A/N: I apologize to those who have been waiting so patiently for this chapter to come out; I did get into a bit of writer's block for a while there, but don't worry, there is no way that I am giving up on this or any of my other stories.
I did make a small change in the story. Instead of Sassy being eight months pregnant, I went ahead and made her two months pregnant instead. You'll understand why after you read this chapter. And if you were confused about the animals hanging around the bar in the last chapter, this chapter will clear that up too.
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Chapter Four: Nothing Is Ever What It Seems
"BEEP-BEEP! BEEP-BEEP!"
Oolong panicked then, and he knew he had to get away quickly. As politely and speedily as he could, Oolong, in his human form, eased himself out of Suiza's embrace.
"Suiza, I'm sorry, but I got to-go to the men's room, yeah that's it! Be back shortly!"
"What, Oolong? What's going on?" Suiza asked worriedly.
Unfortunately for Oolong, Teal had caught up to him in the few seconds that he had started panicking about his time being up. Before he could escape, Teal grabbed him by his leather collar and yanked Oolong towards him.
"Teal let him go!" Suiza hissed.
"Relax, Suize, I'm just going to take Oolong outside for a little chat," Teal told his ex-girlfriend smoothly.
"Let me go, you thug!" Oolong cried, knowing that he only had twenty seconds before he would change back into his original form.
"Sure I will, baldy, just as soon as we're done talking," Teal crooned. "I think I need to emphasize to you as to just who Suiza belongs to-ME."
"Let him go!" Suiza snarled.
Sassy came up next to Suiza and glared at Teal. "Teal, why don't you and your buddies go back to the rocks that you guys crawled out from under? Suiza doesn't want anything to do with ya, so get lost!"
"This don't involve you, Sassy," Teal told her evenly.
"Anything involvin' Suize involves me," Sassy retorted coolly.
Oolong was struggling to get out of Teal's grip…oh it was going to be too late! He'd be busted for sure! Only seven seconds left!
"Let me go now!" Oolong screamed at Teal. "Let me-"
"ALL RIGHT, EVERYONE! THIS IS THE POLICE! TEAL, YOU AND YOUR THUGS COME OUT WITH YOUR HANDS UP!"
Teal cursed angrily.
"Look!" the fattest male member of Teal's gang called out the door. "I don't see no cops-"
"WE'RE BEHIND THE BUILDING! COME OUTSIDE NOW, IF YOU DON'T WANT TO GET ARRESTED!"
And after that a siren echoed loudly throughout the starry night.
Oolong wasted no time in pulling out of Teal's panicked, loosened grip. Hastily, he rushed towards the direction of the men's room.
Only three seconds left…
He opened the door to the men's room and dashed into a stall.
One second…
"POOF!"
An exhausted pig in a worn, leather jacket and five-year-old jeans sank against the wall of the stall in immense relief. Tears of relief hung in his eyes.
He was safe, and his secret was safe-for now.
Behind the building, Puar was rolling around on the ground in her natural cat form, laughing and squealing, as she listened to the panicked screams and shouts of the Rumblers racing to their motorcycles. She giggled, as she heard the whirring of motorcycle engines and the deafening squeals of rubber against concrete.
Once the sound of the last of the escaping motorcycle faded away, Puar shook the dust from her fur and released a huge meow of relief. She hoped that Oolong had escaped in time.
While Suiza had been kissing Oolong, Puar swiftly transformed herself into a housefly and flew out the door above the heads of Teal's fellow Rumblers. No one, whether Rumbler, Leatherneck, or guest, had seen a motorcycle helmet turn into a housefly because they had been distracted with all that had been going on.
When Puar had made it to the safety of behind the building, she turned herself into a loudspeaker and then into a police siren in order to scare the Rumblers into thinking that the police were after them. Puar's ribs ached, as she once again burst into a fit of laughter.
As she transformed into a housefly once more, she hoped that Oolong was okay. If she suspected correctly, Oolong would have tried to make it to the men's room instead of risking a beating at the hands of the Rumblers. Hoping that she was right, Puar the housefly reentered the building through an air vent that she hoped would lead her to the restrooms.
Bigfoot, Blue, Handyman, and Scam couldn't decide whether to be relieved that the Rumblers had left, to be worried that the police would come after them next, or to disappointed that they didn't get a chance to confront the Rumblers and teach them a lesson.
Bigfoot had figured that Teal had come back with his buddies, so that Teal could try to convince Suiza to give him a second chance. He also was certain that Teal would have attempted to make mincemeat out of Oolong, if the police hadn't shown up. Blue, Handyman, and Scam had, along with Bigfoot, looked forward to a scuffle with the Rumblers to teach those morons a lesson about giving any of the Leatherneck members a hard time. But before the four Leatherneck members could confront any of the Rumblers, the police had scared the Rumblers away.
While the Rumblers were fleeing the property, Bigfoot had ordered his fellow Leathernecks to get to the side of the building and wait, just in case the police decided to come after the Leatherneck members as well.
A few minutes after the Rumblers had departed, only Blue had enough nerve at that time to actually look behind the building, and when she did, she saw nothing. She could have sworn that she had heard a strange mixture of meows and laughter earlier, but the source of those noises seemed to have vanished without a trace.
Blue shrugged it off; the situation was strange, but the important thing was the Rumblers were gone now. As she slinked back gracefully to join her friends, she noticed that Suiza, Sassy, and Ruthie had joined the others.
An angry, embarrassed Suiza was calling Teal a variety of colorful, unladylike names that would have made even the foulest-mouthed of radio talk-show hosts blush. Sassy added a few nasty insults about Teal that included a wide assortment of raunchy terms referring to his most cherished body part below his belt. Ruthie was talking in soothing tones to try to calm down both her sister and Suiza, but both women seemed intent in relieving their fury verbally, no matter what.
"That bastard ruined my date with Oolong!" Suiza roared, after she had exhausted her almost endless supply of obscene words.
Having ended her insults before Suiza, Sassy patted Suiza's back sympathetically. "Look, Suize, at least you got one kiss from Oolong before he dashed off to use the potty for the hundred-and-fiftieth time this evening. Just the look on Teal's face was worth it, even if the police did show up and scare him and his buddies off."
"We're sorry that we didn't step earlier, Suize," Bigfoot replied regretfully.
"Don't worry about it," Suiza assured him gruffly. "You guys couldn't risk it with the cops being so close. If I remember correctly, you and Scam are still on probation from the last things you guys were convicted of. And I think that Handyman's just finished his for indecent exposure when he mooned the Hercule Satan Fan Club last year. I'd hate for you guys to wind up back in trouble with the law again."
Handyman smirked at the memory of showing his rather fleshy behind to a crowd of shocked Hercule-worshipping girls just a year ago. But it wasn't so much the mooning that horrified the Hercule groupies as much as the professionally drawn cartoon on Handyman's exposed buttocks. The cartoon, although expertly drawn, had displayed an obscene picture involving Hercule, Perfect Cell, and a vulgar sex act between the two that used the now-deceased Cell's life-draining tail in a way that nobody on Earth would have ever believed possible. Scam chuckled as he remembered that day; he had taken great pride in sketching that lovely moment between Cell and Hercule.
"Hey, relax, Suize," Scam, still chuckling, told her. "Handyman and I just thought that day that we should tell what really happened between Hercule and Cell!"
"After all, the truth will set you free!" Handyman laughed.
Suiza then allowed herself to smile. She and her fellow Leathernecks were among the minority of Earthlings who didn't believe that Hercule had truly defeated Cell. They honestly felt that if Hercule had actually been strong enough to destroy the monstrous android, he would have done so long before the televised Cell Games. And where had he been when Cell had taken all those other lives such a long time ago?
"Well, in that case, Hercule's definitely been living in a glided cage! I suppose if I had a life that cushy, I wouldn't want to leave that cage either," Suiza quipped.
"Yeah, same here," Sassy agreed.
"Well, guys, I better get back inside," Suiza told her friends. "I've hardly spent any time with my date tonight, and I feel bad about it."
"It'll be alright, Suize," Sassy assured her. "I think I'll go back inside with you 'cause it's getting chilly out here."
"Suiza! Are you out here? It's me, Oolong!"
Suiza jumped out of her skin at his voice. Who ever thought he'd come back so soon? Well, she was glad that she hadn't changed back into her
"I take it potty-boy's returned," Scam snickered. Suiza glared at him darkly, and Scam muttered a quick apology.
"Hold on, Oolong, I'm comin'!" Suiza shouted back. Out of the corner of her blue eye, she saw her tall, muscular date in the doorway. "Can you go get us a table? I'll be there shortly!"
"Yeah, sure, Suiza!" Oolong called to her, and he turned around and went back inside.
"Are you guys coming in?" Suiza asked her friends.
"Um…nah," Bigfoot replied. "I think we'll hang out here for a while, make sure that no more troublemakers like Teal and his bunch show up."
"Suit yourselves," Suiza told them, and she left to go back inside.
An hour later…
Oolong and Puar had finally managed to work out a successful plan, and so far it was working. Between them, they had concocted a scheme that had helped Oolong to take less "potty breaks" and be able to spend more time with Suiza.
Suiza had been unusually quiet for the past hour, although she had made polite conversation with Oolong. Oolong had apologized to her earlier, and Suiza had told him not to worry about it. Oolong felt like a heel for not being able to stand up to Teal. What must she think of him? Maybe she was mad; sometime women didn't always say just what they were thinking.
But at least, he didn't have to leave Suiza so often now, although he knew that Suiza was now wondering why he had to scratch his ankle so often or frequently dropped items to the floor. Every five minutes, Oolong would bend down below the table, and he would come back up after a minute. Suiza was puzzled by this behavior, but she figured that maybe Oolong just had an unusually scratchy ankle and extremely poor hand coordination. She had jokingly called Oolong "butterfingers" every time he dropped his fork or napkin or some other random item on the floor. After that crack, both of them laughed, and Suiza's mood lightened considerably.
But what Suiza didn't know was that every five minutes, she would actually be talking to Puar instead of Oolong. Puar, in Oolong's human form, would distract Suiza while Oolong hid under the table, well out of reach of Suiza's swinging feet. Oolong would wisely use that time to admire Suiza's gorgeously shaped human legs until he could safely transform back into the Nappa-like form that Suiza had come to know.
And Suiza also didn't know that when she spread her legs under the table, Oolong would shrewdly take a quick peek at her panties. This evening, she was wearing a blue, sequined thong. At this moment, Oolong was studying what he could of Suiza's panties, and he could barely keep himself from drooling. Suiza was definitely a babe all right!
Suiza was questioning Puar, "So, Oolong, how did you like the beer-battered popcorn shrimp? I have a pretty good cook, eh?"
"You sure do," Puar said in her best imitation possible of Oolong's human male voice. "I like this shrimp as much as I do catnip."
She squeaked when she felt Oolong lightly punch her leg for mentioning catnip again. Indignantly, she kicked Oolong back, right in his stomach. Before he could stop himself, Oolong cried out in a rough groan.
"What was that?" Suiza asked, alarmed.
"Oh, it was…me," Puar said quickly.
"I didn't see you cry out," Suiza pointed out.
Puar laughed nervously. "Oh, no, Suize, I just broke wind. Please excuse me."
Suiza laughed. "The shrimp gave you gas, eh?"
"Something like that."
At that moment, Puar felt a tug on her humanlike leg, and she knew that was the signal for her and Oolong to change again. "Um…excuse me again, there goes that ankle of mine…pesty thing," Puar commented, as she bent down below the table again to "scratch her ankle".
Within less than a minute, the real Oolong, in his fake human form, had returned. "Ah, that felt better."
"If I could, I'd give you a new ankle," Suiza said with a smile. "You're a strange fellow, Oolong, but it's been a while since a guy made me laugh. Teal used to be able to do that, but then…oh, never mind."
"You can tell me, if you want," Oolong told her.
"Nah, Teal's my past now, Ooos, but like any past, he comes back to haunt me every now and then. Don't really care to discuss him anymore for the rest of the night, if you don't mind."
"No prob," Oolong told her easily. "So, Suiza, can I ask how you managed to open up a biker bar and a motorbike shop?"
Suiza smiled. She was about to tell him when a song started to play. It was called, "The Flame", her personal favorite song by the group, Cheap Trick. Well, it actually used to be her second favorite; her first favorite used to be a love song that she and Teal had once declared to be "their" song, but whenever that one song played, she would tune it out and ignore it the best that she couldn't.
But she did love "The Flame", and she suddenly felt an urge to slow-dance. She held out her hand to Oolong and said in a soft tone for her, "May I have this dance with you?"
Oolong was then torn between wanting to accept her invite and wanting to flee. What if he couldn't escape from her in time when his five minutes were up?
"Please, Ooos," Suiza pressed. "This is my favorite song."
"I'm not that great of a dancer, and-"
Suiza laughed then. "Don't be so shy, Ooos!" And before Oolong could confer with Puar on how to handle the situation, Suiza seized him by his wrist and yanked him out of his chair. "Just another dance, just one, please?"
"O…kay!" Oolong cried out, as Suiza pulled him into her embrace. She nestled herself against him, and she and Oolong swayed to the music slowly, taking a few steps every now and then.
She felt so right against him, and Oolong became more relaxed, as Suiza laid her blond head against his chest. He loved the feel of her soft, bouncy bosom squashed nicely against his human chest.
He dared to hold her closer, and he murmured, "Suiza, I'm sorry that I haven't been the best date tonight."
"Don't worry 'bout it, Ooos, no biggie," Suiza murmured lazily. "If anything I should apologize for what you went through earlier tonight with Teal. I should have known that prick would show up; he always seems to find out when I'm with another man. It's like he has a sixth sense or somethin'. But his problems are no longer mine to worry with. I'm with you on a date now, not him. And when we have managed to spend time with each other, you've always managed to keep me on my toes or entertain me. I'm surprised you don't already have a girl."
Oolong chuckled nervously. "Guess I was waiting for you to come along."
Suiza laughed with him, and Oolong smiled; Suiza had such a great laugh, throaty and deep, with a trace of velvetiness to smooth out the rough tones.
"Hey, why don't we do something again Saturday?" Suiza suggested. "We can go to the movies, and I guarantee that this time it'll be just the two of us."
"Hey, yeah, sure," Oolong agreed happily before he thought.
"Let's see Bulletproof, that movie with that ex-gangster forced to become a spy for the CIA. Blue and Scam tell me that's the best action movie this year so far."
"Works for me," Oolong told her. He was a bit surprised though that she wanted to see a "shoot-em-up" movie like that. Most women he knew, such as Bulma and Chichi, usually preferred romantic "chick-flick" films. But hey, whatever turned Suiza on…finally, a woman who liked movies clearly made for men!
He closed his eyes, holding Suiza closer. He was thankful that she was still happy about seeing him…he was afraid that he had blown everything as far as dating her went. He allowed himself to unwind even further, as he dared to run his fingers through her hair.
He was so at peace that only a certain beeping from his watch could bring him back to reality…
"Oh no!" Oolong exclaimed.
"What's wrong?" Suiza asked worriedly.
"I left my wallet at the table, and I don't see it there-yeah, that's it! Be right back!"
"No one's going to take your wallet!" Suiza cried, but Oolong abandoned her anyway to go back to their table. To Suiza's astonishment, Oolong dived under the table, and the table began to shake, followed by a series of indignant sounds that sounded strangely like a cat meowing. Two minutes later, "Oolong" reemerged from under the table, and "he" dusted himself off casually. "He" then tucked "his" wallet back into a pants pocket, and he strolled lightly over to Suiza.
Puar was growing tired of this charade, and she decided then and there that it was time for her and Oolong to call it a night, whether Oolong liked it or not. In her best "Oolong-the-human-man" form, she smiled apologetically as she approached Suiza.
"Hey, Suize," the cat-turned-pig-pretending-to-be-human began. "I hate to cut things short, but I have to call it a night. I'm supposed to meet some friends of mine tomorrow in the morning. Can I call you?"
"Sure," Suiza told Puar, looking at her oddly. "Looks like I met myself an early bird."
"Cat," Puar corrected before she thought. And then she paled in her human form.
"Cat, eh?" Suiza wheezed in laughter. "You sure are a funny fellow, Oolong. Well, night-night, kittykins! Save me some of your catnip, will ya? Sorry I didn't get to bring you any tonight, but I will next time. Adios, amigo!"
"Night, Suiza, I really did have a good time with you," Puar told her as sincerely as possible.
"So did I," Suiza replied smoothly, and she leaned up and kissed "Oolong" chastely on "his" cheek. "By the way, I apologize for kissing you the way I did in front of Teal and his bunch earlier. I was just doin' it to prove to Teal that I moved on without him, and that I could see whichever man I wished. But I did like kissing you on the lips there, even though I normally wait a few dates before doing that. Again, you have a good-night."
"Night-night, see ya!" Puar called as she walked away quickly. She then crawled back under the table, again to Suiza's surprise. When Suiza saw her date again before he left, Oolong was wearing his "motorcycle helmet".
That was odd? Hadn't Oolong left his helmet on the bar earlier?
Outside of the bar, four creatures had been watching through the front picture window. The bear was scratching his behind with one paw and smoking a blueberry cigar with the other. The Siamese cat was also smoking a blueberry cigar, and the toad was feasting on a June bug while the weasel was holding a crippled Japanese beetle in his paws, toying with it. All four animals had been observing the remainder of Suiza's date with the bizarre Oolong, and they had been laughing loudly.
They laughed even louder when, halfway out in the parking lot, Oolong's watch had beeped again. A frantic, helmeted Oolong, had hurried to the safety of the side of the building and disappeared. Moments later, he had reappeared on the same bike that he had came on and sped off into the night.
Yes, it seemed possible that four animals could laugh like humans, but this quartet was no ordinary group. The Siamese was purring delightedly, as she watched a handsome biker enter the bar, and she was wondering how she could seduce him. The weasel had his mouth near the hidden ear of the toad, as if whispering a new scheme to him. And the giant bear was relieved to see Sassy Tolliver come out of the bar, carrying a pitcher of beer and five mugs.
Sassy filled the mugs with beer and passed a mug to the bear. The bear used one paw to hold the mug, and he easily gulped down the beer in four gulps. Sassy shook her head at him, as she passed the filled mugs out to the other three animals.
The Siamese lapped up her beer elegantly, with the normal feline grace of her species. The toad greedily slurped his beer with his long tongue, and the weasel actually wetted his entire face drinking the beer. The toad and the weasel consumed their beers within less than two minutes. Sassy shook her head at them.
She commented with a sigh, "And to think that Suiza's the only one out of us who's really a pig! Sometimes, with you two around, I wind up thinking we have more than one hog."
"Hey, can we help it if this stuff's the best domestic around," the toad quipped in a gruff human voice.
"That's right, Handyman, and I'd sure love another one," the weasel agreed in voice smoother than cream.
"You two are the real pigs," the Siamese told them contemptuously. She meowed huffily at the weasel, "Scam, at times like this, I wonder why I still go out with you every now and then."
"'Cause, my Blue Baby, you don't know any other weasel that can please you between the sheets when in human form," the weasel remarked, and he laughed when the Siamese rewarded him with an indignant swipe.
"How are you feelin', Sass?" the bear asked her. "I saw you sitting near the bar earlier, holding your back."
"No biggie, Bigfoot," Sassy assured him. "It's just the weight of little Brucie in my tummy here, that's all. But don't think I won't be thankful when I have this pup! It's hard enough being pregnant when I'm in my natural form."
"Well," Blue the Siamese told her, "if I were you, I'd be thankful that Chuckie only put one pup in your belly. It could have been four or five."
"And you oughta cut down on the cigs more, Sass," Handyman the toad dared to add. Sassy cut her eyes at him.
"I'm tryin' to cut down the best that I can!" she snapped. "Listen, H-Man, you try carrying a pup for two months and see how easy it would be for you to quit! I'm down to half a pack a day, a lot better than before."
"Well, you'll be giving birth soon," Bigfoot told her comfortingly.
"Yeah, but I do wish that Chuck had stuck around," Sassy sighed. "And this pup will be a mixed breed…ah, well, will still be my baby. I do miss his father on occasion, even if he was a tomcat in a Doberman's body…oh, I'm sorry, Blue, I didn't mean to offend-"
"None taken," Blue assured her easily. "Most tomcats I've met aren't much different than your Chuck."
"Sad break you got there, Sass, a pretty gray-and-white Siberian husky such as yourself getting mixed up with a Doberman," Scam told her with unusual sympathy.
"It's my fault, Scam," Sassy said. "I figured foolishly, that I could find happiness with another shape-shifter, especially since he was naturally a dog like myself. I hope Suiza has better luck than I did."
"Yeah, so what does everyone think of Oolong?" Handyman asked.
"He's weird," Scam said bluntly. "I oughta recommend my urologist to him."
"He does have a bladder problem," Bigfoot added. "But Suize seemed to be quite taken with him for some odd reason."
Blue said, "Odd fellow, but Suiza's dated stranger guys. Everyone remember the time that she dated that human before Teal, the one who turned out to be planning to have a sex-change operation-and wanted Suiza to get one to change herself into a man?"
The others chuckled and snickered.
"Yeah, but he might be too odd," Bigfoot commented. "And Suiza got hurt before by that last guy. I'll never forgive Teal for what he did to her."
"Neither will we," Sassy agreed. "And while I found myself liking Oolong in a way 'cause he is funny, we've got to keep an eye on him. He seems to be very secretive, and I don't think all those 'trips' are potty breaks."
"Yeah, we can't let Suiza get hurt again," Blue replied. "We know virtually nothing really about Oolong except that he has either an overactive bladder or a strange habit."
"He's hiding something," Sassy asserted. "I could tell. We've got to find out what he's up to, and if it's something that could wind up hurting up Suiza, we've got to put a stop to it."
"Do you think it's really necessary to be that worried, Sass?" Handyman questioned. "Just because Oolong is weird doesn't necessarily mean he's dangerous."
"You're right, H-Man, but we can't take that chance," Sassy told him. "Look, it'll probably turn out that Oolong has an overactive bladder and nothing more, but we have to make sure that's all that is."
"So, are we gonna spy on him or somethin'?" Scam inquired.
"Not quite yet, Scammeister," Sassy told him. "We'll wait until after the Saturday date that Suize has with Oolong. And don't any of ya mention this conversation to Suiza, not yet. I'm gonna try to find out where he lives, so I'm headin' back inside. I gotta check on Ruthie anyway."
Sassy looked over at Suiza drinking a beer at the bar. Ruthie was with her, sipping a strawberry daiquiri. Suiza and Ruthie were talking in hushed tones as Sassy approached them. She looked warmly at the two people, besides her unborn child, who meant the most in the world to her. Sassy was as protective of Suiza, as she was of Ruthie.
No matter how funny or interesting Oolong was, if he was hiding something, Sassy intended to find out. Sassy thought for a moment that perhaps she was taking things to extremes, but she then dismissed the idea.
After all, in her eyes, Suiza's welfare came before Oolong's right to privacy.
And being a shape-shifter, Sassy knew from first-hand experience that nothing was ever what it seemed.
I did make a small change in the story. Instead of Sassy being eight months pregnant, I went ahead and made her two months pregnant instead. You'll understand why after you read this chapter. And if you were confused about the animals hanging around the bar in the last chapter, this chapter will clear that up too.
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Chapter Four: Nothing Is Ever What It Seems
"BEEP-BEEP! BEEP-BEEP!"
Oolong panicked then, and he knew he had to get away quickly. As politely and speedily as he could, Oolong, in his human form, eased himself out of Suiza's embrace.
"Suiza, I'm sorry, but I got to-go to the men's room, yeah that's it! Be back shortly!"
"What, Oolong? What's going on?" Suiza asked worriedly.
Unfortunately for Oolong, Teal had caught up to him in the few seconds that he had started panicking about his time being up. Before he could escape, Teal grabbed him by his leather collar and yanked Oolong towards him.
"Teal let him go!" Suiza hissed.
"Relax, Suize, I'm just going to take Oolong outside for a little chat," Teal told his ex-girlfriend smoothly.
"Let me go, you thug!" Oolong cried, knowing that he only had twenty seconds before he would change back into his original form.
"Sure I will, baldy, just as soon as we're done talking," Teal crooned. "I think I need to emphasize to you as to just who Suiza belongs to-ME."
"Let him go!" Suiza snarled.
Sassy came up next to Suiza and glared at Teal. "Teal, why don't you and your buddies go back to the rocks that you guys crawled out from under? Suiza doesn't want anything to do with ya, so get lost!"
"This don't involve you, Sassy," Teal told her evenly.
"Anything involvin' Suize involves me," Sassy retorted coolly.
Oolong was struggling to get out of Teal's grip…oh it was going to be too late! He'd be busted for sure! Only seven seconds left!
"Let me go now!" Oolong screamed at Teal. "Let me-"
"ALL RIGHT, EVERYONE! THIS IS THE POLICE! TEAL, YOU AND YOUR THUGS COME OUT WITH YOUR HANDS UP!"
Teal cursed angrily.
"Look!" the fattest male member of Teal's gang called out the door. "I don't see no cops-"
"WE'RE BEHIND THE BUILDING! COME OUTSIDE NOW, IF YOU DON'T WANT TO GET ARRESTED!"
And after that a siren echoed loudly throughout the starry night.
Oolong wasted no time in pulling out of Teal's panicked, loosened grip. Hastily, he rushed towards the direction of the men's room.
Only three seconds left…
He opened the door to the men's room and dashed into a stall.
One second…
"POOF!"
An exhausted pig in a worn, leather jacket and five-year-old jeans sank against the wall of the stall in immense relief. Tears of relief hung in his eyes.
He was safe, and his secret was safe-for now.
Behind the building, Puar was rolling around on the ground in her natural cat form, laughing and squealing, as she listened to the panicked screams and shouts of the Rumblers racing to their motorcycles. She giggled, as she heard the whirring of motorcycle engines and the deafening squeals of rubber against concrete.
Once the sound of the last of the escaping motorcycle faded away, Puar shook the dust from her fur and released a huge meow of relief. She hoped that Oolong had escaped in time.
While Suiza had been kissing Oolong, Puar swiftly transformed herself into a housefly and flew out the door above the heads of Teal's fellow Rumblers. No one, whether Rumbler, Leatherneck, or guest, had seen a motorcycle helmet turn into a housefly because they had been distracted with all that had been going on.
When Puar had made it to the safety of behind the building, she turned herself into a loudspeaker and then into a police siren in order to scare the Rumblers into thinking that the police were after them. Puar's ribs ached, as she once again burst into a fit of laughter.
As she transformed into a housefly once more, she hoped that Oolong was okay. If she suspected correctly, Oolong would have tried to make it to the men's room instead of risking a beating at the hands of the Rumblers. Hoping that she was right, Puar the housefly reentered the building through an air vent that she hoped would lead her to the restrooms.
Bigfoot, Blue, Handyman, and Scam couldn't decide whether to be relieved that the Rumblers had left, to be worried that the police would come after them next, or to disappointed that they didn't get a chance to confront the Rumblers and teach them a lesson.
Bigfoot had figured that Teal had come back with his buddies, so that Teal could try to convince Suiza to give him a second chance. He also was certain that Teal would have attempted to make mincemeat out of Oolong, if the police hadn't shown up. Blue, Handyman, and Scam had, along with Bigfoot, looked forward to a scuffle with the Rumblers to teach those morons a lesson about giving any of the Leatherneck members a hard time. But before the four Leatherneck members could confront any of the Rumblers, the police had scared the Rumblers away.
While the Rumblers were fleeing the property, Bigfoot had ordered his fellow Leathernecks to get to the side of the building and wait, just in case the police decided to come after the Leatherneck members as well.
A few minutes after the Rumblers had departed, only Blue had enough nerve at that time to actually look behind the building, and when she did, she saw nothing. She could have sworn that she had heard a strange mixture of meows and laughter earlier, but the source of those noises seemed to have vanished without a trace.
Blue shrugged it off; the situation was strange, but the important thing was the Rumblers were gone now. As she slinked back gracefully to join her friends, she noticed that Suiza, Sassy, and Ruthie had joined the others.
An angry, embarrassed Suiza was calling Teal a variety of colorful, unladylike names that would have made even the foulest-mouthed of radio talk-show hosts blush. Sassy added a few nasty insults about Teal that included a wide assortment of raunchy terms referring to his most cherished body part below his belt. Ruthie was talking in soothing tones to try to calm down both her sister and Suiza, but both women seemed intent in relieving their fury verbally, no matter what.
"That bastard ruined my date with Oolong!" Suiza roared, after she had exhausted her almost endless supply of obscene words.
Having ended her insults before Suiza, Sassy patted Suiza's back sympathetically. "Look, Suize, at least you got one kiss from Oolong before he dashed off to use the potty for the hundred-and-fiftieth time this evening. Just the look on Teal's face was worth it, even if the police did show up and scare him and his buddies off."
"We're sorry that we didn't step earlier, Suize," Bigfoot replied regretfully.
"Don't worry about it," Suiza assured him gruffly. "You guys couldn't risk it with the cops being so close. If I remember correctly, you and Scam are still on probation from the last things you guys were convicted of. And I think that Handyman's just finished his for indecent exposure when he mooned the Hercule Satan Fan Club last year. I'd hate for you guys to wind up back in trouble with the law again."
Handyman smirked at the memory of showing his rather fleshy behind to a crowd of shocked Hercule-worshipping girls just a year ago. But it wasn't so much the mooning that horrified the Hercule groupies as much as the professionally drawn cartoon on Handyman's exposed buttocks. The cartoon, although expertly drawn, had displayed an obscene picture involving Hercule, Perfect Cell, and a vulgar sex act between the two that used the now-deceased Cell's life-draining tail in a way that nobody on Earth would have ever believed possible. Scam chuckled as he remembered that day; he had taken great pride in sketching that lovely moment between Cell and Hercule.
"Hey, relax, Suize," Scam, still chuckling, told her. "Handyman and I just thought that day that we should tell what really happened between Hercule and Cell!"
"After all, the truth will set you free!" Handyman laughed.
Suiza then allowed herself to smile. She and her fellow Leathernecks were among the minority of Earthlings who didn't believe that Hercule had truly defeated Cell. They honestly felt that if Hercule had actually been strong enough to destroy the monstrous android, he would have done so long before the televised Cell Games. And where had he been when Cell had taken all those other lives such a long time ago?
"Well, in that case, Hercule's definitely been living in a glided cage! I suppose if I had a life that cushy, I wouldn't want to leave that cage either," Suiza quipped.
"Yeah, same here," Sassy agreed.
"Well, guys, I better get back inside," Suiza told her friends. "I've hardly spent any time with my date tonight, and I feel bad about it."
"It'll be alright, Suize," Sassy assured her. "I think I'll go back inside with you 'cause it's getting chilly out here."
"Suiza! Are you out here? It's me, Oolong!"
Suiza jumped out of her skin at his voice. Who ever thought he'd come back so soon? Well, she was glad that she hadn't changed back into her
"I take it potty-boy's returned," Scam snickered. Suiza glared at him darkly, and Scam muttered a quick apology.
"Hold on, Oolong, I'm comin'!" Suiza shouted back. Out of the corner of her blue eye, she saw her tall, muscular date in the doorway. "Can you go get us a table? I'll be there shortly!"
"Yeah, sure, Suiza!" Oolong called to her, and he turned around and went back inside.
"Are you guys coming in?" Suiza asked her friends.
"Um…nah," Bigfoot replied. "I think we'll hang out here for a while, make sure that no more troublemakers like Teal and his bunch show up."
"Suit yourselves," Suiza told them, and she left to go back inside.
An hour later…
Oolong and Puar had finally managed to work out a successful plan, and so far it was working. Between them, they had concocted a scheme that had helped Oolong to take less "potty breaks" and be able to spend more time with Suiza.
Suiza had been unusually quiet for the past hour, although she had made polite conversation with Oolong. Oolong had apologized to her earlier, and Suiza had told him not to worry about it. Oolong felt like a heel for not being able to stand up to Teal. What must she think of him? Maybe she was mad; sometime women didn't always say just what they were thinking.
But at least, he didn't have to leave Suiza so often now, although he knew that Suiza was now wondering why he had to scratch his ankle so often or frequently dropped items to the floor. Every five minutes, Oolong would bend down below the table, and he would come back up after a minute. Suiza was puzzled by this behavior, but she figured that maybe Oolong just had an unusually scratchy ankle and extremely poor hand coordination. She had jokingly called Oolong "butterfingers" every time he dropped his fork or napkin or some other random item on the floor. After that crack, both of them laughed, and Suiza's mood lightened considerably.
But what Suiza didn't know was that every five minutes, she would actually be talking to Puar instead of Oolong. Puar, in Oolong's human form, would distract Suiza while Oolong hid under the table, well out of reach of Suiza's swinging feet. Oolong would wisely use that time to admire Suiza's gorgeously shaped human legs until he could safely transform back into the Nappa-like form that Suiza had come to know.
And Suiza also didn't know that when she spread her legs under the table, Oolong would shrewdly take a quick peek at her panties. This evening, she was wearing a blue, sequined thong. At this moment, Oolong was studying what he could of Suiza's panties, and he could barely keep himself from drooling. Suiza was definitely a babe all right!
Suiza was questioning Puar, "So, Oolong, how did you like the beer-battered popcorn shrimp? I have a pretty good cook, eh?"
"You sure do," Puar said in her best imitation possible of Oolong's human male voice. "I like this shrimp as much as I do catnip."
She squeaked when she felt Oolong lightly punch her leg for mentioning catnip again. Indignantly, she kicked Oolong back, right in his stomach. Before he could stop himself, Oolong cried out in a rough groan.
"What was that?" Suiza asked, alarmed.
"Oh, it was…me," Puar said quickly.
"I didn't see you cry out," Suiza pointed out.
Puar laughed nervously. "Oh, no, Suize, I just broke wind. Please excuse me."
Suiza laughed. "The shrimp gave you gas, eh?"
"Something like that."
At that moment, Puar felt a tug on her humanlike leg, and she knew that was the signal for her and Oolong to change again. "Um…excuse me again, there goes that ankle of mine…pesty thing," Puar commented, as she bent down below the table again to "scratch her ankle".
Within less than a minute, the real Oolong, in his fake human form, had returned. "Ah, that felt better."
"If I could, I'd give you a new ankle," Suiza said with a smile. "You're a strange fellow, Oolong, but it's been a while since a guy made me laugh. Teal used to be able to do that, but then…oh, never mind."
"You can tell me, if you want," Oolong told her.
"Nah, Teal's my past now, Ooos, but like any past, he comes back to haunt me every now and then. Don't really care to discuss him anymore for the rest of the night, if you don't mind."
"No prob," Oolong told her easily. "So, Suiza, can I ask how you managed to open up a biker bar and a motorbike shop?"
Suiza smiled. She was about to tell him when a song started to play. It was called, "The Flame", her personal favorite song by the group, Cheap Trick. Well, it actually used to be her second favorite; her first favorite used to be a love song that she and Teal had once declared to be "their" song, but whenever that one song played, she would tune it out and ignore it the best that she couldn't.
But she did love "The Flame", and she suddenly felt an urge to slow-dance. She held out her hand to Oolong and said in a soft tone for her, "May I have this dance with you?"
Oolong was then torn between wanting to accept her invite and wanting to flee. What if he couldn't escape from her in time when his five minutes were up?
"Please, Ooos," Suiza pressed. "This is my favorite song."
"I'm not that great of a dancer, and-"
Suiza laughed then. "Don't be so shy, Ooos!" And before Oolong could confer with Puar on how to handle the situation, Suiza seized him by his wrist and yanked him out of his chair. "Just another dance, just one, please?"
"O…kay!" Oolong cried out, as Suiza pulled him into her embrace. She nestled herself against him, and she and Oolong swayed to the music slowly, taking a few steps every now and then.
She felt so right against him, and Oolong became more relaxed, as Suiza laid her blond head against his chest. He loved the feel of her soft, bouncy bosom squashed nicely against his human chest.
He dared to hold her closer, and he murmured, "Suiza, I'm sorry that I haven't been the best date tonight."
"Don't worry 'bout it, Ooos, no biggie," Suiza murmured lazily. "If anything I should apologize for what you went through earlier tonight with Teal. I should have known that prick would show up; he always seems to find out when I'm with another man. It's like he has a sixth sense or somethin'. But his problems are no longer mine to worry with. I'm with you on a date now, not him. And when we have managed to spend time with each other, you've always managed to keep me on my toes or entertain me. I'm surprised you don't already have a girl."
Oolong chuckled nervously. "Guess I was waiting for you to come along."
Suiza laughed with him, and Oolong smiled; Suiza had such a great laugh, throaty and deep, with a trace of velvetiness to smooth out the rough tones.
"Hey, why don't we do something again Saturday?" Suiza suggested. "We can go to the movies, and I guarantee that this time it'll be just the two of us."
"Hey, yeah, sure," Oolong agreed happily before he thought.
"Let's see Bulletproof, that movie with that ex-gangster forced to become a spy for the CIA. Blue and Scam tell me that's the best action movie this year so far."
"Works for me," Oolong told her. He was a bit surprised though that she wanted to see a "shoot-em-up" movie like that. Most women he knew, such as Bulma and Chichi, usually preferred romantic "chick-flick" films. But hey, whatever turned Suiza on…finally, a woman who liked movies clearly made for men!
He closed his eyes, holding Suiza closer. He was thankful that she was still happy about seeing him…he was afraid that he had blown everything as far as dating her went. He allowed himself to unwind even further, as he dared to run his fingers through her hair.
He was so at peace that only a certain beeping from his watch could bring him back to reality…
"Oh no!" Oolong exclaimed.
"What's wrong?" Suiza asked worriedly.
"I left my wallet at the table, and I don't see it there-yeah, that's it! Be right back!"
"No one's going to take your wallet!" Suiza cried, but Oolong abandoned her anyway to go back to their table. To Suiza's astonishment, Oolong dived under the table, and the table began to shake, followed by a series of indignant sounds that sounded strangely like a cat meowing. Two minutes later, "Oolong" reemerged from under the table, and "he" dusted himself off casually. "He" then tucked "his" wallet back into a pants pocket, and he strolled lightly over to Suiza.
Puar was growing tired of this charade, and she decided then and there that it was time for her and Oolong to call it a night, whether Oolong liked it or not. In her best "Oolong-the-human-man" form, she smiled apologetically as she approached Suiza.
"Hey, Suize," the cat-turned-pig-pretending-to-be-human began. "I hate to cut things short, but I have to call it a night. I'm supposed to meet some friends of mine tomorrow in the morning. Can I call you?"
"Sure," Suiza told Puar, looking at her oddly. "Looks like I met myself an early bird."
"Cat," Puar corrected before she thought. And then she paled in her human form.
"Cat, eh?" Suiza wheezed in laughter. "You sure are a funny fellow, Oolong. Well, night-night, kittykins! Save me some of your catnip, will ya? Sorry I didn't get to bring you any tonight, but I will next time. Adios, amigo!"
"Night, Suiza, I really did have a good time with you," Puar told her as sincerely as possible.
"So did I," Suiza replied smoothly, and she leaned up and kissed "Oolong" chastely on "his" cheek. "By the way, I apologize for kissing you the way I did in front of Teal and his bunch earlier. I was just doin' it to prove to Teal that I moved on without him, and that I could see whichever man I wished. But I did like kissing you on the lips there, even though I normally wait a few dates before doing that. Again, you have a good-night."
"Night-night, see ya!" Puar called as she walked away quickly. She then crawled back under the table, again to Suiza's surprise. When Suiza saw her date again before he left, Oolong was wearing his "motorcycle helmet".
That was odd? Hadn't Oolong left his helmet on the bar earlier?
Outside of the bar, four creatures had been watching through the front picture window. The bear was scratching his behind with one paw and smoking a blueberry cigar with the other. The Siamese cat was also smoking a blueberry cigar, and the toad was feasting on a June bug while the weasel was holding a crippled Japanese beetle in his paws, toying with it. All four animals had been observing the remainder of Suiza's date with the bizarre Oolong, and they had been laughing loudly.
They laughed even louder when, halfway out in the parking lot, Oolong's watch had beeped again. A frantic, helmeted Oolong, had hurried to the safety of the side of the building and disappeared. Moments later, he had reappeared on the same bike that he had came on and sped off into the night.
Yes, it seemed possible that four animals could laugh like humans, but this quartet was no ordinary group. The Siamese was purring delightedly, as she watched a handsome biker enter the bar, and she was wondering how she could seduce him. The weasel had his mouth near the hidden ear of the toad, as if whispering a new scheme to him. And the giant bear was relieved to see Sassy Tolliver come out of the bar, carrying a pitcher of beer and five mugs.
Sassy filled the mugs with beer and passed a mug to the bear. The bear used one paw to hold the mug, and he easily gulped down the beer in four gulps. Sassy shook her head at him, as she passed the filled mugs out to the other three animals.
The Siamese lapped up her beer elegantly, with the normal feline grace of her species. The toad greedily slurped his beer with his long tongue, and the weasel actually wetted his entire face drinking the beer. The toad and the weasel consumed their beers within less than two minutes. Sassy shook her head at them.
She commented with a sigh, "And to think that Suiza's the only one out of us who's really a pig! Sometimes, with you two around, I wind up thinking we have more than one hog."
"Hey, can we help it if this stuff's the best domestic around," the toad quipped in a gruff human voice.
"That's right, Handyman, and I'd sure love another one," the weasel agreed in voice smoother than cream.
"You two are the real pigs," the Siamese told them contemptuously. She meowed huffily at the weasel, "Scam, at times like this, I wonder why I still go out with you every now and then."
"'Cause, my Blue Baby, you don't know any other weasel that can please you between the sheets when in human form," the weasel remarked, and he laughed when the Siamese rewarded him with an indignant swipe.
"How are you feelin', Sass?" the bear asked her. "I saw you sitting near the bar earlier, holding your back."
"No biggie, Bigfoot," Sassy assured him. "It's just the weight of little Brucie in my tummy here, that's all. But don't think I won't be thankful when I have this pup! It's hard enough being pregnant when I'm in my natural form."
"Well," Blue the Siamese told her, "if I were you, I'd be thankful that Chuckie only put one pup in your belly. It could have been four or five."
"And you oughta cut down on the cigs more, Sass," Handyman the toad dared to add. Sassy cut her eyes at him.
"I'm tryin' to cut down the best that I can!" she snapped. "Listen, H-Man, you try carrying a pup for two months and see how easy it would be for you to quit! I'm down to half a pack a day, a lot better than before."
"Well, you'll be giving birth soon," Bigfoot told her comfortingly.
"Yeah, but I do wish that Chuck had stuck around," Sassy sighed. "And this pup will be a mixed breed…ah, well, will still be my baby. I do miss his father on occasion, even if he was a tomcat in a Doberman's body…oh, I'm sorry, Blue, I didn't mean to offend-"
"None taken," Blue assured her easily. "Most tomcats I've met aren't much different than your Chuck."
"Sad break you got there, Sass, a pretty gray-and-white Siberian husky such as yourself getting mixed up with a Doberman," Scam told her with unusual sympathy.
"It's my fault, Scam," Sassy said. "I figured foolishly, that I could find happiness with another shape-shifter, especially since he was naturally a dog like myself. I hope Suiza has better luck than I did."
"Yeah, so what does everyone think of Oolong?" Handyman asked.
"He's weird," Scam said bluntly. "I oughta recommend my urologist to him."
"He does have a bladder problem," Bigfoot added. "But Suize seemed to be quite taken with him for some odd reason."
Blue said, "Odd fellow, but Suiza's dated stranger guys. Everyone remember the time that she dated that human before Teal, the one who turned out to be planning to have a sex-change operation-and wanted Suiza to get one to change herself into a man?"
The others chuckled and snickered.
"Yeah, but he might be too odd," Bigfoot commented. "And Suiza got hurt before by that last guy. I'll never forgive Teal for what he did to her."
"Neither will we," Sassy agreed. "And while I found myself liking Oolong in a way 'cause he is funny, we've got to keep an eye on him. He seems to be very secretive, and I don't think all those 'trips' are potty breaks."
"Yeah, we can't let Suiza get hurt again," Blue replied. "We know virtually nothing really about Oolong except that he has either an overactive bladder or a strange habit."
"He's hiding something," Sassy asserted. "I could tell. We've got to find out what he's up to, and if it's something that could wind up hurting up Suiza, we've got to put a stop to it."
"Do you think it's really necessary to be that worried, Sass?" Handyman questioned. "Just because Oolong is weird doesn't necessarily mean he's dangerous."
"You're right, H-Man, but we can't take that chance," Sassy told him. "Look, it'll probably turn out that Oolong has an overactive bladder and nothing more, but we have to make sure that's all that is."
"So, are we gonna spy on him or somethin'?" Scam inquired.
"Not quite yet, Scammeister," Sassy told him. "We'll wait until after the Saturday date that Suize has with Oolong. And don't any of ya mention this conversation to Suiza, not yet. I'm gonna try to find out where he lives, so I'm headin' back inside. I gotta check on Ruthie anyway."
Sassy looked over at Suiza drinking a beer at the bar. Ruthie was with her, sipping a strawberry daiquiri. Suiza and Ruthie were talking in hushed tones as Sassy approached them. She looked warmly at the two people, besides her unborn child, who meant the most in the world to her. Sassy was as protective of Suiza, as she was of Ruthie.
No matter how funny or interesting Oolong was, if he was hiding something, Sassy intended to find out. Sassy thought for a moment that perhaps she was taking things to extremes, but she then dismissed the idea.
After all, in her eyes, Suiza's welfare came before Oolong's right to privacy.
And being a shape-shifter, Sassy knew from first-hand experience that nothing was ever what it seemed.