Darla's Revenge:
A Cats Don't Dance Fanfic

Chapter 1

Darla Dimple groaned and grunted as she finished up her latest mop job. She couldn't believe it. All her fame and fortune. Gone in an instant. Gone when she opened her big mouth. She just couldn't get it out of her head. After all, that fateful night, at the debut of "Li'l Ark Angel," she was the star. She was. Darla Dimple. She was the star. And yet, that obnoxiously irritating cat with the orange fur, that cat with too much ambition, that cat with the talents but not worthy to be praised, known to all simply as Danny, just had to have that big break. In the end, there he was, on top of the world, and there she was, down in the dumps, never to be in show business again, and was nothing more than just a janitor to Mammoth Pictures.

"At least it pays," she said to herself, "but I'll never forgive that cat! He took away everything I had! Well, almost everything." (She did still have her house and her money, which surprised a lot of people, but she no longer had her enormous valet, Max, so she had to spend some of it on a new set of valets and maids, just to keep her huge pink heart-shaped mansion going. To her knowledge, she had no idea where Max was, and chances are he was still flying away on that big balloon. Who knew where he'd end up?) "I was the star! I was! It was my night! Who put the microphone on me anyways? Revenge! I will have revenge! But how?" She continued to ponder how to get herself back in showbiz.

Meanwhile, the studio had finished filming its take on the classic musical "The Music Man," with Danny in the title role as Prof. Harold Hill, and Sawyer (naturally) as the librarian. (Woolie the Mammoth, although doing a bit of acting himself, had chosen mainly to focus on music composition, and had done the score and book for this film production.) The film was set to premiere at the famous Gruman's Chinese Theater the following week; the delay came about when the workers noticed the roof damage. The employees assumed it was Darla's fault, because she had (unintentionally) confessed that she flooded the stage instead of the animals when she got tangled up in the microphone. (You can only imagine the grief L.B. and Flanigan went through when she confessed.)

"What a fun role that was do," Danny commented as the cast left the studio. They made their way over to a fancy restaurant L.B. and Flanigan had invited them to, and Flanigan was having to get used to adjusting himself to directing the animals instead of Darla. "That may be my favorite one yet."

"I figured you'd like that one," said L.B. "It suits you. Tell me something, though. What happened exactly?"

"About Darla flooding the stage?"

"Yes. That cost me a fortune to repair everything. I took it out of Darla's big salary, though; if she's making any money on top of her janitorial duties, it's royalties from the films."

"As far as I know, it could only have been her. I had wanted to get an audition with you so we could prove that animals have just as big the talent and potential as humans. Yet humans always got the good parts. Next thing I knew, the ark was moving. It wasn't supposed to. It was just supposed to be a special effect for our performance. She must have chosen to turn the thing on full blast."

"She must have, because I was giving a press conference. What got you to get use of it, anyway?" (The group was now riding with L.B. in his limo.)

"She invited me to tea, and said she wanted to apologize for what Max did to me that first day of filming Li'l Ark Angel, because there was the incident where I upstaged her."

"Oh, yes; you went off-script. I watched the replay of that during the editing. Of course, I can see why you did that now."

"Uh-huh."

"So what did she say after she apologized?"

"She wanted to make it up to me and the other animals. She decided we should do a number in her movie. She gave me full use of the ark, sound stage, and anything else."

"Well, I knew there was something going on, because in the press conference, I was laying out the recipe for a Darla Dimple movie. After listing all the things that go into it, I said, 'Mix it all together, and what do you get?' Then I pressed the green button, the doors opened up, and the flood began. And when it finally ended, Flanigan and I proclaimed you animals would never get work in this town again. Boy, was I wrong. How was I supposed to know Darla was as evil and psychotic as could be?"

"How could anybody know? She covered it up so well," said Cranston. "After nothing but her, you had to be starving for a new star or two." L.B. nodded.

"So my plan B," Danny continued, "was what you ended up witnessing at the theater. I didn't learn until afterwards that Darla had been sabotaging the equipment, or at least trying to, but she only made it better, so we went along with it."

"Had me fooled; I thought it was genuine."

"Then suddenly, as we got our standing ovation, there she was, all tangled up in the equipment, and she must have had a microphone stuck to her, because she screamed at us, saying she should have drowned us all when she flooded the stage."

"I couldn't believe my ears," Flanigan put in as the group arrived at the restaurant. "I thought my career was over."

"So did I," L.B. added. "But it wasn't. In fact, it's practically tripled the revenue my studios have been bringing in ever since that performance. You kids are something else, you know that?"

"Thank you." As everybody walked inside to eat, they couldn't help but think to themselves that these were better days. Danny also pondered just how different life would be if he had just gone back to his hometown of Kokomo, Indian. Instead, he and his friends were big stars. L.B. would later reveal that the cat with the talent was bound to have a recording contract coming, because he loved to sing as well dance. (It was also possible Sawyer would get one of her own, because she could also sing so beautifully. As it happens, she was still doing secretary work for Farley Wink, but she was abruptly having to adjust her schedule to her other career in the showbiz world. After all, Danny said to her, "Your life isn't back there in that office. It's here.")

Cranston and Frances were big stars in their own right, having been established dance partners long before Hollywood began shunning them in favor of humans. T.W. was getting his own career going, although he wasn't singing as much as Danny. Tillie probably had the least amount of films with her in the title role, but she didn't care. She saw all the brighter things in life.

The group continued to talk over their meal, and it all became clear to everybody. It only made sense that it was Darla's doing, because she wanted all the fame and fortune to herself, and she supported the Hollywood mindset that humans were superior to animals. L.B. then stated he regretted not knowing the reasoning or the history behind that mentality, but that was the way life was.

Everybody was also happy that they had finished "The Music Man" just in time, because very soon, World War II (or WW2 for short to some people) was to break out, and the studios would be forced to put a few projects on hiatus in favor patriotic short training films (one of which would feature Danny conducting the U.S. Marine Corps Band). All the while, it wasn't going to stop Darla from what schemes she was plotting. After all, she was the star, and she wanted her fame back. She'd do anything to get it. She just wasn't sure what. Only one thing was for sure: she was on her own, for Max had long gone since Danny popped the balloon.

TO BE CONTINUED