CHAPTER TWO

BLAZE… YOU'RE LATE!

The meowing stopped. Kim sighed and looked down at the cats that were resting comfortably on her lap. She started scratching them both behind the ear, only to stop when she felt something rubbing against her left thigh. She reached her left hand out beside her and picked the mysterious cat up.

With the cat held out in front of her, she took a good look at the tardy kitten. He had shiny white fur, and charcoal colored eyes. His left eye was shut, with a diagonal pale pink scar running down it. Kim, being the sap that she was, couldn't turn away an injured person or animal.

"Aww! You poor baby kitty," she cooed, pushing the black cats, much to their dismay, off her lap, and cradled the white cat in her arms like a newborn. The cat in her arms started to squirm out of embarrassment. Then he stretched out on her lap liking the way it felt when she started stroking his fur.

The other kittens seemed to be laughing at the white cat. Most of them meowed once happily to show their amusement. Noodle was expressing his amusement the most. Blossom mewed a few times, but Noodle... He was rolling around all over the place and jumping on the others. It was when he jumped on top of Hawk, did he stop laughing.

Hawk hissed at Noodle, which only prompted Noodle to hiss back. As the two cats fought, everyone, the two girls and the eight other kittens, just sat back and watched. They started circling each other, waiting for the other to strike first. Noodle was the one to make the first move when he pounced at Hawk with his claws out. The two cats started fighting all over the floor. They would back off only for one of them to hiss, and then the fight would start over again.

"Jade you should stop them. You know, before they kill each other."

"No. They'll just claw my hands. I don't really want cuts on my hands," Jade retorted hold up her un-clawed hands for Kim to see. Kim's eye twitched.

"Ugh! Jade stop being such a girl!"

"Well, what do you want me to be… a man?"

"I didn't mean that. I meant stop being such a prissy bitch, but if you want to be a man... I will still be your friend," Kim replied with a smirk.

"You're such a jerk. Fine, but if I get any scratches you're going to pay for my next manicure," she said with a glare.

When the girls looked down at the fighting cats they saw Blossom hissing at them both. Hawk and Noodle turned to look at her, and then they continued their fight. Blossom got angry when they ignored her, and calmly started walking over to the two brawling kittens.

The yellow cat noticed her first, and started backing away slowly with his ears pressed down firmly against his head. The black cat just sat down calmly, almost as if he knew the little pink cat wouldn't dare hit him, and smirked at the bright yellow cat. When she got in front of the black cat her eyes narrowed and she hissed at him then head-butted him before chasing after the yellow cat. The black cat's eyes were wide, and then narrowed when the other black cat meowed teasingly at him.

Blossom chased Noodle around the garage while hissing at him. When they made it back to where everyone was sitting, Noodle sighed in relief having had lost Blossom, but when he least expected it, she pounced on him. She head-butted him, as she had done with the smaller of the black cats, and then walked away. Noodle mewed out in pain, which made Blossom round on him. She stalked towards him, hissed, bit his ear and walked away and sat down between Berry and Fang.

"Okay," Jade said looking at the cats.

"Weird ass cats," stated Kim.

"Though they are entertaining," Jade pointed out tilting her head to the side.

"As long as they don't break anything I'm good." Kim raised a brow in the cat's direction. "So... what do we name him," she questioned holding the white cat up facing him towards Jade. She then turned him around to face her, putting them nose to nose she asked, "What should we name you? You're fur is white. Clouds are white. Cloudy? No. Fluffy? No, you're not exactly fluffy. Snowflake? No. Snowball? No, when I think snowball I think of fat cats. Pearl? No that's a girl's name. Lightning is white, but I don't think Lightning would make a good cat's name."

"Hey, Kim, what about-"

"BLAZE! We can name you Blaze," Kim yelled making the white cat jerk back with wide eyes. "Thanks Jade! We should take them inside so they don't hurt themselves down here."

With that said, she scooped up the two black cats, who hadn't moved from her side, with her right arm, and carried them through a door on the other side of the garage and into the reception area.

When in the reception area she walked out from behind the receptionist's desk to the entrance, turned the lock on the door and flipped the sign so that it read 'closed.' Then she went up a spiral staircase that was located to the left of the desk. At the top of the staircase was a door that led into the five bedroom loft apartment that she and her father had shared for about five years. She opened the door and went in, leaving it wide open for Jade, and gently lowered the three felines to the floor before making her way to the bathroom.

The three cats took the time while the human was away to familiarize themselves with their new living arrangements.

When someone first walked into the apartment they would see the living room area to the left. A charcoal gray, tufted-back sofa, was pushed up against the wall adjacent to the wall witch housed the large bay window to the left, along with a matching ottoman to the right of the sofa, two black barrel chairs to the left, and a light gray driftwood coffee table in the center of it all and matching side tables between the barrel chairs and on the left of the sofa. Directly across from the sofa was a rather large flat screen TV centered on the wall with a stand beneath it housing various game consoles, and a studio bookshelf on either side filled with vast movie and game collection.

To the right were the kitchen and dining room areas, with the kitchen being further back and the dinning space adjacent to the front door. The dining table was a simple yet modern light gray rectangular table much like the coffee and side tables with four blue parsons' chairs. The kitchen cabinets were a bright white offset with black fixtures and stainless steel appliances. The island was painted a matte black and, like the countertops, had a white Quartz top with three black barstools.

Then to the back wall, between the living room and the kitchen area was a hallway hidden by a staircase that led to the second floor of the loft. Going down the hallway would lead to two bedrooms and two and a half bathrooms. Up the stairs, would lead to three more bedrooms and three more bathrooms.

Back down in the garage, Jade watched her friend's back as she walked away with the three cats in her arms. Then she looked down to the remaining seven cats on the ground. She stood up straightening out her outfit before walking over to the same door Kim had exited. Before walking through the door, she turned back around and called out to the cats.

"I am not going to carry you guys like Kim. You'll just get fur all over my shirt." She held the door open with her foot while she stretched out to reach the system's control panel on the desk. She hit a few buttons that operated the garage's doors and shut off all the lights.

She made sure all the cats were inside the room before letting the door swing shut, then she led them up the staircase and into the loft apartment, which was also going to be her new home, and closed the door right after the last cat entered the room. She then sat down on the dark gray sofa, laying her head down on the armrest facing Kim, who sat on the barrel chair closest to the sofa. She watched as her best friend placed the three cats she was holding on the floor, and then turned over to face her.

"So... ten cats. What are we going to tell my dad? He should be back from that house call soon."

"Well... he is your dad. So that means you should tell him," the brunette replied with an award winning smile on her face.

"Hey you want them as much as I do, and you're going to be moving in soon, so you can help me take care of them too," Kim reasoned.

"No, I don't," Jade sang.

"And why not?"

"Well, if I'm not here when your dad gets back, then I don't have to take care of the cats. I can just play with them and be on my merry way. No feeding them or cleaning up after them." With that she stood up and started to run to the door.

"Jade! You're going to help me!" Kim got up and started to run after her friend.

The ten cats could only watch as the two girls ran around the apartment. Jade was trying to make it to the front door, while Kim was just trying to prevent her from leaving.

That was not what Ren, Kim's father, expected to see when he returned home from a house call. The call turned out to be from an extremely desperate woman who tried to seduce him all throughout the process of fixing up her not-so-broken down car. She had kept running her hands through his hair and up and down his arms and body distracting him, and made the car fixing process drag out. He was not exactly the dating type. It was not that he didn't want to date, it was just that all the women that were attracted to him only wanted him for his looks. He wanted a serious relationship, but they only wanted a short-term fling. It had been a long morning, and all he wanted to do was take a shower and spend the rest of the day watching TV and relaxing on the couch with a cold beer.

Too bad nothing ever goes as planned. When he opened the front door, he really should stop being so surprised; he found everything in a mess. The sofa was upturned, and there were ten cats sitting there staring at something. All the chairs in the kitchen area were scattered all over the floor. Right in front of him was his seventeen year old daughter and her eighteen year old best friend. To be more precise Jade was on her stomach attempting to crawl to the front door, and Kim was holding onto her waist trying to make her stay. To top it all off they were throwing insults at each other.

"-at least my ass can fit in a pair of jeans!"

"At least I have an ass!"

"I have an ass, it's just little!"

"Sure you do. Well at least I don't have to be constantly worrying about my boobs popping out of my shirt all the time!"

"Shut up, Slut Butt!"

"Let me go, Big Ears!"

"Leave my ears al-"

"Girls!"

"WHAT," the girls yelled in unison. They paled when they saw Kim's father standing there in the door way. He had the same dark brown almost black eyes and ebony colored hair as his daughter. He was six feet tall, had tanned skin, and was well built. He wore a look of exasperation mixed with tiredness and oil on his face.

Without taking his eyes off the two troublesome girls, Ren calmly opened the coat-closet door, grabbed two jackets, a white blazer and a black pull-over with a silver Bat-Symbol on the front, and two bags, a giant pink tote and a burgundy hobo bag. He handed the girls their jackets and walked over to the cats, taking their bags with him. One by one he picked them up and paced five in each bag, his eyebrows crinkling at some of their fur colors. He stood back up and handed the girls their bags, before pulling out his wallet and taking out his debit cart, and handing it to his daughter.

"If you're going to keep these cats you're going to need to buy a few things. Buy them the necessities, collars, name-tags, and some toys. I will not have them scratching up the furniture." Having said that, he pushed the girls out the front door. He let out a sigh of relief, and walked over to the fridge.

"There better still be some beer in here."