Feral was literally floating on air by the time he went to work the next morning. He and Kam had played for hours, broke for dinner and went at it again. Because of the strange device Kam possessed, Feral was never sore for more than a few moments. What was left was complete satiation.
By the time they finally parted at dawn, so they both could go home to get ready for work, he and Kam were firmly lovers. This was no temporary fling and that surprised him. He should be uneasy how well the two of them melded together as if they'd been lovers for years. But for reasons he really didn't want to pick at for the moment, he accepted Kam into his life and accepted the incredible feelings of being whole for the first time.
Kam, however, was very uneasy. His intense desire for Feral hadn't been eased by their consummation of that attraction all last night. On the contrary, he still hungered for the tom, his need to possess him utterly and thoroughly was overwhelming. Feral had gotten under his fur in a way none had since he reached maturity. He feared what this might mean but shied away from looking too closely at it yet. The mission had to come first.
As he showered in the apartment he shared, he growled in annoyance. No omegas had appeared and if he'd been a skeptical wolf, he would have said the stories were fabrications by the inhabitants except they couldn't deny the live video feeds when they tapped into the news centers of the city and first person stories from those that had survived the attacks. The omegas were very real. He'd had Donar do a historical review to see just how long these creatures had been harassing this city and figure out the time line between each attack.
They were to meet at the shuttle two days from now, so he needed to concentrate on getting Feral's defenses beefed up with the new methods he'd briefed him on, but backing off from Feral's bed was out of the question. He bristled at just the thought of it.
Sighing in resignation, he dried off and quickly ate breakfast then took off for Enforcer Headquarters. Entering Ulysses' office he was pleasantly relieved to be greeted by an 'all business' attitude from his lover. Uly did give him a warm smile but went right to work. This only made him that much more attractive to Kam.
With a much lighter heart and his mind fully focused, Kam was determined to make Uly's enforcers more prepared and ready to take on any omegas that appeared.
Under the massive flight line that spanned the twin towers of Enforcer Headquarters, contractors were hard at work rewiring and repairing the damage done to it during the last attack by Dark Kat a few months ago. Genus was working along side a group stringing line and reconnecting electrical connections that had been ripped out.
He'd learned the contractor was on speed dial with the resource manager for the enforcers and considered the Enforcers a regular source of work due to the depredations of the omegas. He listened intently without appearing to, at all the recollections of the workers about the variety of omegas and the damages caused by them.
A few had lost family and/or friends in the attacks and yet they still had a tough, stick with it attitude that allowed them to continue on when much weaker types would have abandoned the city to the aggressors a long time ago. That didn't mean the Katizens weren't hardily tired of being on the defensive though.
Genus could hear anger, resignation, outrage, acceptance in all the voices he listened to. This was a hardworking, brave, and strong species. He thought the Captain's tentative question of whether this planet would be a good addition to the galactic alliance could be answered with a strong yes.
These people managed to handle everything thrown at them and were, amazingly, accepting of the strange and weird with a laissez-faire that was laudable. It also meant they should have no problem accepting other species' visiting their world for rest and relaxation. They would certainly benefit financially by becoming an intergalactic way station. Considerable jumps in technology, medical care and environmental management of their planet were just some of the things a new member gained with their membership.
He had a lot of thoughts to bring up on their next meeting and he thought Captain Ing would be pleased by the possibility of the Wotan being able to gain a new member for the alliance. It was considered a coup for a hunter/exploration ship to succeed in signing up a new planet. It gave them a lot of prestige back home.
As he moved further down the line, his mind drifted to the unusual tom he'd spent the night before with. He'd managed to glean a bit more information from the tom but not as much as he'd liked. Jake was closemouthed though warm and friendly. It almost seemed Genus was dealing with someone with two personalities or plenty of secrets.
He was intrigued enough that he had begun to investigate the tom's background. He hadn't too much time to do more than find out that Jake had been an enforcer and had been kicked out. For what reason, he'd not had time to discover.
He needed to dig a little deeper using his scanner to look into the immense amount of documents this planet, fortunately, maintained on its Katizens. Genus planned to do that when he got off today since he wasn't supposed to see Jake until the weekend.
He grinned to himself. It had taken quite a bit to convince the tom to see him again. Despite the intense attraction between them, Jake had remained cautious and reluctant to continue any kind of lengthy relationship. But, finally just before they parted in the early hours of the morning, he got the cinnamon tom to agree to another meeting.
At lunchtime, he decided to do a little fishing. Normally the contractor's workers ate their meals clustered together but Genus had cultivated a tentative friendship with the enforcer engineers that worked with them. So far he'd been able to glean a lot of interesting tidbits from these sources.
Today, he wanted to see if any of them knew Jake. Sitting in a comfortable, makeshift break area they used, he dug into his meal with gusto and listened closely to the conversations around him, waiting for the right moment to ask his questions.
"Hey, you hear about that foam bomb the SWAT Kats used on that major fire over at warehouse row?" One of the engineers asked another.
"Yeah! Man I wish we could get our paws on that bright Kat that's coming up with those funky and outright incredible inventions. I hear the R & D guys are just frothing at the mouth wanting to get their paws on those glove weapons of theirs." Another responded.
Genus' ears pricked up. "Is it both of them that makes these things?" He asked innocently.
"Heck no! Everyone's fairly certain its that little SWAT Kat that's the genius behind that stuff. That big lug appears to be just the pilot." The second respondent answered, snorting.
"Hey, that big Kat doesn't come off stupid you know! He might not be the inventor of those gadgets but he is one incredible pilot as well as fighter!" Another objected.
"No argument there." A fairly young engineer said, awe on his face.
"Yeah, well, that small SWAT Kat isn't as good as that young fella we lost when he got booted out with his partner. No, that was a real brainy youngster." A much older engineer said, scoffing at the youngster's around him.
"Aw Tyner, you ain't going on about that Clawson fool, are you?" A middled aged engineer sneered.
"He weren't no fool! Clawson was a brilliant engineer and should have been in R & D rather than have his talents wasted as a gunner to that big tabby." He defended the disgraced enforcer.
"Yeah, well he wasn't so smart if he and that tabby couldn't be bothered to obey orders. Look where it got them!" The middled aged engineered snorted in derision.
The rest got into a heated debate about the treatment of the pair of disgraced enforcers until the lunch period ended. As Genus threw his trash away and headed back out to work, he was pleased by the significant amount of unexpected information he'd gained on Jake. Now he had a bit better picture on the small tom. He could hardly wait to find out more when he began his research tonight.
Donar paused to wipe his brow, after hauling huge empty tanks of chemicals into the store room at the Biochemical Labs. He had just brought them from Pumadyne. Unlike his team mates, he'd not heard as much gossip because he worked alone. All he had gotten was snippets of gossip from the guards when they were willing to talk and the lab people.
It was disappointingly little. All the personnel seemed to talk about was the annoying problems of restocking, repairing or even rebuilding destruction caused by the omega attacks. They didn't have much good to say about the enforcers, except to say they were inadequate and that the vigilantes caused nearly as much damage as the omegas and enforcers combined.
He had managed to overhear a small piece of gossip about Professor Hackle. It appeared he was the one responsible for creating the Metallikats but it had been totally an accident and, as one of the speakers derisively said, 'That Kat is such a bleeding heart. All he goes on about is making life easier for Katkind with all his inventions especially his robots. Too bad he's now known as the one for creating the worst pair of robots in history.'
Donar wasn't surprised by that attitude. It seemed to be universal among inventors and scientists with no moral standards. They just developed things that killed because of the money and with no regards to what their devices would be used for.
He might be a bit unfair to this group of scientists but the information he gleaned with his research said he was right on target. Though Pumadyne did create things to push Kat kind ahead, like the satellite to break up earthquakes and the exploration robots, still their main function was creating weapons and military hardware.
Professor Hackle, on the other paw, had been one of them early in his career but had gradually become disillusioned by all the violence and had broken away to quietly invent things for the betterment of his species. The fact that one of his good intentions had gone awry was no excuse to condemn him out of paw completely.
Donar would like to meet this Kat before they left here, just to see if his impression of the elderly inventor matched his profile of him. If this planet didn't think much of him, he knew a lot of other races that would revere him and encourage him in his work.
Just thinking about the Professor gave him a inkling of an idea. Hackle had already invented some robots, he'd heard. Would it be possible to coax him to allow their use in defeating a few of their enemies? He began to get excited as he mulled the idea around in his mind.
Depending on what kind of robots Hackle had developed, it was too great an opportunity to ignore. Because of his pacifist attitude, Hackle probably didn't even think about how his inventions could eradicate, say...Dr. Viper and even Hard Drive. Now there was an idea worth pursuing. He'd have to come up with an excuse that would get him in to see the Professor, then they would see. But first, he needed to bring up the idea with Kam.
He sighed, that would have to wait another couple of days. Meanwhile, he could hardly wait till his shift was over. He'd certainly gotten the boringest job of all of them. Maybe he should check out the club scene tomorrow night. Donar hadn't gone out since he'd arrived since he spent his evenings doing research for Kam. Walking in Megakat Park had been his only relaxation, time to do something else. Tonight, however, was confined to doing that time line research, Kam wanted.
Over at the museum, Tara was in heaven. Working with Abi Sinian was really great and the stuff she'd been researching from this planet's past had kept her enthralled. It was really too bad this species had veered almost completely away from magic. It was now practiced in a very limited way by small die hard groups that hadn't changed their beliefs for centuries but there were very few. Science ruled the day now and they were just discovering that hadn't been entirely a good thing.
Some basic knowledge of magic might have helped them when they began to have omegas with the ability show up and cause such havoc. They had been incredibly lucky in their encounters so far but that might not continue. Which was a good reason for Sinian to focus her attention on this neglected area.
Tara found the time of Queen Callista endlessly fascinating and had recently learned, the Deputy Mayor of the city was apparently her descendent and quite possibly possessed dormant talents in this area. The Pastmaster, one of their worst omegas, seemed to think so and was constantly trying to take her.
This gave Tara an idea on how to finally rid this city of its magical menace. It would require some tinkering with their advanced technology to check Ms. Briggs for a magical signature then, if she possessed it, help her develop it enough to allow her to defeat their enemy. It was worth a shot and it helped that Ms. Briggs was a very brave Kat who was willing to do anything to protect her city.
But to do this, they would have to reveal who they were and why they were here. This wasn't a decision she was authorized to make and a lot of other factors had to come into play before they could or would reveal themselves to this world.
She sighed. In the meantime, she would research everything she could about how Queen Callista used her powers so that, if the opportunity arose, they might be able to go forward with her plan.