The Fighter Part One

The Fighter - Part One

The city lay amid the biggest drought it had known in years. Water-starved leaves rustled noisily in the dry breeze, the chirping of insects carrying through the hot air. The city pavement simmered and shone as cars zipped past, blowing grains of sand in all direction. Neither the cars nor their occupants bothered to glance over the side at the shore of the bay, where, if one had a keen eye, they would have seen a pitiful sight. But no one noticed. No one cared.

It was a cat. And that was all. Just a cat. Not a human, who would have raised a fuss, or a dog, who would have broken some child's heart, but a cat. An ordinary, average alley cat. One nobody noticed, or cared about.

A lone fly buzzed its way lazily over the hot sandy beach, its simple mind only focused on one thing. Food... The fly sensed the cat lying among the seaweed and foam. Meat... It buzzed down, landing neatly on the cat's sodden eartip. The smell of old meat and blood greeted it. Greedily, it began to munch.

A yeowl. A flick. The fly leaped away, buzzing angrily at being robbed of its meal.

The cat was alive!

Macavity, the Mystery Cat, was invincible as he ran through his dreams. His coat was the red flame of death as he dashed headlong through the fire surrounding him. His claws, gleaming like silver daggers, flashed left and right, cutting down the cats that dared to stand in his way like strands of grass. They rose up before him like ghosts, yeowling and snarling in anger, but one after another he tore them to shreds. None of them could stand up to him. Laughing insanely, Macavity came upon two queens. He stopped, grinning evilly at them.

One was smaller than the other: extremely pretty with long brown fur. Macavity raised his claws and killed her with a single swipe. The other, slightly bigger, had fur of the purest gold. Macavity rounded on her, baring his fangs...and stopped.

Jade green eyes stared at him in defiance. He felt his claws waver under her stare, which made him angry. He snarled, and tried to advance to attack and kill her, but her eyes never blinked. They stared, radiating hatred.

Macavity turned and ran. His breath poured hot and ragged from his throat, and he laughed. He laughed as he ran past all the cats he'd killed or maimed...or both. He left his tracks in their blood, his ears filled with the agony of a thousand screams of pain. He laughed at it all, reveling.

But then he looked back over his shoulder. The golden queen was chasing him! He was confused, and snarled at her. Macavity ran from no one! He tried to stop and turn, to face and fight her, but his legs carried him on. He felt his heart tinged by something...something he never remembered feeling before.

Fear. It crept into his heart like a stalking tiger. His grin began to fade as he saw, still running behind him, the gold queen had grown larger! At first she had been small, a kitten, but now she was the size of two full toms. Macavity growled curse after curse and urged his legs on to greater speeds. But they were like lead weights. In fact, it seemed he was slowing.

"Yeeagh!!" Macavity slowed to a stop, whirling to attack this cat which struck fear into him. He snarled and bristled, but now the queen towered over him: the size of a tiger. Macavity snarled, but it was drowned out by her screech, and the golden queen's claws came flashing toward his throat. And her eyes... her jade green eyes...staring...

Macavity woke up screaming. He shot up from where he lay, panting and covered in perspiration. He shivered and shook violently, wiping wet fur from his eyes with the back of one paw. Looking down, he saw his claw tips covered in blood where he'd gripped his own arm too tightly.

"Macavity, sir?" a timid voice spoke from behind the door as it opened a mere inch. Machete's concerned face peeked through. "Are you alright? Phetalone said she heard scre--"

"Get out!" Macavity shrieked, throwing an empty chalice so that it banged against the door near Machete's head. "When I want your help I'll demand it! Get out of here, you miserable roach! Out!"

Macavity slumped back on his damp pillows as Machete slammed the door and dashed away. His breathing was regular now, and he laid back to sort his thoughts. He was confused. Macavity didn't believe in dreams and omens; he held strong to the belief that each cat was in charge of their own fate. But this dream had been so real...so lifelike and vivid that he shuddered.

"Etcetera! Get back here!"

"Cet! Don't make me hafta come get you!"

Etcetera ran for all she was worth, scrambling over loose junk and dodging through pipes. Her fur was wet and bedraggled, smelling of an awful odor. Blinking furiously against the water in her eyes, she scrambled up and over an enormous tire. She could see the rusted fence that encircled the junkyard, and knew that she was almost free.

"Almost there...almost there...almost there..." She panted heavily, sprinting headlong for the gap next to the fencepost she so often used. "Almost there..."

Something silver flashed before her, before she had time to stop, and she slammed into something strong and sturdy. She fell back, head over tail, and landed with a grunt on her backside. A strong black paw grabbed her arm securely.

"Hey, what's the rush, kit?"

Etcetera struggled, trying to disengage. "Lemme go, Strap! They're not gonna get me! I gotta get outta here!"

Munkustrap pressed his ears forward a moment and glanced over the area. Empty. "Who?"

"Them! They're gonna give me a bath!"

Munkustrap laughed heartily, full-throated, just as two sleek forms appeared in the same direction Etcetera had appeared. Alonzo immediately set his sights on the kitten, growling. "You've got it coming, rascal! Jenny is frettin' her whiskers off at you right now." He grabbed the little queen by her ear and proceeded to drag her protesting back to Jennyanydots's washing tub.

"Nooooo! No! I gave myself a bath yesterday! I'm clean! Lemme gooooo!"

Munkustrap watched them a moment, laughing inwardly. Sometimes he pitied to poor kitten, but not often. He glanced back to the second figure as she slipped a hand over his shoulder.

"Thank Heaviside you caught that little terror," Bombalurina laughed. "I wasn't bred to chase kittens." Leaning back against an old washboard, she let the sun shine on her silky red fur, kneading her claws on the water-rotten wood.

Munkustrap scratched behind his ear for a moment, looking away. Through the twisted, limp metal fence that surrounded the junkyard on this side he could see the first traces of beach, and beyond the blue water of the city bay. "Then what, pray tell, were you bred for?"

Bombalurina flicked her tail, smiling beneath her whiskers. "For breeding."

Munkustrap laughed, a little ironically, knowing the horrible truth behind her statement. He didn't think about it long. "I suppose you don't want to chase and bathe kittens all day..."

"Of course not." In response to his observation she flicked a tail under his chin, sashaying toward the well-used hole in the fence. "C'mon."

Munkustrap glanced at her in annoyance. "Don't," he warned. Bombalurina grinned.

"Aww, I ain't gonna do anything. Just a walk?"

Munkustrap considered this a moment, knowing how the pretty red queen could be sometimes, but the sounds of struggle behind him, no doubt from Etcetera's bathing, decided for him that he didn't want to hang around the junkyard. "Oh alright." He followed her out toward the beach.

A lone set of tracks traced their way across the scorching sands. The female alley cat trudged her way along, barely able to stand. The sun beat her back mercilessly, and her tongue lolled from dehydration. She trudged on, alone, tortured: physically and mentally. Her fur hung filthy and salt-soaked from the water. Her eyes were barely open, and she stumbled, collapsing to her side. For a moment she lay, panting, before forcing her weak limbs to go on.

The loose beach sand began to give way to a flat grassy area, which ran perpendicular to the busy highway. The brown, prickly grass was a different torture to her feet than the scorching sand, but torture all the same. The queen brought her worn, weary eyes up to gaze over the drought-eaten ground. She never remembered seeing this place before, but, then...she didn't remember much at all.

She was so tired. She tried to open her mouth to say something, but her throat was parched. She coughed, spitting up a dry retch: the only contents of her empty stomach. She was starved.

Her head brushed against the turned-upright rock before she even saw it, stumbling back dizzily. Her blurred, stinging vision only half comprehended what she saw. She was too tired... The queen let herself collapse in its shade. It wasn't two minutes before she was asleep.

The bedraggled queen woke to the sight of an enormous black nose in her face. With remarkable strength for her condition, the queen leaped to her feet, backing against the rock with a hoarse hiss. The dog was enormous and shaggy, yet--like most dogs--stupid. It leaped back with a snort, baring its chipped fangs. It growled and advanced again. The cat hissed and coughed. There was a flash of golden-yellow, and the dog was sent yelping away, a deep set of scratches on its wet nose.

"Yeagh! That'll teach you to try and make dog(cough)meat outta me!" the cat cried after it hoarsely, her voice dry and scratchy. She lifted her yellow-furred paw and looked at the bright red blood drops on her flexed claws. Had she done that? It had felt so easy...so natural. The queen set her paw down, swaying as a sudden dizziness overwhelmed her, a strange intoxicating feeling. She must have realized it then. She was alive, and she was a fighter.

"Hey," Munkustrap clapped a paw to his cheek, glaring at the red queen. "I said don't do that!"

Bombalurina took a step back, pouting playfully. "Aw, c'mon. You had a mud clump in your fur. I was just gettin' it out."

"With your teeth?" he snapped in reply.

Bombalurina crossed her arms. "Okay, lighten up. D'you even know how to relax and have a good time?" She set her weight on one leg, jutting her hip out to the side: her usual attractive posture. Munkustrap tried to ignore it.

"You have your ways of fun, Trix, and I have mine."

"Hey! Don't call me that. I hate that name."

"What? Trixie?"

"I'm warnin' you, bud."

"What's so bad about Trixie? It's kinda cute..."

"Mrowrph!"

In a flash of red Bombalurina threw her weight against the silver-gray tabby and knocked him to the sand. The two fought, neither really serious about it, as they rolled head-over-tail across the hot beach. Sand flew in every direction, and the two felines only parted when the cold shock of saltwater greeted them both as they rolled into the surf.

Bombalurina leaped back, flicking her wet paws. "Gah, now look what ya made me do." She rubbed her back into the shifty sand, striving for the dry warmth. Munkustrap stretched out on the dark, water-soaked part of the beach, seeming unbothered by the dampness.

"Serves you right," he replied lazily, lulled by the warm sun reflecting off the water. He flicked one ear, half-shutting his eyes. Bombalurina stood and glared at him, her temper rising at his outward coolness.

"How you an' Tugger can share the same father and be so different I'll never know," she finally spat, unable to think of a better insult. Munkustrap opened one eye at her.

"For your information, I've got a wild side of my own."

Bombalurina couldn't let that go. She fell to her side, laughing. "Hahahaha! You? Wild?! Woohoohaha! Oh, dogs! That'll be the joke of the day! Haha!"

Munkustrap frowned, fully awake now. "What about the time I--hey! Look out!"

Bombalurina turned to look in the direction he pointed, and barely had time to open her mouth to scream before the enormous, shaggy dog bore down on her, snarling and slobbering. Bombalurina instinctly fell onto her back under the mutt, clawing for all she was worth. The dog's enormous jaws snapped at her. Bombalurina lashed, adding a new set of scratches to his nose, where, she saw, there was already a fresh set.

Munkustrap was on the dog in a flash. He leaped boldly onto the dog's shaggy gray back, biting and clawing as deep as he could through the thick fur. The dog bucked, feeling the new weight added to its back, and jerked its head away from the red cat beneath it, snapping at the silver-gray on its back. Bombalurina scrambled away, tripping on her own paws in the deep sand. She stopped at a fair distance and looked back, afraid of what she might see.

The dog's jaws clamped shut like a steel trap, barely missing Munkustrap's exposed side. The cat snarled, sinking his teeth deeper into the dog's foul-tasting fur, searching for its spine. What to do if he ever reached it, he still wasn't sure of.

Neither knew where the golden cat came from. She came darting down onto the beach from above, near the highway, and in a flying leap landed with her claws outstretched on the dog's face, her paws but a blur as she worked. Bombalurina watched, her mouth hanging open, at the cat that looked like something to be found in an alley gutter gave the dog its due thrashing.

The dog yelped in pain as the gold cat's claws found its eye, and with a final howl and jerk, threw the two cats free of it and speed off once again. This time it ran alone.

Bombalurina first rushed to Munkustrap, who sat in a daze, blinking dizzily on the sand. Remarkably, he seemed unscathed.

"Are you alright?" she asked breathlessly. She took a rough hold on his arm and helped him up.

"Fine," he rumbled, brushing sand from his fur. "You?"

"Yeah, but...who...?"

Both their voices faded to nothing as their eyes landed on the golden queen. She was a horrible-looking thing. She was young, obviously, barely looking out of her kittenhood. Her limbs were extremely thin, like a cat who had spent a long time with only a little food, as her ribs were visible through her sides. And her fur, although brilliantly colored gold, was shabby, thin, and soaked with saltwater. Around her neck there seemed to be a spot where the fur was worn away, but she wore no collar. And her eyes... Bombalurina grabbed Munkustrap's arm unconsciously as they landed on her. They were deep, sunken, and burned strangely.

Her haggard appearance seemed to be felt as well. No sooner had the dog disappeared, she stood staring after it, trembling with excitement or rage...it was difficult to tell...before she looked back to the two cats, and stumbled. Her legs seemed to give out from under her, and with a quiet gasp she fell to the sand. Both Jellicles rushed forward and knelt beside her.

Bombalurina's paws were as gentle as a mother's as she slipped them under the gold queen's back and head, gently propping her up against her lap. "Don't talk, hun," she soothed as the queen made a series of choking coughs, her throat horribly dry. "She needs water," she mumbled to Munkustrap without looking at him. The silver tabby glanced about. Water, all over, but none of it potable. His sigh told Bombalurina his thoughts.

"Relax, hun," Bombalurina focused on the cat. "We're not gonna hurt you. You feelin' okay?"

In response the queen went limp and fell unconscious.

Munkustrap stood to his feet, looking over Bombalurina's shoulder at the gold cat's face. "Let's get her back to the junkyard," he said at length.