Note: This is a piece from the book Cat City: Tuffy's Story Vol. 1, available at , , and ; written by T. G. K. 110.
After a nuclear holocaust, humans and chimerians are forced to work together in order to rebuild all that has been destroyed. Meanwhile, gangs plague the streets with the deadly promise of another war.
Following a young, timid, chimerian boy named Tuffy Baxton who is just trying to survive and make a few friends in the process. But how far is he willing to go when the streets are constantly trying to swallow him up?
Mybears smirked along with the rest of his gang. One of the kids—a multi-colored boy called Rainbow Bear—smacked the data pad Tuffy held out of his grasp. The boy was Mybears' half-brother; they shared the same mom but had different Bear had piercings in his bottom lip, eyebrow, and most kids in the Slums, he came from a broken family that dealt in neglect and physical abuse. Rainbow Bear had bounced from home to home until Mybears' older brothers took him in.
"Looks like you dropped yer data pad." There was venom in his voice.
"Let me get that for ya," Mybears exclaimed with a malevolent glint filling his eyes as he picked up the computer. Then he threw it against the floor with all his might. "Whoopsy." Pieces of glass and electronic bits scattered across the dirt floor. The gang laughed. All Tuffy's assignments were gone in the blink of an eye. Thank goodness he had backups.
Fleece peered through the dense crowd to see her friend in distress. She ran over on a wave of defense. "Leave him alone," Fleece demanded as she forced her way through the crowd.
Rainbow Bear was shoved out of the way. After regaining his composure, he frowned at her advancement. Mybears folded his arms over his chest with amusement, as did Quook.
"Oh, what'are you gonna do if we don't?" Quook pressed with calculated anticipation.
"I'll tell Max," she fired back, glaring at Quook. Quook seemed to be nonchalant about Fleece's threat.
"Max?" Rainbow Bear exclaimed, "What da hell he gonna do?"
"I'ma tell him that you hit me." Fleece's snapped.
Max was one of Mybears' older brothers, and a leader of the Stuffedy gang. He owned several brothels in the Slums. Mybears and his siblings had been living with their oldest brother, Fat Puddy, but after his fiancée was murdered, Fat Puddy had a nervous breakdown. The kids were sent to live with Max at his largest brothel in Sector 213. Since Max was a pimp, he often took in females in need of a home. Fleece was one of those cases: Her mom was addicted to the powerful synthetic opiate, xi yud xi; however, she was very beautiful. Catching Max's eye, he moved her and her daughter, Fleece, into his house. When her mom passed, Fleece was left in Max's care. He kept her because she had her mom's beauty; already settling her future in his mind. She was to be an escort, and Max ordered Mybears and his crew not to harm her.
Mybears shifted his weight. "You say that n' I guarantee you, he'll be dead."
Fleece moved closer to Mybears. Her hands were balled into fists. She looked into his eyes with enough fury to ignite a thousand suns. BAM! Her knee jetted up, hitting him in the privates.
"Uh." Mybears groped himself as the pain pulled him down. The faces in the group were the picture of dismay.
"Go, Tuffy." Fleece barked.
"You bitch!" Quook screamed. She charged Fleece, but Tuffy purposely got in the way.
Quook jumped on his back in a fit of rage—kicking, screaming, and scratching Tuffy. In a panic, he spun around with her on his wooly back. Fleece tried to run after hitting Mybears, but Rainbow Bear and Jonathan—Mybears' adopted brother-grabbed her. They threw her up against the metal lockers, causing her to wince loudly. Her head slumped over with winded lungs.
"I'm gonna kill you," Quook spat from Tuffy's back. Without thinking, Tuffy slammed her against the lockers, dislodging the wild beast from his back. The rest of the gang gasped with shock. Tuffy looked behind him not realizing what he had done. Quook got up off the floor. "You really fugged up now!"
Quook balled up her fists; rage painted her eyes blood-shot. She charged him only to have her arm consumed by a much stronger and larger hand. "What's go'n on here?" Knowing full well what was going on, the male teacher released her.
"What it look like?" Rainbow Bear retorted with attitude.
"Get to class," he responded plainly. "Now."
Slowly recovering from the pain, Mybears seethed, "Don't think this is over, bitch." His voice wavered between pain and rage. Then he obeyed, turning slowly and moving toward his classroom. The rest of the gang did the same, sucking their teeth and spitting snide remarks as they made their exit. Rooted next to his locker, Tuffy gazed at the scattered parts of his data pad.
"I suggest you get to class too, and quickly." The teacher turned and briskly walked away.
The bell chimed, signaling the beginning of class. Seconds later Tuffy trudged in. He kept his head aimed at the floor as the teacher, Mr. Tweela, spoke. "You're late."
Mybears and his crew were late as well, but Mr. Tweela didn't said anything to them because he was a fellow Stuffedy, donning his tattoos proudly on his forearms and a small area of his neck. He glared at Tuffy from the moment he entered the room until the moment he sat down.
Fleece raised her hand but spoke before she was granted permission. "Mr. Tweela, Mybears and his stupid brothers and sister are late all the time n' you never say anything to them."
Tuffy glanced at her as if to say, "Why did you say that?" The teacher crossed his arms over his chest, eyeing Fleece in a condescending manner. "S'cuse me?" Mr. Tweela exclaimed defensively. His blue cat eyes narrowed on her off-white sheepish form.
"You always—"
"Did everyone finish their assignments?" He flipped the script by changing the subject altogether. Most of the class melted into echoes of moans, but Mr. Tweela was able to make out a few yeses, not that he really cared. "Okay, you know the drill."
In unison, some of the children, very unenthusiastically, pulled out their data pads. Like robots, they crowded the bulk of machinery stationed near the teacher's desk. Brandishing their data pad screens toward the scanner, the machine graded their work. Because Tuffy's was destroyed, he could only sit at his three-legged seat with his palms against his face.
As the machine graded the students' homework, Mybears and his crew got up from their seats and left the classroom. They returned just before the grading process ended with the smell of marijuana and alcohol clinging to their musty garments. Mr. Tweela turned a blind eye to it. Once the grading process finished, the teacher read their grades aloud. He didn't have to, but Fleece suspected that he got some sort of sick pleasure in telling the students who were actually trying succeed that they didn't.
"Meow Meow, you failed." He blurted out as his blue eyes ran over the screen on his desk. A painted grin was poorly hidden behind his sorry excuse for professionalism.
A soft-spoken girl with large eyes and folded ears dipped her head in despair.
"Ringo…" A chimerian with a black mask of fur around the eyes, glanced up from his cracked desk, focusing on the teacher. "You got an F."
"Man!" he whined. Mybears and his crew singled out Ringo and Meow Meow with their snide laughter. "My dad is gonna kill me." Desperately, Ringo raised his hand but Mr. Tweela ignored him.
"Bruno… failed." A boy with a beige hide and ivory underbelly, rested with his large flat face on his desk.
"Denis, why'd you even bother turning this assignment? It's not like you completed it." Mr. Tweela chastised. Mybears' crew burst into more obnoxious laughter, even though none of them ever did homework.
"I did complete the assignment." A slender bear-faced hybrid with black and white patches of fur proclaimed.
"No, you didn't. You missed sections: 0.08 and 0.07, also section 0.04." Mr. Tweela tapped on his partially holographic keyboard. "I don't know why some of you scoob-dooby's even bother coming to school, with grades like these… Denis… Meow Meow… Bruno… Fleece…!"
Ringo made pathetic struggling sounds as he stretched his arm in the air. "Ooo… ooo… ooo, Mr. Tweela… Mr. Tweela…?"
With a heavy sigh the teacher responded, "What d'hell you want now, Ringo?"
"Can you tell me what I missed, so I can study it when I get home?" His brindle-colored arm sank down as he spoke.
The teacher glanced up from his computer, glaring at the masked kid with malevolent eyes. "You've got to be kidding me."
Mybears and his crew continued with their torrent of laughter.
Ringo lowered his focus to his desk. "No," he whined. His ears dipped as well.
"It'd be faster for me to tell you what you didn't miss. You spelled yer name right. Everything else you did wrong!"
"What an idiot!" Rainbow Bears chimed.
Flicking bits of trash off his desk and refusing to make eye contact with anyone, Ringo's voice came out in a shallow hum. His foot swept sharply from side to side.
"Well, it was hard." Ringo sang defensively.
"It was hard…?" Mr. Tweela abandoned his slouched position for an upright one. "People, these assignments are not hard, you just have to remove your heads from your asses and then read the material!"
The classroom quieted to broken chatter.
"It's funny how you hoodlums can hang out in the street all hours of the night, sell'n dope n' whoring around!" He glared at Fleece who stared right back at him, her arms folded over her chest. "But when it comes to doing your homework, 'Oh, It's hard,' or 'I didn't understand it!'" He held his bitterly condescending tone as he addressed most of the classroom. His eyes finally left Fleece's. "You understand when there's a gun in your face. You understand a crack pipe. I don't get it."
A strangulating smog of silence lasted only a split second before Fleece interrupted. "You're an ass!"
The teacher lobbed a sideways glance at the sheep-like girl as his temperature rose. Several kids gawked at her with bouts of laughter, in awe of her direct insult. They looked to Mr. Tweela for a response.
"And you're a slut," he fired back. Tuffy sulked into his desk, wishing that he could just melt away. It killed him to see Fleece being attacked like this.
Several kids turned their focus back to Fleece: "Ooo!"
Her snout turned pink with anger and humiliation.
Meow Meow raised her little hand. The class quieted as she spoke before being acknowledged by Mr. Tweela. "Um, you shouldn't say stuff like that. It's very rude, sir."
Mr. Tweela leaned forward in his chair, bracing his forearms on his large desk and observing the fragile-looking girl. "And you shouldn't be so dumb, Meow Meow. I'm sure it's quite embarrassing for your family."
"I'm not…" Meow Meow slowly began before Fleece cut her off.
"She's not dumb. You are, you son of a bitch!"
The classroom resonated with loud chuckles.
Mr. Tweela rolled his eyes as he sat back to engage her. "Fleece, I'm sure there's some guy in the bathroom waiting on his blow job, so have at it while I start the next lesson."
"Ooo!" cried the students.
Fleece's face morphed from reddened anger to a painted grin. "Oh, I'm sure your mom can wait!"
"Ooooooh!" The classroom roared.
She had sliced a nerve, and Mr. Tweela shot up from his seat. "Get out!" he attempted to yell above the cheers of her classmates.
Even Tuffy had to shout his support, yet he did so with caution.
"Get the hell out!" the teacher demanded, straining his vocals as he pointed a claw at the opened door.
Fleece snatched up her belongings with a satisfied look.
As she made her way to the exit, Mr. Tweela squeaked, "Hurry up!"
"Cheez down, Mr. Tweela. Yer let'n everybody know how tiny yer dick is," Fleece fired back.
"Shut!—" the teacher abandoned his sentence for a mug full of chewing gum and cigarettes. He sent it barreling toward Fleece. She sped up, merely ducking her head with the knowledge that Mr. Tweela couldn't throw for shit. The mug exploded against the metal door frame. Its contents rained down on the dirt floor as Fleece exited.
"Damn, Mr. Tweela, she got'chu! You gonna let that bitch get away wit dat?" Bruno, who was awoken by the unfriendly banter, exclaimed slyly.
Mr. Tweela, nearly shaking with rage, ignored Bruno's question. He eventually plopped into his seat, releasing a weighted sigh. Glaring at his computer, he briskly started the next lesson. It took the students several minutes to finally quiet down.
For the next three hours, the children were plagued by an electronic voice transmitting over-the-top excitement. On the darkened screen of the grading machine, the static-filled voice blared from the outline of two blue lips. Mr. Tweela played games on his communicator as usual—only this time it was also an attempt to blot out the fresh wounds left on his ego by Fleece's insults.