638/Cat Chat

Cat Chat
Date of Scene:	27 May 2017
Location:	Unknown
Synopsis:	Summary needed
Cast of Characters:	337, 283

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WilyKit (337) has posed:
    It was like they were living in the future!

    All throughout the horizon, great buildings of metal and glass stuck out of the Earth like teeth, the sunlight catching off of them and glinting. It was probably one of the many wonders of this world that caught Kit's eyes at first - and still one of the more awesome things she had ever seen.

    Television was a close second, so far. And maybe laser dots. But the last one was just amusing, more than anything else.

    And here she was - scrunching her feet together a bit closer than she remembered having to do back on Thundara, leaning this way and that to guide the hoverboard here and there, her longer hair fluttering in the wind. Bringing up a hand, she pulls it out of her face and sneezes.

    Everything was different, and just yesterday, it felt, she was a kitten. This whole situation was messed up. But work didn't wait.

    Spying another figure on a hoverboard in the distance, Kit leans that way, lifting her hand to wave over towards that figure. It was Kat - she could tell from here. "Find anything!" she calls, with cupped hands.

WilyKat (283) has posed:
It'd been a while since the twins had the opportunity to go do something by themselves. In the past, they had little choice otherwise. Rather, the decision they made left them with little choice otherwise, until they met and befriended the Thundercats...or were tolerated by them.

Since then, everything changed. Their world was destroyed, or if it wasn't it might as well have been. Mumm-Ra and his minions won. The Thundercats had to flee New Thundera and take whatever they could with them. Then came the stasis pods, the long, deep sleep. It was supposed to drastically slow down the aging process, but while the others looked their familiar selves, both WilyKat and WilyKit came out of it physically older.

Mentally? That's a different story. To those who have encountered Kat so far, they'd be hard-pressed to say he acted as old as he looked. There was still a lot of the kitten left in him, even with such a drastic jump ahead in the physical body's maturity. There's catching up in order, growing up to do.

Right now, certain responsibilities have gone by the wayside in the interest of doing something with his sister. Fun would be an added benefit, but there's catching up to do. Armed with their hoverboards and usual tools, they set out from Cat's Lair, not meant to let it out of their sight, but exploring the forest was on the menu. Splitting up, but not too far, it gave them more room to maneuver and see what's around while remaining close enough to communicate. Thankfully, they don't need those translators. They both speak the same language.

"Trees, and a lot of them!" he returns, putting his weight into the board such that it'll angle him closer to her.

WilyKit (337) has posed:
Giving her tail a flick, WilyKit brings up her hand, shading her eyes as she turns, looking towards the southwest - where New York loomed over the landscape. When he draws near on his hoverboard, she leans back, her too-long legs giving her a little more leverage.

All in all, she was really clumsy on her hoverboard, and Kit puffs out her cheeks in irritation at that. "I found a couple humans down there," she says, gesturing to the forest below. "And there's a road /full/ of... uh... metal carriages that drive like tanks, over about a mile that way," she says, pointing that direction.

"And of course there's the city that way - it's /huuuuuge/," she says, glancing over as a flock of ducks honk as they fly by. "I heard there was a river near here, but I haven't found it - but the ocean... is kinda obvious." This high up, they could easily see the ocean proper.

WilyKat (283) has posed:
WilyKat's own tail trails behind him, aiding with balance in ways the other Thundercats don't benefit from. Why did they have no tails again, or have them cut? Some outdated royalty thing? It never made sense to him, the rare times he actually thought about it. He and the others in his family always just had them.

He's handling the hoverboard a bit better for the time being, likely because he's had some extra time to refamiliarize himself with it, but neither of them are going too far ahead of the other. "Their cities are crazy here. So noisy, and smelly, and /full/ of people. I don't know how they don't all go crazy from it," he declares with a shake of his head. "And they call those things 'cars.' People use them to get places faster than walking. I guess that's smart, right?"

He slows to see if he can sniff out the scent of the water, at least the river itself, and he gradually glides to a halt beneath the shade of a few large trees. "Hey, let's take a break, Kit."

WilyKit (337) has posed:
Maybe they all just tucked their tails.

Or maybe tails shrank as you grew! Either way... KIt nods her head, looking towards her twin brother. Kit tended to follow Kat's lead as a general rule - and right now was no different. Her foot fumbles on the hoverboard. She purses her lips.

"That's what I noticed too - there's /soooo/ many humans, all stuffed together, and it's only getting worse by the year, as I hear it," she says. A beat. "So, like hoverboards," she says with a slyness.

Dipping forward on the board, Kit adjusts the shoulder strap of her top briefly, worrying with it as she glides down towards the same spot Kat was directing her towards.

"Sure thing - I um... so how do you think Lion-O and all of them are doing - now that, you know - we're here?" she asks, tilting her head towards Kat.

WilyKat (283) has posed:
WilyKat certainly has not seen room for the others to hide their tails. But, they still have theirs. All is right in the world. Stepping off the hoverboard, it shuts down and he hides it behind a tree before scrambling up to a thicker branch so he can perch upon it and look down from there.

"I bet most of them have never even been to a place like this, where it's quieter and more peaceful. They probably don't know what it's like." From his spot he watches WilyKit whether she's joining him or not. "I don't really know. Everyone's been so busy building a new Cat's Lair, and I'm not even sure where we fit in yet. I'm still not even used to being older. Are you?"

WilyKit (337) has posed:
Likewise shutting down her board, she actually hides it behind the same tree that WilyKat does, before she flexes her wrists - the claws snap out - pointy little things. She leaps at the same tree, easily climbing it - and with a little cartwheel, ends up at a spot right next to Kat, before letting her legs flip out from beneath herself.

She ends up on her flanks, near him.

"Do you think they like it? Running all around like that?" A beat. "I know I liked the markets - more busyness means more chances to do things without being seen - but this... this seems to the next step. On some streets, there's no room to even slow down or stop, or the rest will push around and through you."

A beat, though. She purses her lips then. "I'm..." Kit glances down at herself. "Really really not," she adds. Looking back up towards Kat, she sighs softly. "They're used to doing things without us, I think - because we weren't able to help with things like... you know, lifting and carrying things as well. I don't think they really see us as big cats yet."

A beat.

"I'm not sure I see myself as a big cat yet."

WilyKat (283) has posed:
WilyKat's legs dangle over the edge of the branch, balance kept with a combination of the way he sits, his hands, and his tail. She may look the more relaxed of the two, but he's focused on their surroundings. Just in case.

"I don't know. If it was a different time, I'd say we could get rich off of them, they'd never know it, and we'd never have to find El-Dara." He looks to her quickly and adds, "And you don't have to say it. I know it's wrong and we don't have to do that stuff any more. We /could/ though, if we ever had to again. They're not even cats. There's a lot they don't notice, and a lot of them have their faces buried in these little things half the time anyway." He mimes holding a phone or a tablet, tapping and swiping at it, then the hands go back to the branch.

"If we were bigger back then, we could have helped papa with the harvest, and mama too, and the other kittens." As for being older, he shakes his head and admits, "I don't really know what to do around here yet. We never learned anything except how to survive by ourselves. Then they looked after us." Not without them acting like that was the way it should have been, of course. "And now we're all that's left. I don't know if we even have a home to go back to. We're bigger cats now, but it's like we missed everything in between."

WilyKit (337) has posed:
Don't worry about that. Kit always considered herself the most perceptive and watchful of the two - and while he might be glancing around with his eyes, her ears were perked and on alert - swiveling about as branches snap, or birds fly by.

Opening her mouth, she was /about/ to say it, when he amends himself. "You could let me say it anyways - it makes me feel better to say it," she says, perhaps pouting a little bit. "They live their lives in this little handheld television, it's a bit frightening," she says, pausing a moment.

"If we were bigger back then - we would have never have had to leave," says Kit, her tone of voice drawing a little quieter - a frown plays at the edge of her lips.

Bringing up a claw, Kit scratches the tip of her nose, nodding her head towards Kat.

"Maybe we just need to find a way to learn all of that stuff that comes between being a kitten and a cat?" she says. "Maybe there's a book somewhere, or..." Kit sighs. "...I'd say ask Jaga, but he's not... here, is he?" she asks, canting her head owlishly to the side.

WilyKat (283) has posed:
WilyKat gestures as if to say 'go ahead and say it then,' before switching to one of the other topics. "But then we might never have found the others, and we could have been stuck back there when everything went bad. At least we would have been with them, though." He's trying to decide whether that would be better or worse than things now. "There's just a lot here to figure out, and I don't know where to start."

"I don't think you learn how to be older from a book, Kit," he explains in a semi-scoffing manner, coming off a little more sarcastically than he means it to be. "And I think Jaga only really talks to Lion-O. Anyway, we just have to find some things out on our own. I don't think the others were ever kittens." He can't picture them young like they were.

"We should find something new to do here and see what happens."

WilyKit (337) has posed:
WilyKit just crinkles her nose, deciding she got more amusement now out of being annoyed at not being able to say it than actually saying it. She kinda stares at Kat for a few moments. But then the conversation drifts back to things that happened before. She brings up a hand, wrapping a lock of her hair around her finger - curling it and uncurling it.

"Well. You start with the first step. That's how you start everything," says Kit. "So we start figuring out what we don't know by trying to figure out what we don't know," she adds, sounding all too serious. But he scoffs at her book idea! Bringing up her hand, she gives Kat a shove - she was a lot stronger than she used to be, but he was a lot bigger and stronger too, so maybe it works out.

"I wonder if Lion-O can make Jaga talk to us too. I think he might know things." A beat. "Maybe Cheetara would too - she seems a little... um..." Nicer? Down to earth? Approachable? "...I think she would be easier to talk to about these things," she says.

Another beat.

Something new?

"Well, this is a new world - I bet we can help the rest of the Thundercats learn a lot by just... exploring, you know?"

WilyKat (283) has posed:
"That..doesn't even make any sense," WilyKat says of figuring out what they don't know to..yeah. "But at the same time it sort of does." What a conundrum. He swings his feet back and forth beneath him, then he stiffens his grip on the branch when the push comes. He absorbs it for the most part, so both of them being older and bigger does kind of cancel out.

"Tygra's always seemed like I could talk to him about things, more than Lion-O anyway," says Kat. "But.."

"Not Panthro!" they both say in unison, sharing the same thought.

"No, definitely not Panthro. I think he still wants to kill us sometimes," Kat goes on to add.

"Just like I always told you!" adds Kit.

Then they both go about a few seconds of licking their hands and grooming up around the ears, a remnant of their time as kittens, which they may not even realize right now.

Kat then finishes and adds, "But yeah, I think we need to find some ways to fit in and help out. I was thinking.." A dangerous thing, sometimes. "If we're going to start over here, I mean /really/ start over, and now that we're bigger..we should find some new things to wear."

WilyKit (337) has posed:
"Tygra?" Kit crinkles her nose. "I mean... Lion-O is always... um..." Kit lifts her chin up, looking through the tree cover towards the heavens. What was she thinking about? She sets her jaw at an angle. It'll forever be a mystery.

Finishing up her grooming behind her ears, she looks earthward now.

A beat at what he says last, and Kit glances down at herself. The admittedly smaller chestplate and the cute little dress. "I like this," she says. "I could always move around in it, but I guess it's... harder to breathe right now for some reason," she says. The hesitant tone in her voice means that she knew what that reason was, however.

"I think we should. They know us in these outfits, and it's all we could find, so... where do you think we can find different ones? In the city?" she asks, tucking a wayward strand of her hair back behind an ear.

WilyKat (283) has posed:
"I know you've always believed in him," WilyKat admits over his sister's faith in Lion-O. The legs return to swinging back and forth, hinting at a show of restlessness, energy building up beneath the surface in wait of release. "I /like/ this too," he answers, picking at his tunic-styled garments, "But we could really go for something new. Maybe that'll make the others see us in a different way, too."

If he follows what Kit's getting at with the breathing thing, or if he doesn't, either way there's no response to those words.

"I've already seen people wearing all kinds of things. Vorpal even took me to a place to look for some stuff. He's..kind of another cat, too. Just different. He's the one who found my pod." He clears his throat. "Maybe he could help some more, and you could meet him too."

WilyKit (337) has posed:
"I'd like that. I've heard Tygra mention Vorpal as well - he seems like a good cat." A beat. "Is he from Thundara... ever?" she says, tilting her head to one side, letting her eyes linger on WilyKat. Unlike him, she seemed to have her energy under some sembelance of control. But his energy was starting to get to her as well, and her tail swishes behind herself.

That was for the best.

"I don't think they'll ever see us as anything other than Thunderkittens - but... maybe it'll work?" she asks, tilting her head a bit to one side. "I like your idea, very much - let's go meet Vorpal - ah... where do we find him?" she asks.

WilyKat (283) has posed:
Shaking his head, WilyKat answers, "I don't think so. If he is, he's not like any Thundercat I've ever seen. He can do this thing that's like magic. It's like an opening that pops up out of nowhere and suddenly you're somewhere else when you go through it. It's wild."

Yep, now his tail's on the move as well.

"He has a home close to the big city out there." He gestures in the direction of New York City itself, then he swings himself off the branch and lands below in a brief crouch, coming up to grab the pair of hoverboards from behind the tree.

"I can ask him about it, but we should go find that river. I'm thirsty, and I'm getting hungry too." Not going to swim, though. Nope, nope, nope.

WilyKit (337) has posed:
As long as there were no fruges around, Kit would be fine with rivers. Briefly, she checks her pockets, tapping her paw on a flupe. "So he's a sorcerer?" asks Kit then, looking back towards Kat. "Like Mumm-Ra or Jaga?" Another few moments, and her eyes track towards the gestured direction.

She purses her lips. "I caught some fish the other day," she says. "But they tasted funny." A beat, and she hops down off of the branch, and reaches out for her hoverboard from Kat. Turning it on, she moves to stand atop it.

"I hear they have all sorts of wonderful foods in the city as well, but... I'd be afraid to try to shop. I don't understand monkey person talk..."

WilyKat (283) has posed:
"Nooooo, not really anything like them!" WilyKat calls back up before his sister's joined him below. "It's hard to explain. I think he called them 'rabbit holes.' You'd have to see for yourself." He goes about checking the hoverboard to make sure nothing's changed for the worse in the few minutes they spent in the tree, but Berbils make good stuff. It's fine.

Atop the board once more, he does a few circles around Kit, then pauses. "What do you mean, the fish tasted funny? Funny how?" he asks, then he notes, "We also don't have any of their money here. You have your translator, right?"

WilyKit (337) has posed:
"Ummm... well."

Kit pauses a few moments more. They didn't have money. How /would/ they pay for the stuff?! They couldn't, well... steal it, could they?

Kit pauses with a frown, scratching at the side of her cheek. "You think Lion-O has any money for this place?" she asks, tilting her head a bit to the side. Crinkling her nose as Kat flies circles around her, she kicks off of the ground as well.

"They just tasted different. Almost a little poisonous - I should have saved some for you, but..." A beat.

"I was hungry." But as for the translator? "Yeah, I think I do. Have you tried it out yet?"

WilyKat (283) has posed:
"We'll have to ask him," Kat decides. "If you have to buy things here, maybe we can figure out something to do to get whatever they use for money." See? That's a step up from stealing! Who says the kittens can't mature?

Stopping in place, he squints long and hard at Kit and plants his hands at his hips. "A little poisonous, and you were thinking of saving some for me? Whiskers, Kit! Why would you even eat it if it was bad for you?"

Pause.

"Oh. That's why."

Waving the whole thing off, he shakes his head. "Of course I'm using it. Maybe we'll learn some words along the way - Panthro already seems to know a lot somehow - but it's hard enough being on a new planet where we're the ones who aren't native."

WilyKit (337) has posed:
"Maybe we can catch animals, and sell them at a market?" A beat. "Or I could play my flupe for money - I mean... they'll give us money for me to play the flupe?" she says, canting her head to the side. "Not me play the flupe and you steal like in the old days. We're not stealing anymore."

Kit nods her head then, crinkling her face and sticking out her tongue. "Where are you getting /your/ food then?" she challenges in return.

The concept of languages - Kit frowns, the edges of her lips turning downward. "...I dunno. There's a lot for all of us to do, I think..."

WilyKat (283) has posed:
WilyKat's eyes light up. After a sort of 'meh' face follows the idea of catching and selling animals. "I like the flupe idea more. I can still use my flank. They have people around who do stuff like that and people actually give them money for it. Maybe they all have some kind of flupe of their own, or..you know, their own things? Or maybe the people here don't have to be hypnotized. Maybe we don't have to bother with that part."

Is some of Tygra's species-superiority complex rubbing off on Kat? Surely not, but he did sort of just call humans simple-minded.

"My food? From..you know../places/ and stuff. Nevermind. It's not important. We'll figure things out soon, though. Oh.." He rummages around in one of his pouches and comes up with another red disc that has the Thundercat insignia on it. "Did you lose yours? Lion-O wanted me to give you another one. It has the translator built in and everything." It's offered to her.

WilyKit (337) has posed:
"Well, it's better if they don't have a flupe of their own - that way our music will be unique and special," says Kit. "And people will want to listen to it more," says Kit, bringing up a hand to scratch at her neck behind her ear.

"I'm sure not all humans will be so easy to hypnotise, you know? They're all going to be just a little different from each other," a beat though. "But they are hypnotising themselves with their little devices."

"Oh, that translates too?!" she says, holding up her hand to accept the disc. "No, I didn't lose it, but... I didn't think about it."

WilyKat (283) has posed:
"Aww, don't worry about it. We'll have money in no time if they're that easy to get it out of," WilyKat says with confidence. "When we put our minds to it, we're unstoppable." And, now, they might even be more trouble than they were before, some loss of cuteness aside.

He nods to the understanding of the disc also working as the translator. "I guess you forgot when you were asleep all that time," he gently chides, then he darts off into the woods, zipping between the trees. "Race ya!"

Of course, he's already started it.

"No fair, Kat!" comes the cry from his sister, who begins the pursuit to take them wherever they end up going.