#smudge is the type of cat to lay on your face while you sleep stg

[acceleracers-baby]

The Teku & Their Cat.

You all can blame @might-be-a-potato for this one. We were talking about Bumper and then she was like… so the Teku have a cat right??? They thought of the name and everything!! Now I have brain rot beyond repair. Please enjoy the byproduct of us going feral about this last night lol!

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Smudge

It was Kurts turn to pick up dinner. He’d been dodging the responsibility for the past week and a half due to a cold front blowing through the city. It was freezing out, and he hated having to bundle up just to stay warm. Unfortunately, if he pawned the chore off on someone else again, Karma might get involved. Which is something no one wanted to see happen.

Nolo had been talking about having some sort of soup all week, so instead of stopping by their usual burger joint, Kurt opted to visit the grocery store instead. It was the least he could do after making Nolo pick up his slack when it came to keeping the gang fed. Plus, if he made enough, they would have leftovers for the next few days and not have to worry about risking their cars on the ice. It was a win win.

Kurt was just about to start tossing the grocery bags into his passenger seat when he heard a strange noise come from under the car. He paused for a minute, listening for the sound to repeat, but when it didn’t, he continued to haphazardly toss the bags into the seat. Of course, as soon as he started moving though, he heard the sound again.

“What the…” Quickly, the driver ditched the rest of the bags onto the floor boards, and closed the door to keep whatever heat was left in the car trapped inside. After he heard the noise a third time, he groaned and crouched down next to his car to try and find the source.

He looked around for a good minute or two before his hands and feet began to go numb from the windchill. He was about to give up the search until he heard the noise one last time coming from up near his hood.

There, shaking like a leaf, was a kitten that couldn’t have been larger than his hand. It was covered in soot and grime- probably from trying to keep warm near his engine block- and it looked like it hadn’t had a decent meal in days.

With a grimace, Kurt got onto his hands and knees to fish the poor thing out from under his car. It was wet with snow, and it had to have been freezing. Especially, being as small as it was.

“Talk about an underdog.” Kurt mumbled to himself as he crawled into his car and cranked up the heat. He shed his scarf and used it to dry the poor thing off as best he could but it was soaked to the bone and still shivering awfully hard. After a few minutes of trying to warm the kitten back up, he decided that the best course of action was just stuff the thing into his jacket and hope that would keep it warm enough for them to make it back to garage.

Kurt would be lying if he said he wasn’t worried about the thing crawling around while he was trying to drive but luckily it seemed that the cat was just happy to be somewhere warm again, so it didn’t around move much. Every once in a while, it would pop its head out to meow out some commentary, but that was about it did.

The garage wasn’t far, so the drive wasn’t long, and of course as soon as he pulled in and shut the door behind him, his car was swarmed with people trying to help out with the groceries.

“What took you so long? We thought you might have crashed.” Karma stated, opening his car door and pulling out a few bags.

Vert was right behind her, grabbing the remainder or the groceries and walking them over to the kitchenette.

“Yeah, dude. We were starting to get worried. Last time I saw you on ice, you had a pretty hard wipeout,” Vert loved to poke fun at him for what happened on Highway 35. It was better than the alternative he supposed.

Despite his friends concern, Kurt momentarily brushed them off in favor of finding somewhere warm to get the cat currently clinging to the inside of his jacket. On a whim, he rushed over to their makeshift laundry area and put his hand on top of the dryer. It felt like it was in the middle of a cycle, but he couldn’t tell.

“Have these been in here long?” He asked, pulling the door open.

“Yeah, they should almost be done, why?” Vert answered from the kitchen, starting to unpack the bags and lay everything out on the counter.

That was when Shirako and Nolo walked in.

“Look what the cat dragged in,” Nolo snarked upon seeing a cold and wet Kurt Wylde raiding their dryer for something warm to wear.

“You’ve go no idea,” Kurt responded before finally tugging the shivering kitten out from the inside of his jacket. Using the random amalgamation of team jackets, towels, and spare blankets, Kurt made a little nest for the thing to sleep in while it warmed up by the space heater they had going.

Within seconds the whole team was gathered around the heater keeping a close eye on the kitten.

“Where’d you find a cat?” Karma finally questioned, fixing Kurt with a look.

“Under my car. I think it was trying to keep warm. Looks like it wasn’t doing a good job though. Thing was practically frozen when I found it.” He explained, wandering over to the kitchen sink to start running some warm water to clean the kitten up. Being covered in all that grime couldn’t be good for it.

“We gonna keep it?” Nolo asked from his place next to the cat. He was starting to pet the top of the blanket pile to let it know that they were still there.

“Well, we can’t just kick it back out into the cold.” Kurt answered, testing the water before putting the stopper in the drain so that the sink would start to fill. It wasn’t hot, but it was still decently warm. He didn’t want to take the chance of burning the kitten or putting it into shock.

When the sink hand enough water in it to at least fill the bottom of the basin, Kurt came back over to the heater and plucked the cat from its makeshift nest. It whined in protest, but didn’t bite or scratch, so Kurt placed it in the water.

All things considered, it took the bath like a champ. Especially with how hard Kurt had to scrub to get some of the grease out of its fur. He made sure to be careful, but some of the stains just weren’t coming out.

“Damn. These won’t come out.” Kurt remarked with a frown, wiping the kittens face dry with a washcloth. “He looks like he’s got grease smudges everywhere.”

Shirako laughed from behind him, peaking over his shoulder at the cat.

“That’s what we should call him. Smudge.” Shirako suggested, as Vert came to join them by the sink.

“Aw, man. That’s adorable!” Vert agreed, clutching at his chest comically.

After a few warm nights spent in lots of Teku beds, Smudge was able to make a full recovery. It wasn’t long until the cat broke out of its shell and started getting into lots of mischief around the garage, but at the end of the day, the Teku don’t mind.

Besides, Smudge becomes a rather fitting mascot. Particularly when the Metal Maniacs start bringing their brutish dog to races. He makes a solid edition to their little family.

——— Thanks for Reading ———