AUTHOR'S NOTE: Alraaaaht, new chapter! My first term exams are finally over as of today (for those confused, summertime in the east is from April to May). I must say that we are nearing this story's climax. I predict it'll end by Chapter 16. Finally, all of those insignificant seeds I planted and watered during earlier chapters will sprout into the glorious baby tomatoes I planned them to be! (cackle)
Also, as I only recently became active in the fandom, I do not have many friends, silent sob. (outstretches arms) WHO WANTS TO BE MY FRAHN?
Creepy requests aside, on to the fic! Crazy stuff, appearance of blood (our old friend and M-rating-inducer), Jenny-related fluff, eavesdropping. Thank you so much for all the reviews, by the way! Enjoy!
The Pariah, Heroic
CHAPTER 12
It was time again to report to Macavity, and Rumpleteazer would be leaving today. For the last few days, the black-and-orange queen had been missing in their den at night. Up to now, Mungojerrie had no idea where it was she went off to for sleeping. Still, the only thing on his mind now was to find her before she left, to convince here to let him report this one last time.
Mungojerrie raced over to the spot at the fence where they always met the messenger.
Rumpleteazer was there, standing quietly, her back to the Junkyard. She was leaning against the wire of the fence, her hands clasped behind her. To see just this part of her, not even her face, brought overwhelming relief. Mungojerrie sprinted on across the main clearing of the Yard.
"Teaze!" he called out, huffing. "Teaze, I need to talk to ya!"
The calico queen whipped around to look at him. For some reason, she had the most frightened expression on her face. "Mungo!" she cried, stepping away from the fence in tiny, uncertain steps.
"Teaze," Mungojerrie repeated, quickly slinking out of the Junkyard through a minor entrance. He got up and took her hands tightly in his. "Teaze, we need to find the messenger queen."
Rumpleteazer stared up at him through widened blue eyes, and then shut them as she shook her head hard. "Mungo, you don't understand…"
"You can't leave yet!" Mungojerrie exclaimed, nearly out of breath from his run. "Let's talk to Macavity, just one more time. I got to tell him something. If the old queen goes on saying one'll suffice again, then let me be the one to go. Then we'll leave, together. I promise, Teaze. I promise."
Rumpleteazer slowly opened her eyes again, seeming anxious. She was beginning to hyperventilate. "I-I-I don't want to wait for the m-messenger."
"And why is that?" the pair of calico cats turned their heads to see where the familiar voice had come from. Mungojerrie, alarmed, let go of Rumpleteazer and stood straight. It wasn't the old silver-furred queen who usually came to fetch them for the update. It was Jyx, burly and black, strongest henchcat of Macavity, the cat who Mungojerrie had scratched as a kit.
"Jyx," said Mungojerrie, shocked. He had not seen the henchcat in ages. "What's goin' on?"
"I'm here for the reporter," the large tom growled, and trudged forward to take Rumpleteazer roughly by her arm. Forceful, he pulled the queen forward.
"No!" Mungojerrie suddenly hissed, and grabbed Rumpleteazer back by her shoulders. He stepped forward, hastily. "I-I'll go."
Jyx glared at him unkindly, moving away. "Macavity's words. One will suffice."
"Then I'll go this time! Instead of Teaze! I gotta talk to him!"
"I'm taking the girl," the henchcat snarled, pushing him back. Again, he took the arm of Rumpleteazer who, in her silence, was acting startlingly obedient.
"No!" Mungojerrie, struggling from the force of the shove, stumbled forward. "I gotta talk to the boss. Let her go! Let Teazer go!"
The black-and-orange tom made another reach for Rumpleteazer, grabbing desperately for her left wrist, when suddenly a powerful sting clawed through his face.
Mungojerrie let go of Rumpleteazer and fell back as he shouted in pain, quickly putting a hand to his right cheek.
He felt three hard gashes tearing along his face, and blood dripped steadily down his fingers. Deep red stained the fur on his arm. For several seconds, his vision was bleared, the misty images of a black cat and a bright orange one towering over him.
"I preferred you stayed mute like you once were, you insolent little reject-kit," Jyx sneered. He turned to pull Rumpleteazer away towards the road.
"T-Teaze!" Mungojerrie yelled as she was led off. The aching of his wound sank deeper as he tried to get back up again. "Teaze… it'll be alright!"
Rumpleteazer looked back at him soundlessly, her eyes filled with pain.
A scream tore through the inside of Munkustrap's den. Swiftly the Protector darted to his room, where Demeter was thrashing about violently in her sleep.
"No! No, please, please, no, no, no!" she shrieked, pulling at nothing, grabbing for nothing.
"Demeter! Demeter, wake up!" Munkustrap called out, scrambling onto the woven cushions to hold on to her. As soon as he laid his hands on her shoulders, Demeter, her eyes still glued fiercely shut, jerked forward. She began to claw at the air, at times grazing Munkustrap's face, yelling piercingly out.
"Please! Please, M-M-Maca… Maca… please…" the gold-and-black queen began to sob, utterly out of control. "Please, no…"
"Demeter, it's alright!" Munkustrap cried out over her screams. He couldn't understand what she was saying at all. With one hand he grabbed for her thrashing arms, and with the other he cautiously stroked her cheek. "Demeter, Demi, wake up, love…"
He watched as the queen's eyes flew open. The silver tabby dipped down to embrace her, gingerly kissing her forehead. She was breathing hard. Munkustrap felt his mate's heart beating wildly against his own.
"Demi, love, you're alright," he whispered over her softly. "Nothing's happened. I'm here. It's daytime."
"M-Munkustrap," she stammered, stunned, and slowly propped herself up as she wiped her tears away. "Was it…?"
"Nightmare," Munkustrap nodded, taking both her hands to kiss them. Her fingers were smooth, slender, tense. "Another nightmare. It seemed… worse this time, though."
Demeter's eyes turned downwards for a long time, seeming ashamed. She gently pulled her hands away from Munkustrap's to hug her knees to her chest.
"I'm a screw up."
"You're not. You're not, Demi. You're brilliant and beautiful. You're healing."
Demeter looked up at him forlornly, and murmured, "I need to tell you a-about my past." The Rets. The rape. Macavity.
"If you want to, but…" Munkustrap frowned. "Would it help you heal?"
The queen was quiet for a long, long while. She began to shake her head. "No, no, never mind. No."
"Demeter," said the Protector tenderly, inching closer. "You can tell me. I want to know."
The gold-and-black queen gazed back at him through gloomy eyes. "No, Munkustrap. You don't."
He winced as he felt a damp cloth being pressed against his right cheek. Mungojerrie pulled away from it, and sank deep into the mattress that he was lying on.
"Stay still, darling," Jennyanydots' voice rang in his ear, and the cloth came down onto his wound again. It seared just as agonizingly as before. "My poor darling, to think some savage old stray would do this to you…"
The pain rankled underneath his skin until it subsided into numbness. The marmalade queen's voice sounded distant and muted as the tom began to close his eyes.
"Mungojerrie, can you hear me?" she asked. "Sit up, dearest; I'll clean off the blood. Your lovely invention, it's been stained… open your hand, let me see."
Woozy, and still lying down, the calico tom spread out his fingers to let her look at the device.
To his surprise, Rumpleteazer's magnet was attached to it, along with the yarn string. It seemed, when he'd grabbed for her wrist, the knots were loose enough to let the magnet go towards his metal tab. The yarn was partly marked with his blood.
"My dear, what's this?" whispered Jennyanydots, sounding just as astonished as he felt. She delicately lifted the old magnet from his palm, to expose the tab that was under it. It was entirely clean of bloodstains. "How strange…"
"It's Teazer's," Mungojerrie managed, his face partly buried into the bed. He reached out for the magnet as the queen dropped it back into his hand. "I-I made a grab for it."
"Why would you do that?" Jennyanydots asked, leaning closer to the tom as she dabbed her cloth lightly on his scratches.
"We were runnin'… from the stray," Mungojerrie lied. "I grabbed her hand." Suddenly he sat up, his alertness renewed. "Teaze… have ya seen Teaze?"
The Gumbie Cat sadly shook her head. "No, I'm sorry, my dear. I haven't."
Mungojerrie sighed, and leaned with his back against the wall. As he did, he stared dejectedly at Rumpleteazer's magnet that he clutched close to his tab.
"It's alright, Mungojerrie," Jennyanydots said soothingly. "I'm sure she's safe." The queen dipped her rag once more in a large thimble of water, and pressed it against his wound.
"How do you do that?" asked Mungojerrie. The water clung to his fur, the cold seeping into his veins.
"Do what, darling?"
"You… you know what to do…" the tom said shakily, still weakened from the injury. "…when someone's hurt. Like, not only with healin'. You know the words to say, too."
Jennyanydots smiled kindly at him. "I've had plenty of my own kits, Mungojerrie. Some have stayed, like my son Plato. Others, like his sisters, have ventured off to find their own places in London. The one thing they all have in common is that I had to endure caring for them."
Mungojerrie gazed at her, amazed. "You… you and Skimbleshanks?"
"Oh," the queen said thoughtfully, lowering the cloth from Mungojerrie's face. "Well, Skimbleshanks wasn't always my mate, though he is quite a wonderful tom."
"He wasn't?" Mungojerrie blinked, leaning forward. "Who was your mate before?"
"Well, he was my mate… more than a year ago," Jennyanydots fondly recalled. "Jonathan, his name was. Very brilliant. We had many children. A good pair, we were."
"Then why did you stop being mates?"
The Gumbie Cat shifted to a graver expression. "It wasn't by choice. Many months back, Macavity had launched an attack against the Junkyard with his henchmen. My Jonathan, he fought back with dedication. He had a lot to give… but he gave too much. A good tom, yes. A good tom… he was our hero."
Mungojerrie sat quietly on the bed, staring at her in awe. "He was a hero?"
"I'd like to think so. The tom himself dreamed of being considered one. We would put our kittens to bed at night; with stories… we'd tell them what heroes were like…"
Jennyanydots looked back up at the calico tom, soft and misty-eyed. "Our kittens… they've all gone."
Before Mungojerrie could do anything to try and comfort her, the Gumbie Cat wiped lightly at her face, and shook her head. "You're fine now, my dear. The scratches will heal in time, but I don't know how long you'll have the scars. You should go now."
Mungojerrie stepped off the mattress, and then glanced at Jennyanydots. He hesitated, first, but stepped toward the queen and put his arms around her in an embrace.
"Thanks, Jenny," he murmured, remembering the road he had ahead of him. He sighed heavily. "I dunno how I'd pull through this without you."
"Oh, my darling, you will pull through," she said lovingly, stepping away from the hug as she placed her hands on his shoulders. "You will, because heroes are the valiant ones."
Mungojerrie sat at the highest part of the junk pile that overlooked the city, facing the main clearing. The tom was waiting, and he was going to keep at it until he got what he wanted. The sun was hovering hesitantly over the skyline; he was running out of time.
He heard steps pattering on the pieces of junk below, until the same familiar, stately Maine Coone reached the top of the pile, staring at him in surprise.
"Fancy seeing you here again," said Tugger. "What happened to your face?"
"I need your help," Mungojerrie replied plainly, rising from his place.
"How in the hell could I-" he stopped as Mungojerrie stretched out his palm and opened it, revealing the old fridge magnet. "…and what is that?"
"Macavity took Teaze," said the black-and-orange tom, his eyes still locked on Tugger. "I reckoned you might know why."
Tugger stared at him, and then sighed. "He's Macavity. He's full of trash."
"Then why are you best friends with him?"
"I was," Tugger narrowed his eyes at the calico. "I was best friends with him." The tom, seeming frustrated, turned to look at the horizon of the city. "We used to stick together whenever we left the Junkyard. We discovered all the other tribes in London – Meladou, Quelle, Thoron… Ret. That's where he found Demeter."
Mungojerrie stepped closer, stunned. "Demeter's from the Rets?" He knew little of the queen, just that she was Munkustrap's second mate, and Electra's stepmother. He didn't know that Macavity knew her, too.
"She was. And, well, when you're as bored as she was in the largest tribe in London, and when you're as charming as Macavity is, you can get led off rather quick. And… all those meetings at the outskirts… he was just trying to get to her. He wasn't in love with her, I can tell you that. Just another pretty queen in another dirty alley. I'm sure the rape screwed her up for life."
"Damn it," Mungojerrie suddenly muttered. His knees felt partly weak, and he limped over to a broken television set to sit down. His mind began to spin again. The air stung the wounds on his cheek.
Macavity wasn't a hero. Hell on Heaviside, he wasn't. He raped a queen. He got away with it. He hadn't saved anyone.
"Jerrie," said Tugger. The Maine Coone walked nearer to him. "I'm not best friends with him anymore. I pretend to be, when I have to go to his Headquarters, but he's become trash. And nobody else is catching on. He's already won the favor of the Thorons and the Rets."
Mungojerrie looked up at him, bewildered. "Even the Rets? Even after doin' that to their kind?"
"Hell yes, even the Rets. They're a stupid, uncontrollable bunch. They hate everyone he hates. Remember what I said before? The Jellicles had enough good in them to accept me back. That was so I'd be able to keep away from them."
The calico tom, baffled, stared at his companion. "Why would ya need to keep away from them?"
Tugger stared back out at London. "He told them I raped Demeter."
Electra bit her lip hard. She leaned against the wall of the den, her ears pricked, her eyes wide, every muscle within her tense and trembling. She could hear everything coming from her parents' room.
"He's trash. He's scum. He's nothing."
"Munkus… Munkus, please come back into bed."
"He's done nothing but cause trouble since the day he left the tribe. Look at what he's done! That's it. That's through. We'll send over our army. We'll end it for good."
"Munkustrap, please! Don't let me be the reason for an all-out war!"
"You aren't! Macavity's practically been asking for it ever since he launched his own attack on us months ago. Jenny's mate died. Kittens were lost. Heaviside, Demeter, his mother was still living with us!"
"Munkustrap… Munkus, please, don't do anything drastic. Your protecting the Jellicles is good enough. What - what would it look like if you fought back all of a sudden? He would know that I'm here."
"What if he's figured it out by now? What-"
Electra leaned closer against the wall, scared. Her father's pacing and livid ranting had stopped. There was only the hum of her own breathing to accompany her, to assure her that she hadn't suddenly gone deaf. Suddenly, she heard Munkustrap speak up again.
"…Spies. He must have sent spies by now."
"No," the young queen breathed. The single word echoed, filled her head. She could only see this idea going one way. "No…"
"…Those stray calicos," Munkustrap, out of the silence, snarled. "They're his. They're Macavity's spies."
Electra broke into a run.
The Ret tribe was the largest in London. If Macavity was able to rally their support, he would be unstoppable.
"When you're as charming as Macavity is…"
It occurred to Mungojerrie that the first inklings of what he considered his upbringing – his days spent at Headquarters – could all be based on a charmingly spun lie.
"Jerrie. Your greatest ever."
Macavity had named him after his so-called greatest ever. Was he trying to win his favor then? To create out of him another mindless, devoted minion, like Yowler or Jyx? To believe that those months of his life were occupied with no other thoughts than to make his supposed "hero" proud made Mungojerrie sick to his stomach.
The center of the Junkyard, clear of trash, was entirely empty. It was nap hour, not to be missed by any Jellicle who was clueless about the silent war that raged on within the city.
Mungojerrie padded halfheartedly across it, unsure of what to do with what information he had now. Would he still tell Macavity who he had to kill to open the Heaviside Layer? Was he going to carry on gathering information?
Would he ever see Rumpleteazer again?
The black-and-orange tom stared once more at the old magnet. It was still attached to his invention, its strings hanging loosely from his hand. He wondered if Rumpleteazer knew she had lost it. Did she still have the earrings he'd stolen for her, at least?
He tried to remember the earlier part of the afternoon. She'd been wearing her Woolworth necklace, like she always was. But the chandelier earrings weren't hooked onto them like a week ago.
Mungojerrie looked to the cement pipe that led to their den. He looked above to where their sun hole was, to see if its lid had been removed. The metal sheet was still in place, neatly covering their den.
Then he remembered that Rumpleteazer didn't need the sun hole as an entrance. She could walk normally to their den through the tunnels just fine.
Is she back from Headquarters?
Mungojerrie suddenly tore through the main clearing for the pipe. He remembered that time he'd run away from Tugger and had navigated the den tunnels perfectly. He needed to see if Rumpleteazer had returned, no matter how long it had been since she was taken by Jyx.
He stumbled into the cement pipe. Already there was a division of paths. Bloody Bast, he thought. Mungojerrie frantically racked his memory for the directions to their den.
Left. Then right. Then left again.
He took off to the left, and already the rocks and bumps of the tunnel felt familiar.
He was going the right way. His feet picked up speed.
"Teaze!" Mungojerrie called out as soon as he burst into their den. Sure enough, Rumpleteazer was standing there.
And so was Macavity.
