The Queen of Cats

Undercurrents

The air was hot with tension.

The cats could feel it, brewing in the air. Sweltering. Waiting to explode. They drifted further and further away from each other. Not meeting. Not sharing whatever thin conversations they used to share for centuries.

Parts of the world were getting blasted by the passage of time.

Old monsters rose up again and tore down the urban edifices that had been there for centuries. For millennia. For a lifetime.

The aftereffects of the conclave were felt for days afterwards. The end was nigh, and everyone knew it. They walked with their heads bowed low, looking for the revolutionary, hoping against all hope he'd be there to bail them out of the incumbent doom, like he always was.

But he was gone.

And the prophet was gone.

And they could do nothing but wait.

And then, the undercurrents began fanning across the city. Little messages. A long, drawn out game of Chinese whispers.

Another meeting.

Before the end.

The one called Socrates, perhaps the oldest of them all, and in his own flawed sense of self, the wisest, clung to the shadows. His ears were often pressed tight to the walls. He struggled to tap into the information that was pulsating through the currents.

The undercurrent.

Another meeting.

Another congress of cats.

Only, this time it wasn't just for the cats.

This time, it was for everyone. The Yakuza, the storekeepers, the ghosts, the palimpsests of what was past.

Everyone.

This message eddied in the deep. And in the high places.

Bourgeois swine, who crawled the depths of the world, seeking out whatever solace they could receive, looked up into the air, their noses sniffing.

They could feel it too.

Everyone could feel it.

Things were changing faster and faster.

Things were morphing.

The cats began coming together, on occasion, standing close to the regular entrances to the great hall, waiting for someone to make the first move.

They danced a ridiculous dance.

Forwards and backwards and forwards again.

Waiting.

Somebody had to do something.

The Yakuza emerged. As quiet as they could. But the others saw. They watched. They quelled their fear.

They were expecting them to re-emerge guns blazing. Looking for blood.

Ushering in the end.

They came empty handed.

The big boss tried to stand firm, but his tentacular accoutrements betrayed him.

They danced like the best of them.

Forwards and backwards.

Fear.

Something you could taste in the in-between.

And Death.

She was everywhere.

Blood splatters lined the universe.

Nothing died.

Because everyone was about to die soon.

She would be very busy.

A doorway creaked open, and two hooded figures emerged.

A delicate, feline face, wrapped in velvety cloth.

A vulpine one, holding her close.

She remembered what she last told her, before she went out to do what she had done. "Never come back. Never show your face here again."

What a way to treat someone. Even if she was the harbinger of doom.

Because, she realized, doom was relative. What was doom. An infinity of servitude. Tending books in the scape of someone she didn't even know. Not reading. Not comprehending.

Tending. That was doom. And freedom was something she wanted.

And the automaton next to her.

Her baggage.

She made him to be everything he couldn't be back on the farm.

Knowing everything she didn't know. Strong enough to protect her. Her lion. Her wolf.

It was difficult to pinpoint exactly when she began to tire of him.

Maybe the moment she reached here.

The moment she saw him next to her. Fake. Flaccid.

The real one was dead. By her own hands, of course.

Though she could blame the cat, if she wanted to.

Yes, it was all the cat's fault. The cat did it all.

It was no sense trying to blame herself for something she clearly had no hand in.

The cat disposed of her.

Because it tried to save her.

That was none of her business. She had to fulfil her own destiny.

She had to bask in her own doom.

Because doom or no doom, it was something she could claim. Something she owned. It belonged to her.

They arrived at the gates, one of the myriad entrances. Perhaps even the most popular one. The tentacle-head was there. The cast were there.

Death was there.

But then again, Death was everywhere.

She began her dance.

The automaton didn't.

Because the automaton was designed to be what she couldn't be. What she wanted the real him to be. He was stronger. In will and in body.

He refuse to dance.

He opened the door.

A quick little mini-chapter. Hope you liked it!