Vigilante PAW

Chapter Forty-Three: A Mayor's Motive

The man shook his head, "We can't do that. It's a policy not to release dogs unless they're directly asked for by their owner."

"How will he know we're all the way in Toronto, though?"

"We'll tell him everything."

Thinking through possible solutions, the Shepherd's eyes soon widened, "What if Marshall and I sneak off of the train at one of the stops? That way, the pound won't be liable!"

"You two will be in cages while you're transported... You'd have to worry about the cages before anything else."

Chase's brows furrowed. He had a good point. How could they possibly get out of those cages?

The door leading into the room then silently cracked open. Something that none of the room's occupants noticed midst their conversation. Peering into the medical room was a kitten. The same kitten that had been watching Chase and Marshall while they were walking through the pound. The kitten, listening into the conversation between Chase, Marshall, and the pound worker, swatted at a strange object attached to its collar.

Sitting at a desk far away from the pound, a familiar purple-clothed Mayor's eyes narrowed as he listened into the conversation Chase and Marshall were having with the pound worker through the device attached to the kitten's collar.

Following Humdinger's interaction and ensuing altercation with Marshall, the mayor decided to retreat back to his hideout and tend to both his physical and metaphorical wounds. Not only was he shown up by a group of puppies yet again, but now, he also had been bitten by one of them! How humiliating!

After listening to the private conversation through the device he attached to the kitten's collar, he seemed to have found a way to get back at the Dalmatian.

"They're being sent to Toronto, huh?" Humdinger mused, "And they'll be telling that to Ryder? Not on my watch!"

The purple-clothed mayor suddenly stood up from his chair, turning around to walk toward the entrance to his hideout. The familiar clomping noise of his dress shoes tapping against the sleek floors alerted a group of kittens off to the side, who all stopped what they were doing in order to look in Humdinger's direction.

"Come now, kitties!" He called, "We need to take a trip to the Foggy Bottom pound!"

Obeying his directions, the five kittens ran over to the small cage that also functioned as a form of transportation for the malicious mayor. After they were all aboard, Humdinger sat down on the carrier, using a small remote to guide them forward and out of the hideout.

As the light of the midday sun beamed through the thick layer of fog that always seemed to cover Foggy Bottom, Humdinger turned his attention to the town in front of him. The town he had become the mayor of so long ago.

He did it all on a whim. It all started because of that simple whim, and push from his mother.

Long before, Humdinger moved to Foggy Bottom with the expectation of a new start. Somewhere where he would be taken seriously. A place where all of the burdens of the past would be alleviated. And for the first few years, it was. While sure, after moving to Foggy Bottom to live independently, he was forced to find a job. He hated work. Detested having to do things for somebody else. Though, in working as a mechanic, he learned a few things about technology and how vehicles worked. This ignited a passion he never thought he had.

But why? He was working. Working for someone else, even. He hated it!

So then why did he wake up with a start each morning? Why did he come to work like he was a kid again, going to enjoy a nice treat baked by his mother? As time grew longer, Humdinger's skills sharpened. His aptitude for vehicles increased by the day. Humdinger even started thinking about how the machinery he learned how to build could benefit the silent town that was Foggy Bottom. But there was no way that such an ambitious project would be allowed by the mayor.