-Bone. Sorry."

The weather grew worse as they entered the heart of the city. Out in the sky a very changed Forecaster was reeking havoc on the city below.

---------

Forecaster was enjoying himself immensely. However the fun would have to end soon. There was no point in ruling over a city that was nothing be rubble, however there was just something about explosions that he liked. It was like freakin' katnip! From out ahead came a jet speeding at him. It was the same jet as before, the one that had sent him packing to the sewers last time where he wondered for hours until he found his way to the labs. Well they may have been able to take out the old Forecaster, but this was his new season premiere, baby!

Two missies shot from the jet. They were short things with a head that resembled that of a match. The tips caught fire on both in mid air. Now there was something you didn't see everyday. He made a motion with both hands at the projectiles. A heavy sheet of rain came pouring from the sky like a faucet. It their targets dead on, puffing out the flames and pushing them off course. He didn't even move as the now soaking missiles shot by his left side.

"Is that really the best you can do? Come now. How about another shot? On the house!"

Another duet shot at him from the incoming plane. There seemed to be nothing special about these two, just plain old darts. With another wave, they struck his air shield, blasting harmlessly away from him. This was great. He didn't even have to move. Now if only he could get a recliner and a TV up here, he'd be set. His enemies looped around and came at him again. This time only firing one arrow with a pointed end at him. He put up another shield to block it. These guys were obviously not getting the idea that he was more powerful then they were. As the missile approached the shield, the tip of it started to spin like a drill. It hit the air directly, and started to burrow through his defense! He put his full power into it, but it wasn't enough. The missile dug through and headed strait for him. He flew down and felt the drill tip passed through the top of his hair. Then he saw a missile like the one before follow it. The first was only a distraction! He dodged the seconded one too by mere inches, a close call if there ever was one.

"Alright. Now you have my full attention!"

He pushed the wind forward at the plane with all his strength.

-------------

The Turbokat vaulted upward as a strong blast of wind struck them. T-Bone managed to his baby back under his control and leveled out. Razor's idea to use the Drill-Pit Missiles had worked pretty well. While the wacko did dodge the attack by a few inches, it proved that he wasn't invincible and that was all T-Bone needed to know.

He was above Forecaster now and Razor took the chance to fire with the Gatling Vulcan Cannon. However he pulled the same shield trick a third time, making it impossible for even one bullet to get through. This was getting really receptive. If Forecaster didn't have that one stupid trick, he'd be blasted out of the sky by now. Maybe if T-Bone should just run into him with the Turbokat, see how he like that.

There was a cracking on the radio and the voice of Commander Feral come through the static. He was surprised that any kind of radio signal could get through his weather, but apparently that wasn't the case. Would have been nice if it were, though.

"SWAT Kats! This is Feral! The Enforcers are here to handle this."

To the North, a squadron of choppers came beating in the storm. He could see that far down, but T-Bone was sure that the tanks were well on their way too.

"Great to hear, Feral." He said, the sarcasm think in his voice. "If you're Enforcers couldn't stop him last time, what makes you think you'll get him now?"

"I don't recall you bring him into justice, either."

T-Bone ground his teeth. As if he didn't have his hands full already, but now he had to deal with Feral as well as this.

"Calm down, buddy. Worry about Feral later" Razor called from the back.

"One of these days, Razor. One of these days, I swear it."

"That's fine, but today isn't that day."

Razor was right, there were more important things to take care of. Yet, it was amazing that no matter how bad things got, Feral would always be there to make it worse. He shook that from his mind and got back on their mission.

They could try the Drill-Pit missiles again, T-Bone thought, but now that Forecaster was on to that trick, they'd be shot down long before they reached their target. Maybe they should just fire everything they had at the creep. Something would have to go through as blast him away, but that wouldn't work either. There were too many Enforcers around, they couldn't risk hitting one.

T-Bone saw the Forecaster make a strange motion with his hands and in-between his palms grew a round ball of blue energy. He blasted it forward and it streaked at them with incredible speeds. T-Bone pulled the Turbokat up as hard as he could to dodge the blow and watched in horror as the beam actually widened as it went. He felt the impact hard as the energy streak blew out the underside of the Turbokat. The handling became nearly impossible and black smoke poured from the engines.

"We lost stabilizers!" Razor yelled, punching buttons on his control pad. "T-Bone, if we don't land soon, were in for a bad crash landing!"

"Hold on! I'm ganna try and make it back to the junkyard!"

-------------

He was hoping for more of a direct hit on that flying menace, but that blast would have to do. Forecaster didn't even knew he had that kind of power. 'You never know unless you try', as his mother used to say. Words could not express the joy in his heart as he watched the jet take a dive, pull back up, and retreat. He prepared his beam again, ready to shoot the aircraft in the back as it fled. No more loose ends.

"Attention! This is Feral of the Enforcers! Surrender while you still can!"

His concentration was broken as a squadron of choppers roared up from behind him, followed by tanks below. Even through he was thrown off for only a second, that was all the time it took for the jet to get too far out of range. There was no way he could hit it accurately now. He thought about taking the shot anyway, but by now they were out of site. Dumb luck, that was all. He'd proven his point to them, that there was nothing that could stop him. Now he just had to deal with this minor threat. He turned, looking over the rows of helicopters and tanks with all their guns pointed right at him. There was something thrilling about looking down those barrels. A lesser kat may have feared such a site, but he was lesser to nothing. He was the ruler now and the city was going to be his after he put the Enforcers in their place.

"This just in, Megakat City is a good as mine. Details at eleven."

-------------

The Turbokat had just made it back to the scrap yard by a hair. Somehow T-Bone had managed to touch down inside their hanger, but how was a mystery to Razor. It wasn't exactly a soft landing, but any landing you can walk away from, right? The doors popped open and the two kats jump to the floor. T-Bone went strait under the jet to check the damage and Razor just stood where he was.

That had been one of the worst battles he had ever been in. Every missile he shot was either brought down with perfect precision, or simple blocked or dodged. Up in the air like that, Forecaster was unstoppable. There was no way on earth he could take him down. The guy was strong enough before, but now he was badder then ever. Not good.

"Geez." T-Bone said, looking under the Turbokat. "This is bad, really bad. A few more inches upward and it would have been the big litter box in the sky for us."

Razor joined him to check for himself. He wasn't kidding. A little bit more and the fuel line would have been struck, blowing the whole thing up.

"We're lucky to get out alive." T-Bone added.

That was true. They were both very lucky, but only by the smallest sense of the word. There was no way they could get the Turbokat fixed and airborne soon enough to stop Forecaster. Razor didn't even think they had enough time to re-stock the missiles. They were in it deep.

"I think this is the end of our luck." Razor said.

"How do you mean?"

"The Turbokat is ruined. It'll take hours to fix, let alone re-stock. By that time Forecaster will probably have the city under his control."

He paused.

"I think……I think we failed."

T-Bone grab his shoulder and whipped him around to face him.

"What are you saying, buddy?"

"I'm saying it's over, T-Bone! We lost! We can't stop him! The best we could do before was wound him, but now we can't even get that far! It's….it's over."

"How can you say that! We've never given up before, no matter how bad things got! We always came out on top!"

T-Bone still had a paw on his shoulder, Razor knocked it away. Anger consumed his entire body like he was drowning in it. He was angry at T-Bone, at Forecaster, but mostly at himself. He hated himself more then anything right then because he knew that he was too weak to stop him. No matter how hard he fought, he was still too weak.

"On top! On top! You call this on top!" Razor yelled "We've spent five years here, T-Bone! Five years of fighting and re-building and what do we have to show for it! Has Dark Kat been stopped! How about Dr. Viper or any of the others! How's that for on top! Stop living in your stupid comic book world and wake the hell up! Over half the city is destroyed and almost everyone has fled! There's nothing here to defend, T-Bone! It's over!"

From out of nowhere he felt something hard hit the side his face. Razor flew back and landed on the ground. He pushed himself up to a sit with one arm, and held the other over his cheek. He looked up at T-Bone and saw his paw clutched into a fist in front of him. He had actually punched him. T-Bone had punched him!

Neither one of them moved or said anything for a long time. Razor was still on the floor and T-Bone was still standing, fist clenched and shaking ever so slightly. His eyes were shut an him mouth was drawn to a fine line. When he did shatter the silence that had fallen around them, his voice came out very calm in a way that greatly frightened Razor.

"I can't believe I'm hearing this from you. I just can't believe it. I've known you for a long time and never once did I think you could act that way."

T-Bone opened his eyes now was looking directly down on him. He was shouting now, like opening his eyes had released a beast.

"So this is how you act, huh! For the first time in your life you have to actually work for something and when you can quite grasp it, you give up! Well I'm sorry that this wasn't handed to you on a silver platter, genius boy, but sometimes you have to actually fight for what you want! You have to fight like I had to fight every day of my life to get where I am!"

His voice calmed a little.

"When I met you at the Enforcers, I had the highest respect for you. I thought that there wasn't a single thing you couldn't do. Anyone can work out and become strong physically, but no one could match the brains you had, no one. And that's what I respected about you. You had something no one else could have. But now I see that it was dumb of me to trust you. If you want to run, then fine! Run! I'd rater finish this without you anyway!"

Razor got off the floor and stood there, looking at him. They had once been the closest of friends. No one could have matched them, but now…. now something had happened. Everything they had build together had shattered. He couldn't speak, all he could do was stand there, viewing the person he had trusted with his very life for so long. Now what? It was over, for the city and for them.

Razor turned and left the hanger without a word. He kept walking till he reached the outside garage. All around him memories of the past haunted him like ghosts; the living area where they had once sat up all night watching horror movies and eating junk food till the got sick, the gym equipment that have salvaged themselves, the obstacle course they must have run and improved a million times! He had all of those memories, and that was all they were now, memories. They were lock away in the museum of his mind, only to be looked at, never touched.

Now Razor stood by his motorcycle, the only thing that had been lovingly repaired by his hands only. It wasn't completely done, but it could still run. And it could take him out of the city, he was sure of that much. He wasn't sure what he would do outside Megakat, but it didn't really matter. He had nothing to lose anyway. The city, the battle, and his best friend were all too far gone. With a heavy heart he grabbed the handle bars and sat down on the fine leather seat. From the other side of the garage, the door slammed open and there T-Bone stood.

"I just wanted to tell you," He said. "That if you leave, I never want to see you again. You keep that in mind. Start that thing up and you prove to me that you're nothing more then a spoiled brat, Razor."

He sat there for a minute, thinking about what T-Bone had just said, then closed his eyes tight and felt a wave of sickness rise from him like his insides were trying to escape through his skin. The worst part of all was the tears that were brewing. He couldn't hold them back for much longer. He didn't know who the tears were for; himself, T-Bone, the city, or all of the above, but they were coming on strong.

He let out a deep sigh from inside of him that brought no relief and gave his answer.

"The names Jake."

That was as much as he could bear to say. He brought up the kickstand and started the cycle. It moaned to life as he revved the clutch. Jake brought his foot up from the cold floor and drove away, out of the garage and out from everything he had ever known. This was game over, and Jake was out of quarters.

TO BE CONTINUED