Disclaimer: I do not own Gargamel or the Smurfs, but Mandrake the Mischievous is mine. Please don't sue me or steal my story!
NOTE: When I was little, I thought Azrael was a girl. I realized later Azrael was a guy cat in the show, and he's a guy cat in just about all of my other Smurfs stories, but since this story deals with an alternate reality, I thought it would be fun to write Azrael as a female, so that's what I did. I hope you don't mind, and I hope you enjoy my story!
NOTE II: Gargamel calls Lord Balthazar "Uncle" in the Smurfs episode "Handy's Kite." So, Balthazar is Gargamel's uncle and his godfather (something that's pretty common in lots of families).
A World Without Gargamel
By Rowena
Chapter One
Azrael woke with a start, her growling stomach jarring her from dreams of food.
Stretching hugely, the scruffy brown cat jumped lightly down from the hearthstone where she'd spent the night and began investigating the dust that had collected in the corners, her keen senses on the alert for any sign of mice. The search was one of habit, though. Azrael knew there was nothing to find. The cupboards had been bare for so long, even the mice had deserted their holes.
Growling deep in her throat, the starving cat shot an angry glare across the room to the sagging bed where her worthless human snored. She watched him mutter in his sleep, and her hackles rose.
Padding to his side, Azrael crouched low and pounced.
She landed with claws outstretched right on her wizard's chest.
"YIIIIPE!" Gargamel yelped hoarsely.
His eyes shot open and his arms flailed as he struggled to sit up.
Azrael wouldn't let him. Instead, she walked up his nightshirt and glared right in his face, her crooked tail twitching behind her as if to scold him for sleeping when he should have been finding breakfast for his hungry cat.
"Get off me, you mangy feline!" Gargamel shouted, batting her away with his frayed, gray pillow. "Are you trying to suffocate me?"
Azrael raised an eyebrow.
"Mrower."
She shrugged with a wicked smile.
Gargamel frowned, and sat up at last.
Azrael jumped to the floor.
"Well?" the wizard demanded. "What do you want? Why have you woken me up at this ungodly hour?"
"Mreow!"
Azrael scowled, and leaped up onto the counter. She balanced on her hind legs and scratched pointedly at the cupboard door.
Gargamel sighed deeply, scratching his fingers through his greasy, thinning hair.
"Oh, right," he muttered. "It's market day today, isn't it."
He shot his cat a slitted glare.
"And I suppose you'll be wanting some nice chicken livers and duck hearts for your supper, am I right?"
Azrael's yellowed eyes opened wide and she licked her lips.
"Mrowrer!"
"Well, you're not going to get them," Gargamel grumped.
Standing up on his spindly legs, he strode over to his wardrobe, where he pulled on his frayed, patched robes and stepped into his worn, red shoes.
"I've only got three pennies, so we're both just going to have to make do with gruel as usual."
Azrael hissed and spat, but her snarls were wasted on the failed wizard, who was staring dolefully down at the three pitiful coins in his hand. Taking a long glance around his crumbling hovel, he slowly shook his head, his expression bitter and his thin lips pursed.
"I hate this place, Azrael," he said. "I truly do."
Azrael nodded.
"Merow," she agreed.
"But it won't always be like this, mark my words," Gargamel assured her. "Someday I'll catch those Smurfs, and then we'll have all the gold we could ever want. Enough to buy that castle from my rotten godfather, Uncle Balthazar. Enough to impress Mummy! Enough to finally vindicate myself before the entire wizarding world!"
Azrael yawned and rolled her eyes, as if to say, "Yeah right. Dream on."
Gargamel didn't notice. He was charged up now, striding to the door with a new bounce in his step.
"Wait for me here, Azrael," he ordered. "If any Smurfs should come near, you know what to do!"
"Mreah, mreah," she said, curling back up on the hearthstone as the door slammed behind her human's departing back.
"Just be sure to bring me food," she thought darkly to herself with a predatory smirk. "Or else I might just eat you..."
What do you think so far?