Vel grinned, pleased at her success and looking like a cat who got the cream; in her mind, no protest at and answering to the nickname cemented it in her mind as his official nickname. ‘Shades’ it was. The blonde had to tilt her head back to look up at the guy, but showed no inferiority at being so much shorter. She knew at five nine that she towered over most sprites.
"Neat pals you got there." It took a moment, but eventually she registered just what he’d called her. And she didn’t like it. Her expression transformed slowly, brows knitting over her eyes and her mouth turning down stubbornly.
"Nnnno." She drew the word out, cutting it off short at the end. It was the same tone one might use with a misbehaving dog. “Nuh-uh. Not sweetcheeks. Not ever." The rest of his greeting was woefully forgotten in the midst of her refusal.
Kid motioned to the lanky cheetah-man, and he waved lazily in response, his other hand running through his spiked-up mane that Kid had done with some of his own hair gel. It felt prickly against the anthro-cat's skin, but he had a feeling he'd get used to it. He sort of liked the new look.
"This is Leck, his second-in-command."
The black panther only nodded, but a small grin showed momentarily, exposing his teeth. "Pleasure to meet you," he responded in a slightly British accent, before focusing back on the weapon he'd been tinkering with.
"Montezuma, the muscle. He prefers to be called Monty."
The big, bulky jaguar sat still as a stone, staring at Vel. Only the occasional jingle of the hoops in his ear that clinked together when he twitched them showed that he was paying any attention at all.
"And Shawnee, the sharpshooter."
The mountain lion showed the most interest, standing up from her spot and pacing around the blonde girl, sniffing her clothing and the air around her, beads and buckskins rustling and clinking with female cat's movement. "I smell an entire kitchen on you," she stated simply, taking a step back to stare at her with yellow-green eyes. "Do you cook?"
That first knock made her jump, and scamper away from the door. Had he seen her put the box outside? Had he come back? Hadshejustmadehimangry?
..Well he could /be/ angry! He deserved it!
“I said no!”
The little girl frowned, glaring at the door from across the room—she was still half expecting it to just break in at any moment, and her heart was still racing. She thought he /left/!
“I said—I said t’go away! And I meant it! And—!”
Wait a second. There were other footsteps out there—several, if she was listening right. Not just Maniaxe—and he wasn’t the sort to have /friends/. She knew that (or, at least she did now). So, slowly, she inched to the side, just far enough so she could peek out her window to see onto the little porch outside, and…well, it certainly wasn’t Maniaxe outside her door.
“Kid!” she yelped, and in half a second she had the door tossed open and his hand snatched up in hers, tugging him inside and telling the Super Cat team behind him to come in, too.
While Kid was used to enthusiastic greetings from Jubileena at this point, the way that she practically shoved the coolkid inside her house (which was newly refurbished, he could see...she'd done well for someone who didn't want anybody older to help her fix the place up) and the way she'd quickly invited Phoebus and his gang inside the house as well that something was wrong. However, on the other side of things, Phoebus and the rest of the Panthera Belligerent sprites seemed to be very grateful for Jubi's hospitality...they hadn't really been invited inside her house as of yet.
But once they saw that Kid had suddenly tensed, they went on high alert as well...except for Shawnee, who had picked up the scent of Socks and had gone off to look for the little kitten. She'd always wanted to meet her.
"Jubes," Kid began slowly, gently pulling his arm from the little girl's grasp and kneeling down so that he could look her in the eyes, brows furrowing behind his shades. "What's going on? You seem a little...uptight."
While the kid himself hadn’t left a lasting impression on Vel, his words stuck in her mind. She sat against a wall, leaning her head back to rest against it.
Since it wasn't all that busy in Game Central at this hour, the commotion that Vel was making was enough to get Kid to look up from his cat-man entourage.
It was the gameless sprite...the one that no one knew quite where she came from, or why she was around here so often...not that it mattered anyhow because she didn't seem to pose any real threat to anybody. What was her name again...something with a v?
What a coincidence Casey couldn't remember her name, when she couldn't remember his.
Nonetheless, he quickly dismissed himself from the Super Cats and turned back to meet up with the blonde-haired girl, a cool grin playing across his lips as he spoke.
"So, you remember me this time, sweetcheeks? That was a pretty cool party we were at the other day. I just hope Wifi liked my gift."
Dude, once you spark the “R” word, there’s no going back. So I’m being completely, truly, 100 percent honest. I wouldn’t use such a potent adjective if I wasn’t being serious.
Ding! askmishela started following you.
Ding! hater—anon started following you.
Ding! god-and-son-of-anons started following you.
Ding! wearthehatbethekid started following you.
Ding! idreamofsheep started following you.
Though his dark shades hid his eyes, the rest of the teenage boy's face had only an expression of pure awe as he sat at the feet of four massive jungle cats and listened to their leader talk, getting lost in the tale of a forgotten, unplugged beat 'em up that once starred them and completely forgoing his usual spot, curled up on a bench and grinding at his latest high scores on his Game Gear.
In the short time since they had rescued him, Casey (better known as the "Kid Chameleon" to some and just "Kid" to others) had learned a lot about this motley crew of cat people, known as the Super Cats in their old game of Panthera Belligerent. First, he'd learned they were 90's-copyrighted, just like him. Then, he learned that they were made to compete with the Cheetahmen, a gaggle of console-game kung fu cheetahs whom most of the virtual world scoffed at due to how poor their programming was...which, he had to admit, made Kid chuckle a bit at first, but as he heard more and more about PB, the more he realized that their game must have been at least playable, otherwise they wouldn't have been ported.
Again, just like him.
There were four of them in total: Phoebus, the leader (who just so happened to be a cheetah, exactly like the sprites he was supposed to be better than), Leck, the technical brain (whom Kid incorrectly called a "panther" at first and immediately got the most piercing glare he'd ever seen come from an animal...Leck then carefully explained that he was a leopard, you just couldn't see his spots because his entire coat was black.), Montezuma, their brute force (a very terse, very big jaguar with some sort of Spanish/Native American accent) and Shawnee, their archer (whom Leck insisted was the proper definition of a panther, but she preferred the term "cougar").
However, these were only the good guys. Phoebus said that there was a whole other cast of animals who served under the mad scientist who created them all, but the Brotherhood of Murgon hadn't been seen since PB's unplugging. Neither of them knew where they were...but Phoebus made it very clear to Kid that Dr. Alistair Murgon had been one of those bad guys who was only bad during arcade hours, so the 90's coolkid need not worry about some sudden hostile takeover by a man capable of making dangerous, genetically enhanced animals. And he liked that just fine.
"Our overworld was simply called Centralis, and it served as a hub for the actual levels of the game," Phoebus repeated. "The part we specifically lived in, however, was called 'Urafiki Msitu'...the Friendship Forest." The Super Cat rolled his eyes, flashing Kid a wry smile. "It was named by one of Murgon's human assistants after he purchased the land...part of his cover of being a philanthropic researcher."
"I see."
"And then of course, you could access all the levels from the main area of Centralis, and thus the game progressed from there. Sort of like how your own game is configured, only the players got to see some parts of the overworld, like our base and Murgon's lab."
Kid nodded his understanding, but just a few moments later, something shifted into view that Kid hadn't quite noticed in Game Central Station before, the strange character weaving in and out of a crowd of sprites Kid had seen day in and day out.
It's not like she physically stood out. She looked like just an ordinary human being, with short blonde hair, a white button-up and pants that looked to be some shade of red; Kid would have easily mistaken her for some sort of NPC had it not been for the way she carried herself...like she wasn't all that familiar with most of the sprites around her. It made Kid curious, and before he knew it, he was ambling through the crowd towards her, keeping a low profile in case she got spooked.
Dude, once you spark the "R" word, there's no going back. So I'm being completely, truly, 100 percent honest. I wouldn't use such a potent adjective if I wasn't being serious.
Oh, is that another jab at my 90's appearance? Dude, my world is perpetual 90s. It's not like it doesn't fit. Besides, the 90s were awesome and you can't say anything to convince me otherwise.
