The whole yard was trembling with fear. The piercing laugh of the single most nefarious cat rang out. It's sound alone caused mountains of rubbish to collapse and quake with the powerful waves. Rumpleteazer screamed and ducked for cover, only to have a mass of heavy objects rain down on top of her. The pressure of being sandwiched between what she thought was the ground and an upright piano was enough to make her pass out.

It was some time later that she stirred. She awoke to the sound of another cat choking, male by the sound of it. Rumpleteazer opened her yellow eyes to find the yard shrouded with dust, and nobody else around. When her brain caught up with the situation realized she was sprawled out across Alonzo's torso rather awkwardly, unable to move under the weight of the piano. The fact that she didn't really know him (and slightly fancied him), made the dilemma even more awkward.

"Once you've finished gawking, do you think you could help me slide this under the piano so we can get out?" The tom wheezed between coughs, his hand resting on a large flower pot, "...before I die of suffocation"

"I can't move! Moi arms are trapped" Rumpleteazer replied, a little shocked at his brash manor. Alonzo sighed and rolled his eyes.

"Can you get them un-trapped?" he was starting to feel light headed, Rumpleteazer wiggled in an attempt to free her right arm. Her body jolted, causing him to cry out in pain.

"Sorry" she mumbled and yanked her arm out from underneath a large wooden box. Placing her hand on the other side of the pot, the pair of them shoved it beneath the piano, giving them enough space to scramble out. Relief washed over Alonzo's face as he took in deep breaths. The pair of them were covered in small patches of blood from a various scratches, both looking like a couple of zombies.

"Red suits ya well Cruella DeVille" She joked,

"Watch it Carrot!" Alonzo gave her a filthy look and ran a hand through his head fur.

"Oi just saved your loife!"

"At my instruction. Anyway, if you hadn't have been here I wouldn't have nearly died in the first place" he looked at her indifferently.

"Well that's 'ardly Moi fault" she huffed

"Of course it's your fault! I wasn't–" Alonzo was cut off as three rather large and brutish hench-cats strode into the area with machetes.

"You will come with us, or die" One of them ordered in a gruff voice. The two Jellicles surrendered, neither in a condition to run away or fight.

"Oooff!" Rumpleteazer breathed as they were thrown into a dark cell and the door locked behind them. "This place stinks!"

"Outstanding observation, but I thought you'd be acclimatized to it by now" he snapped.

"Wot?"

"Well you're the filthy criminal that hangs about here every other week"

"Excuse me! Oi am not a crim!" Teazer said defensively

"Pah! You stole my fob watch"

"You nevah used it. Besoides – it wos Uncle Skimble's Birfday"

"Oh 'Uncle Skimble's Birthday' indeed" Alonzo rolled his eyes and crossed his arms in annoyance. A long silence passed between them.

"Well if you're just gonna sit there an' sulk, Oim gonna troi an' foind us a way out" Teazer said, standing up and making her way over to the door.

"You cant escape a cell this tight" Alonzo said condescendingly. She pressed her ear up to the small gap between the door and the door frame and managed to hear some hench cats talking outside. She turned away and scanned the room for an alternative exit. Grinning, she walked over to the adjacent side wall and peered up at the ceiling. She found it a little odd that there were so many sprinklers, but thought no more about it. She lifted herself up onto a shelf, and removed her pearl necklace.

"Oi knew this would come in 'andy" Rumpleteazer chuckled to herself, using the clip of the necklace as a screwdriver.

"What are you doing?" Alonzo couldn't see any logic in her actions, mostly because he hadn't noticed the air vent panel that she was removing the screws from.

"Escaping" she flashed a smarmy grin at Alonzo before chucking aside the panel and crawling into the duct silently.

Alonzo wouldn't admit that he was a little taken a back. He really wasn't expecting a small queen of such low class to be so clever. He sighed and followed her into the duct, deciding that spoiling his ego was probably better than waiting for an execution or some sort of sadistic torture. Anything could happen to him at the mercy of Macavity, assuming he had mercy anyway. Rumpleteazer wasn't actually a bad queen – well, she certainly had a nice figure, he thought while he crawled staring at her bottom – the duct was only wide enough for one cat.

They continued crawling until Rumpleteazer stopped abruptly, causing Alonzo to bump into her.

"Careful!" She hissed. There was another vent panel on the floor of the duct shaft. Through it she spotted Jemima and Etcetera in a similar cell. A hench-cat said something to them, and soon left the room – locking the door behind him. The panel screws were on the other side of it, so this time the necklace wouldn't be of any use.

"Oi 'ope the walls are sound proof" Teazer thought out loud, before slamming her fist down on the vent panel with a bang. It wouldn't move, but it caught the queen kits' attention.

"Oi it's me! Rumpleteazer, and Alonzo's behoind me. Listen, we're gonna get'cha out, but is there anyone else who got captured as well as ya?" Rumpleteazer asked, and Alonzo rolled his eyes.

"No it's just us" Jemima replied.

"Trying to play hero are we?" Alonzo scoffed,

"Shut up Lonz, it's called not leaving your friends to die"

Rumpleteazer paused to have another unsuccessful crack at the panel.

"That requires great strength and infallible skill – fortunately of which I have both" Alonzo remarked.

"Oh really" She snickered and crawled over the vent so he could get to it. It took him several blows but eventually the screws gave way

"Cloimb up on the shelf quickly!" Teazer hissed to them, and they did so. Once Alonzo had helped them up into the vent all started crawling again, Teazer finding their way to an outside wall of the warehouse.

There was another vent panel behind a fan where the outside air was sucked in.

"Damn!" Teazer exclaimed.

"What is it now?" Alonzo called from the back of the line with a face full of Etcetera's tail.

"Oi can't get through to outsoide without dealing with this fan. I'll 'ave to foind the control room an' deactivate the air conditioning" she pressed on around the corner of the duct shaft.

"Be fast Rumpleteazer! It shouldn't be long now for them to find that we aren't in our cells" Alonzo called to her.

Rumpleteazer reached what she made out to be the control room. For some reason the vent panel was missing, and getting into the room wouldn't be hard. The only problem was, there wasn't a shelf she could stand on to get back into the ventilation system.

"Sacrifoice moiself for friends, or sacrifoice Alonzo's arm in that fan..." She thought aloud. Time was running out, and it wouldn't be long before the security hench-cat returned to the room from whatever he was doing that yielded him absent. Alonzo might not even be able to stop the fan anyway.

She jumped down into the room and stared at the controls on the vast desk of assorted knobs and levers. None of them had labels.

"'Ow convenient" She muttered, wondering which one the Air-Con was. Giving up on that idea, she set to work at flicking off all the switches, including the lights and power. She looked around the room for another way to cause confusion in an effort to get out of there alive. She spotted a fire alarm and extinguisher. An impish grin spread across her face as she smashed the glass and flicked the switch. Just as she was pulling the extinguisher from the wall the control room door opened and the security hench-cat walked in.

"Hey!" Rumpleteazer yelled at him. The hench-cat turned around and she sprayed the extinguisher carbon dioxide foam at his eyes. He recoiled and yowled in pain, staggering across the room clutching his face. She scuttled under the desk and disconnected the wires supplying power to the controls.

"That ought ta give 'em some toime" she thought and made for the door.

Without thinking she ran down the corridor and slammed straight into Macavity and his body guard hench-cats.

"Heeeeey Mac, ...Oi was just leaving" she smiled sweetly at him and turned to run away, but he grabbed her by the scruff of the neck.

"So soon? Wouldn't you like to have some tea and cake first?" Macavity played along, a false soft expression on his face.

"Errr sounds lovely but no fanks" she wiggled to break free, but his grip tightened.

"Oh but I insist" Macavity purred and held a knife to her throat.

Alonzo, Jemima and Etcetera had escaped the building and leaped over the chicken wire fence that surrounded it. When they got to the Junkyard Alonzo halted. Jemima and Etcetera were being smothered in hugs from their friends and family and told about how they were thought dead, the way parents always overreact. The Rum Tum Tugger ran up to Alonzo.

"Are you alright? You could have been killed!" the usually cool tom genuinely sounded concerned.

"I'm, I'm fine... yeah" Alonzo replied, but his mind was on something else.

Rumpleteazer had put her life at risk so they could get out, regardless of how he treated her. Alonzo felt a twinge of guilt for leaving her there... but there was something else aswell. A strange sensation, and it was urging him to go back and rescue her. Well what did he care, she probably deserved it – how many other crimes had she committed since taking his watch? He tried to shrug her off, but his mind was still uneasy. The more he thought about it, the more he realized he didn't want her to die. No, it was preposterous! He didn't care in the least about her! But a voice in his head laughed.

"Alonzo?" Tugger asked shaking him back to his attention.

"Yeah... I'll be right back" the black and white tom said quickly before dashing off without a single glance towards his confused friend.

Rumpleteazer was placed back in her original cell, this time strapped to a chair and her mouth taped. Macavity had sedated her, and bolted the chair to the ground. In a few minutes the room would start filling with water just in time for her to wake up, and be fully conscious before she started drowning. He wanted it to be cruel, as always.

She came around when the some of the water from the high power sprinklers was splashing on her face. Still a bit dizzy, she managed to work out just what was going on.

"Shmit!" Teazer exclaimed through the tape, now fully awake. She tried pulling her arms, legs and tail free but it was futile. The drug had rendered her body almost useless, and she was running out of time very quickly.

Just when she began to say her prayers, Alonzo popped his head out from the air vent.

"MmmmMmmm!" She yowled, thoroughly surprised at his return. Alonzo quickly jumped down and untied her, hissing slightly at the cold water that was already up to Rumpleteazer's neck. He helped her up, only for her to collapse.

"Great" Alonzo said rolling his eyes. He picked her up and removed the tape from her mouth.

"Oi'm a vegetable!" Rumpleteazer screamed, fearing that the paralyzation would be permanent. "Oi can't move my arms an' legs!"

"Please stop shouting! it's hurting my ears!" Alonzo propped her up against the wall adjacent to the door and climbed into the ventilation shaft. He managed to turn around in the small space and leant out to grab Teazer. With some difficulty and quite a struggle, he eventually pulled her into the vent too. They both lay there in silence, overcome with exhaustion.

"Oi nevah thought Oi'd be 'appy to see you, playing 'ero are we?" Rumpleteazer broke the silence and stared at Alonzo, who was still puffing.

"It's called not leaving your friends to die" He said simply. Teazer grinned. He wasn't a bad tom, really. She started giggling, and Alonzo joined in. They laughed together until Teazer stopped and frowned.

"So Oi'm a friend now am Oi?"

"I suppose you are, after all, you did save my life"

"Twoice!"

"And I just saved yours" He smiled at her, then put on the most pompous expression "You're lucky I have such impeccable timing"

"Oh Oi nevah met anyone who loved 'emself so much" She scoffed with a roll of her eyes, "Are we escaping or wot?"

"Yes, any sign of the drug waring off yet?" Alonzo asked, and Teazer made an effort to wiggle her toes.

"Oi can feel 'em now, but still a bit vegetable-ish" she said with a bit of relief.

"I was right in calling you 'Carrot' earlier" he smirked and started pulling her along the vent shaft.

"When Oi can move again, that cheek of yours is gonna 'ave my 'and print left on it for a week!"

When Alonzo had managed to carry Teazer back to the Junk yard, she was rushed to the medical den (or rather what was left of it) and was fussed over by Jenny, Jellylorum and the kittens. Much of their fuss was quite unnecessary and the effects of the sedative were already dwindling.

A few hours later Teazer was up and about, and looking around for the black and white tom. She spotted him behind a junk pile fixing the style of his head fur in some sort of reflective surface. Teazer smiled and went up to him.

"Recovered alright?" He asked with a friendly smile when he noticed her presence behind him.

"Yep. Oi just came to say fanks, you know, for getting me outta there" she fiddled with the pearls around her neck,

"No worries, really I should be thanking you. We made a good team"

"We certainly did... speaking of 'teams', Oi was wondering if you'd loike to accompany me on a heist" Teazer grinned and batted her eyelashes cutely.

"Oh no I couldn't possibly–" Alonzo started but was cut off abruptly when Teazer cupped his face and kissed him. He didn't pull away, despite being caught off guard.

"Please?" Teazer said when it ended, looking up at him with her large kitten eyes, the pupils of which had dilated, without shame.

"Well, when you put it like that..." Alonzo said nonchalantly before wrapping his arms around her and kissing her again.