Chapter Text
Surprisingly,for the first time in roberts life,things have been looking good lately. Well, as good as the aftermath of a city wide organized attack could be.
Blonde Blazer - or rather Mandy, now - was trying to make him be a bit more positive. And for the record, he was actually trying to. But to be fair, it was really hard to be positive when the first thing you register as you wake up is a sharp pain on your lower back and numbing sensation on your left arm.
But, all things considered, it was a good day, really.
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Yeah, he can shove all his positivity up his ass.
He always walked to work, SDN wasn't far, and he no longer had a functioning car after borrowing some - too many - pieces for his Mech suit. He knew his neighborhood wasn't a friendly, all sunshine and rainbows type of neighborhood. But this was the first time he's ever been mugged at this section of the street.
"Come on man, i ain't got all day, y'know."
His very patient mugger said as he pressed a gun - probably a 36 caliber - further into his lower back, which earned a grunt from him in response. Not a good massage.
He could hear the nervousness in his voice. The kid - no more than 16 - was probably doing this as a last resort. He knew it, had seen it too many times. Law didn't leave space for those who were struggling, and neither did Mecha Man.But right now, he wasn't Mecha Man,he was Robert, the one who's seen the faces of fear, of desperation behind those screens. He couldn't not feel it for them, not when he'd felt it too.
However, the one thing all of them shared, so in jealousy and hatred as in fear and nervousness,is that if pushed, they would break. And Robert knew it better than anyone. And when people break, they don't hesitate, they don't think. And right now, Robert was sure the kid wouldn't hesitate before pulling the trigger.
The kid leaned in, grabbing Roberts wallet. But that was a mistake, a mistake he would take advantaje of. Robert grabbed his pulse, pushing him even further into his field of vision and making him stumble, and slammed his elbow into the others face. Stumbling and in pain, his grip loosened and the gun clattered onto the floor.
Before Robert could pin him to the floor and call SDN for assistance,he felt a fist conect to his face. His knees gave out and he fell forward before puting his hands in front of him to catch himself, Robert had fought supers outside of the suit before, their enhanced strenght was nothing new to him. He'd learnd how to outmanouver them and use their strenght against themselves, but that was before the coma, before having to relearn how to walk because his muscles turned into play dough.
He was in a coma, that part was more true than he'd like, but it was only for two months, not four. The other two were spent relearning how to walk and building more muscle mass so he didnt look like he was satrved - which, at some point, he was. IV food wasn't as nutritious as solid food - it still wasn't like before, his armor still clattered when he walked, the reason he didn't use it for the press conference despite making him look buffer.
Still lightheaded from the punch, he could only register searching for the gun, a blinding light, and falling - which was strange, given how he was on his knees just now - and then his vision decided it was a great time to prank him.
It was just how his migraines made him see black. Sometimes, with shapes and colors dancing around, much like a kaleidoscope.
After probably too long - given how there was no one around but only the fading sound of hurying footsteps and panting - his vision cleared. But he didn't need his vision to know he looked like shit, he felt like it too. It would be a long day of avoiding and deflecting concerns about his wellbeing from Chase and the Z-team.
On the bright side, it looked like he wouldn't need to chase the kid to ask what kind of weird power he was struck with. It was quite clear as he felt his clothes fall of his back like blankets, and his - his tail? When did he have a tail?- swished around nervously, as if somehow sensing it should not be here, or pretty much exist.
His ears flattened in cofusion as he processed what had happened.
Oh.
Oh god.
Being turned into a cat at a random friday was not... an ideal situation. But it was not the worst thing that has happened to him. Robert has learned to keep his cool and not-to panic at situations like this - well, not like this, but you know what i mean.
The first thing he thought of doing was trying to call someone. Certainly Chase or anyone on the Z-team would find it strange when someone who's late for work and with an unknow status suddenly called them and the only noise at the other side of the line is traffic and meowing.
However, trying to type his password, open his contacts and call someone turned to be impossible on the situation at hand. His paws being too big and with not enough pin-point capacity to type one digit at a time, instead pressing multiple buttons at once and succesfully blocking his phone for 15s until he could try again. Great.
Without a wallet or a usable phone, his last option was to run to SDN and try to somehow make them realize he's now a cat.
Now with a plan - if he could call it that - he began to make his way through crowds of high-heels, sneakers and a variety of formal shoes of diferent flavors of over-worked men to SDN. More two blocks and a turn to the left was his only chance at not having to fight with street rats for a piece of meat, when suddenly, a very sturdy door came into view - more like into his snout - which hurt.
He stumbled back, realizing he ran into some cafe's door. He really wasn't on luck's side today.
"Bitch you dont need animal cruelty added to your charges."
"Please it was an accident. It's the pussy's fault anyways."
Or maybe he was?
Looking up at the familiar voices he saw flambae accompanied by prism. After studying the cafe a little more, he realized it was their favorite coffee shop to gossip without having sonar of invisigal eavesdrop on them. Invisigal was banned and the coffee smell was too strong for sonar to stay more than 5 minutes - he now understood what he meant when he said "it feel's like someones punching my snout repeatedly".
"Oh shit his nose is bleeding. Damn bae, never thought you would turn out to be an animal abuser." Prism sounds surprisingly concerned. She is one of the closest to beef on the team.
"girl shut up, we can just bring him to SDN. Doesn't wetboy have like a thousand cats or something? We can ask if he wants one more, it's not like gets enough pussy anyways." Flambae was never a dog guy, one time while waiting to be dispatched he was talking with golem and phenomaman - surprisingly, the latter was not on flambaes death list anymore, not after SDN insurance covered what phenomaman made to his car. The ass-shaped dent was fixed - he explicitly said he prefered cats to dogs, so he supposed he was concerned too, his accent also became more present , which happened when he was anxious or concerned.
Before he could do anything, he was picked up by prism and gently cradled on her arms - at least he was not gonna have to stare at her boots, which did not match her two-themed outfit at all. Seriously, why couldn't she get a pink boot too? She already had the gloves and the hair. - while robert wouldn't admit it, it was quite comfortable to be held like this, he could understand beef better now.