Chapter Text
It was an hour past closing and Jake wasn't back yet, leaving Chance to grumble around closing up shop.
After turning the neon 'open' sign out front off, putting away all the spare parts and tools, and powering down the winches and machines, he finally pulled the garage doors down just as the sun was hitting below the horizon. Although he'd managed to get through the routine with minimal complaint, he still gave a frustrated grimace as he pulled the last car into the carport and carefully, carefully backing it up into place next to the rest. Car roundup was Jake’s job, thank you.
Manning the garage they ran could have conceivably been a one-kat job at a point in time, but Chance and Jake had divided up the responsibilities so evenly that he couldn’t imagine doing it any other way now. Thankfully, they hadn't been too busy that day, apart from a man coming to pick up his convertible, but that was no reason to shirk their system.
Speaking of which...
Wiping his paws on an oil rag, Chance began to wonder just where his partner had gotten off to. Jake was usually the main one to lock up, while Chance more or less helped. But he’d taken off earlier just as they were wrapping up, citing various errands that needed attending to. Bill payments, supply runs, oil and brake fluid pickup, tax-whatevers, blah blah blah. Chance had just stopped listening.
He began to wonder now, though. Should he be taking this long? Had he come back already, gone off to the yard, or the hanger? No, he would have seen him. Chance sighed, and made his way to the back. His instincts for danger had always been strong since he was young, and they were tempered as sharp as steel now with years from fighting under his belt. If something were truly wrong, Chance would know.
Forget it, he thought, cracking the fridge open for a beer. Jake'll come back soon enough.
Leading his way to the backroom, he collapsed on the sofa with a sigh of relief. All day he'd been waiting to kick back and watch his favorite show, ‘Scaredy Cat’. Preferably with his partner, but it didn't look like that was happening anytime soon.
He flopped onto the couch and clicked the remote. Already he missed the warmth that was usually pressed into his side about now, and kisses at commercial breaks that tasted faintly of beer.
Chance sighs, and takes a sip from his can.
A few episodes into the marathon (and a surprise few episodes from the less popular but cult classic spinoff, ‘Fraidy Cat’), he considered calling, before deciding against it. He said he’d be out for a while and he was, no big deal. Any city emergency would get called in here. If anything, maybe he’d found some more pointless stuff to do, or gotten some new project in his head that he needed special parts for.
So he’d be back soon.
Hopefully.
The thought doesn’t stop him from glancing at the clock.
—
Jake hadn't meant to take this long at all.
On top of the fake-but-still-very-real errands he’d undertaken to throw Chance off his scent, the real errand of the day was beginning to take longer than the bank visit and the auto supply store run combined. The lines had been longer than he'd hoped, traffic was abysmal, and he still had yet to even figure out the idea of his gift. Casting another glance at his beat up old watch, Jake sighed. He wouldn’t even have to be here much longer if he could just decide .
It was the ninth of August.
Six years ago today, some meathead pilot ace in the enforcer academy had gone up to some scrawny kid they called the genius upstart weapons engineer, sat across from him in the mess hall, and asked for the rest of his pudding. It was the six year anniversary of the day Chance and him had met and became best friends.
Not for nothing, it was also the two and a half year anniversary of when they'd become a little more than best friends. When they had been crashed on that beach after a grueling mission, one that, like so many others, had cut it much too close.
—
Some shredded scraps of the Turbokat stuck out of the sand and water, black and jagged like broken bones.
Jake remembers the wings taking damage, as Chance grit his teeth and struggled them to a safe landing site. He remembers barely making it out of the city, careening towards the coastline. He remembers a feeling like floating as they descended rapidly toward the water. He remembers the aftermath of the crash, though he never remembers hitting the ground. But he had.
He almost didn’t survive it.
He remembers coming to, slowly, lying half in the water and half against something solid and warm. The first thing he feels is a bone-deep ache throughout his body. The next thing he feels are strong arms shaking him, claws gripping into his sides with panic.
“Razor! Come on, buddy, come back to me…”
The words swam in his ears like he was underwater.
“Razor! Razor! Jake –!” The voice cried out.
He manages to open his mouth: “Nice landing, hotshot,” he croaks out in a whisper.
Barely audible, but alive.
“Oh thank fuck!”
Chance –No longer T-Bone the fierce vigilante, but Chance, his Chance– pulls him into a crushing hug that creaks his ribs. A knot unravels in his body, and the exhaustion feels distant. His scent is so familiar, his voice a constant thrum through his heart.
‘I almost lost this’, Jake thinks woozily, pain ebbing and flowing like waves. ‘Almost lost you…’
Chance pulls back and glares at him, angry, and frantic, and scared . “I can’t do this without ya, y’know! Shit, I wouldn’t ever want to. It’s you and me okay? And don’t ever scare me like that aga–”
Jake pulls him down and kisses him, half just to shut him up.
—
Even now, the memory has him catching his breath.
His affections caught up to him at weird times. Jake Clawson owed Commander Feral for exactly one thing in this world, and it was letting him meet Chance all those years ago and changing his life forever.
This was important. He couldn’t articulate why, but it was.
So he'd left without Chance knowing his true plans, heading into town using one of the many cars in their lot, a little before closing time. Jake chuckled at the knowledge that his partner was closing the shop, growling and grimacing all the way. He was probably bringing in the cars now. He hated doing that. If Jake was a traditional romantic, he might have waited until their actual anniversary to pursue this, but he could never claim being a romantic as his style. No; the pure fluffy, impulsive sentiment of the day had driven Jake down to 'Birman's Collars and More' shop at closing time to get one for his partner.
A collar was always a meaningful gift, given to those you care about. But for a relationship, it's not just the collar that's important, it's the charm too. A charm chosen to represent everything that your mate stands for and what they mean to you. One wouldn’t think the modern and cutting edge Megakat city would hold so tight to something so traditional, but this city could surprise you. Personally, Jake, while finding the notion nice to a degree, had never really paid them mind. He'd seen shekats get proposed to with shiny collars and diamond charms in the movies and the comics and in the high society pages, but had never really thought anything of it. Certainly had never thought about it for himself.
Yet here he was, in the middle of a shop, trying to find the right charm for his brute of a companion.
Picking the collar itself had been easy. Chance has been bellyaching about his old one being frayed and faded from sweat, so Jake had the style already in mind; The light brown of his friends' tabby stripes was too perfect a color to pass up, and the size matched up with the neck of their flight suits when they were Razor and T-bone, so measurements weren’t a problem. No, the problem was the charm. He'd looked around the quaint little store a dozen times already and found nothing that suited Chance. Inwardly, he couldn’t help but cringe at the amount of care he was putting into this. They were never the type to care about these things. Heck, last anniversary, they'd just closed shop an hour early and went out for pizza with extra anchovies.
Their relationship wasn't that much different from before. They worked the same, they joked the same, they certainly argued the same. Only now they’d pushed their shitty twin mattresses together. He had a groggy good morning kiss to look forward to each morning and a warm side to cuddle into every evening on the couch. The Swat Kats had changed too. On the field, they could read each other better, picking out what the other needed before it left his mouth. They fought with a renewed fire to protect each other.
Jake let out an agitated hiss, ignoring the startled patrons beside him. This was going to be tedious.
“Excuse me, sir?”
He jumps, gaze shooting down to his side. A grey-furred older woman, the owner of the frail voice, was standing beside him, her attire classy with a string of pearls. Mrs. Birman herself, he surmises quickly. She smiles politely as he scrambles to look less startled than he was.
“Ah, sorry…” He scratches his neck, cringing at his awkwardness. “I’m kind of out of my element here.”
Her paws are clasped in front of her, smile never wavering. “Anything I can help with, dear? I’ve been at this for a very long time, just so you know.”
“Ah, probably not,” Jake says. "I don’t think what I’m looking for is anything you’d have.”
To his surprise, her eyes narrow, holding a glint of challenge in them now. “Try me.”
—-
Three episodes later, Jake still had not shown up.
Chance tried to ignore the restlessness in his gut as time passed, with waning effectiveness. He had even gone out to look for him in the scrapyard, finding nothing.
And his mind had, of course, jumped to the worst possibilities; Had he been kidnapped by Dr. Viper? Or the metallicats, or worse, Dark Kat? Chance shook his head. He was getting ridiculous. He knew better than anyone that his partner could handle himself, and would call for help if city-wide danger was imminent. Maybe he'd gotten arrested by Feral? No, he was more careful than that, and to be honest that was something that Chance himself would get caught up in.
For a brief moment, he considers throwing his can at the tv again in exasperation. He looked at the clock to his right. It was late. Chance had closed the shop well over two hours ago.
His eyes shift to the calendar beside it, and briefly onto the scantily clad shekat on the top division (no regrets). The month reads August. Doodled in red ink below between the squares was a tiny cartoon of the two kats, a poorly drawn cup of pudding between them.
Chance's memory makes the connection. Damn, that was today?
Six years already, he thought, and smiled.
Normally, he was never good with remembering dates and Jake never cared when he didn't, and they both thought they were ridiculously cheesy anyways.
Their relationship was something he never put that much thought into, not for a lack of care but because with Jake it just felt that easy. He preferred to just go with the flow, but at times like these, he reminisced. The day Jake had kissed him, the day he truly thought he had lost him for good, had begun as one of the worst days of his life and ended up as one of the best. He’d meant every word that day, that he couldn’t even think of going through life as T-Bone without his Razor by his side. Jake was, truly, the best partner a cat could ask for.
They didn’t need cheesy dates or jewelry to show it. For Chance, it was all on the battlefield. Their eyes would lock, and words would pass in only a few seconds. T-Bone pivots, Razor shoots. Razor readies for a fight, T-Bone was right there beside him. Coordination taking them through a fight as though they were just one being. He recalled a fight with a street gang where they had scarcely said five words to each other. When it was the two of them, tackling a problem side by side, that was what mattered.
That was love.
They also may or may not do this when arguing about who was going to answer the door.
Chance swells with pride, and a rush of affection to chase it.
He decides to give it ten minutes before going to look again. Maybe they’d go out for a late dinner to celebrate or something. He'd tried to call earlier, but gave up when he heard a ring from the next room over. And so Chance sat and stared at the tv screen, watching Scaredy Cat run around the room. His vision started to blur. A yawn escaped his muzzle.
Ten minutes.
Then he would get up…
—
When Jake pulls into the lot, smiling triumphantly, it is very dark and very much past when he should have been back.
But he was immensely satisfied, much like he was when he had finally found the missing engine component to increase the Turbokat’s speed, or finally adjusted the right metal alloy composition for the hull reinforcements.
He'd finally found the perfect charm to go on the collar.
It had taken even more time to get the adjustments done on it, but Mrs. Birman had been kind enough to do them then and there, and he figured the extra minutes would be worth it.
Stepping out of the truck, Jake scanned the pitch black yard before him, his only saving grace being night vision. He brought a paw to the back of his head guiltily. Chance was probably worried that he'd been gone so long, errands be damned. Not to mention he had accidentally left his phone behind in his haste out the door.
He knows he would not hesitate to chew him out for it, so Jake hopes his partner wouldn't hold it against him too much.
As he slams the truck door shut and makes his way across the lot, the nervousness sets back in. All the way back, he'd kept wondering if Chance would even like the gift. It was no secret that the ace pilot had a low tolerance of sappy gestures. With how much effort he’d sunk into this, he’d better, Jake thinks with a growl. Using his key to enter the shop, he made his way to the back room. Before he could call out, he heard a faint noise from the tv room. Smirking, Jake entered the room to find his mate, the very apex of katkind, sprawled out on the couch, dozing off.
The tech wiz let out a hushed laugh. No wonder he hadn't come running the moment he'd walked in. As he slowly approached the sleepy kat from behind, his foot landed on a creaky board. Chance perked up, dazed.
"Huh..? Whozerr?" He slurred, sleepily.
Taking the opportunity, Jake pounces, wrapping his arms around his partner's neck.
Chance springs awake instantly and yelps in surprise. Instincts kicked in as he prepared to throw off his attacker, before hearing a familiar voice pipe up next to his ear.
"Miss me?" Purrs the mischievous voice.
Chance immediately relaxed. Turning around, he saw none other than his partner, Jake Clawson standing behind him. Chance furrowed his eyebrows, his expression irritated, but relieved.
"Jeez, 'bout time ya got back! Where the heck were you? I looked everywhere!" He yelled. You had me worried, he contemplated saying, but didn't. Whatever. It was implied.
"Heh, sorry. Got caught up. I wanted to surprise you." Jake smiled guiltily.
This intrigued Chance. He raised an eyebrow. Turning the tv off, he turned around to face Jake. Upon observation, Chance saw that he was clad in the same work uniform from earlier, only now he had a paper bag at his side. He raised an eyebrow: All those errands and only one bag?
Jake catches on to his suspicions rather quickly, and chuckles.
"Close your eyes"
"Huh?"
"Just do it." Jake insisted.
Rolling his eyes, Chance obliged, hoping he wouldn't regret it.
"This better be good, sureshot."
He hears the rustling of the bag being opened. From there, he also hears something being pulled out of it, making a sound like light metal hitting metal. Curiosity welled up inside him. He briefly considers opening his eyes anyways. Before he could, Jake beat him to the punch.
"Ok, open 'em"
Chance opened his eyes.
In his paws, Jake held a collar.
His eyes widened, and his body froze. Jake felt the forgotten nervousness from before start to bubble its way back up.
He stole a quick glance at the collar in his paws. It was a true work of art in its simplicity. Dark brown leather with marigold stitches holding it together, and donning a sleek, black buckle. The easier part. He then gave a quick onceover of the charm he had chosen, swallowing.
Mrs. Birman was everything her reputation made her out to be. Jake had been just about ready to give up, toss some lame excuse for being out so late and wait till next year, but she’d been persistent. Once Jake described what he wanted, what his mate would like, it hadn’t taken her long to go through her catalog and produce a pair of silver, military style dog tags. Practical. Sleek. Just like the ones they’d been given upon becoming captains of the sixth squadron. She was happy to give them to him at a discount (people didn’t consider them romantic enough for the style to be in high demand). He knew he would take them right then and there.
It had taken some extra time to get the engraving done, but Mrs. Birman was known for nothing if not her work pace.
Jake looked at Chance again, still frozen on the spot.
"Chance? Buddy? Something wrong?" he asked nervously.
Chance suddenly lunged forward, trapping his mate in a tight bear hug. Jake gasped in surprise before sighing in relief. ‘ Would you look at that,’ he thinks with amusement, ‘ Not too sappy for him after all.’
Chance mumbled something against his shoulder.
"What's that now?" Jake teased.
"...looks just like my mom's.”
His eyes widened. Chance had only ever had faint memories of his mother. He had told him that she 'hadn't been around that long', and all the things he knew of her were from his father’s war stories, and tales her old squadron mates would tell about her with fond, admiring smiles. Had Jake really picked a collar that looked like his mom's? Like mother, like son.
His train of thought was cut off when a pair of lips met his. Jake felt his heart swell with emotion and reciprocated just as eagerly.
After a moment, Chance pulled back with a faint blush and smile. "Thanks Jake. Really… It, uh, means a lot to me."
Jake shrugs, returning with a smile of his own. "Yeah well, you mean a lot to me.”
They sit in a silence that's embarrassing, and wonderful at the same time.
Jake finally clears his throat. “Well?”
"Well?" He questioned back, confused.
"You gonna try it on or what?" .
"Oh.” He blinks. “Yeah"
Chance carefully took the collar from the other tom and undid the buckle. Wrapping the leather, firm but soft, around his neck, he redid the fastening and lowered his arms.
Chance took a deep breath and opened his eyes. The tomcat before him had his eyes fixated on his neck. Was that a blush? Grinning, Chance fiddled with the accessory.
"So uh, how's it look?"
"Well…” Managed Jake, “You clean up alright, that’s for sure.”
"Gee thanks", snorted the tabby, turning toward a mirror.
In truth, Jake thought that the collar was one of the most amazing sights in the known world. He swiftly disregarded any of his previous judgements on the tradition of collar giving: he understood now. This sight, his love sporting a symbol that he had chosen, alone made all the frustrations of the day worth it.
Chance seemed to like what he was seeing as well. “This means I gotta go pick something out for you too, huh?”
“Well we gotta match, don’t we?” Jake teases.
The two stood there for a few moments, grinning and blushing like idiots, before Chance took the russet furred tom by the arm over to the couch.
"Alright, enough sappy stuff. I've been waiting all day to watch Scaredy Kat with you, and I'll be damned if it's not going to happen now!"
Jake let himself be pulled over to the couch and scoffed at his lover’s persistence.
"Ok! Ok!, I guess I owe ya that much."
They sat on the couch for a while, laughing at the cartoon antics on screen, Jake finally in his coveted place nustled into Chance’s side. It doesn’t take long to hear a noise from beside him. Chance was snoring. Jake grinned sleepily before leaning on his mate to take a well deserved snooze.
The collar jingles upon contact, and Jake smiles. He can just barely read the engraving on the back of the tags from where he’s positioned. Not that he needs to; he knows what it says.
“C & J – This time, we do it our way.”