Journeys Chapter 21.

I'm sorry that it's taken so long to write up the next chapter of this story. I've had a huge amount on my plate lately and have honestly been too buggered to muster the brainpower to write.

I'd like to thank Emily for giving into my badgering and letting me know what she thought of the latest chapters, btw if you haven't already. Check out her story on this site. "The Yellow Eye's of the Sickened Cat." It is brilliant.

I'd also like to throw out my continued thanks to Faded Book and MsCloverJellicle for their continued support.

Now then, on with the story, if I can remember how to write…

…

Munkunstrap groggily opened his, bleary bloodshot eyes slightly. Peering through the barely open slits he tried to take in his surroundings. All he could make out was the bright white overhead lights in a white ceiling. He attempted to move his head, when he made a discovery. He was tied down and restrained. As his faculties began to return, he began to feel areas of his fur that didn't feel normal. Small spots on his head and chest had been shaved, and something had been stuck to the bare areas.

He began to arch his back to try to slip his head out of its restraint when part of the situation revealed itself. A line of sharp spikes began to press themselves into his neck, flinching back and slightly to one side he discovered even more of the spines.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you. I don't want to have to repair yet another one of you freaks" came a neutral, even bored voice from one side of the hard surface that he was held upon. "Please don't try to change forms as the results could be unpleasant, and quite messy."

A figure dressed in a dark jacket and shirt hove into the Jellicle protectors limited view. Barely able to make out the features of his captor due to the background light, one thing drew Munks attention like a lodestone. It was a golden torc hanging around the man's neck, embossed with a strange Egyptian looking ankh that Munk had never seen before.

"What?" croaked the tom, who cleared his dry throat before trying again. "What do you want from me? Where are my friends? What have you done with them?"

"Oh. Your friends are quite allright, in the most part anyway, and are waiting for you back downstairs. You can join them as soon as we've had a little chat."

"What do you want to know? I can't think of anything that you'd be after from us?"

"Well then. I guess we'll find out for ourselves in time." With that the human reached across the face of the restrained tomcat and then pulled his arm back. Held in his hand was a large syringe filled with an evil looking yellow liquid. Waggling it in front of the unfortunate cats gaze, he continued. "Yes I think we'll find out everything I want to know…"

…

The cold slapped the tired and nervous queen in the face as she exited the aircraft. They'd had to circle for 2 hours as the airport cleaned up after an arctic storm had closed the runways and the extra time had just heightened her feelings of trepidation.

Dragging her feet in the airbridge, she allowed the few other passengers to rush past her into the warmth of the terminal, until she could no longer hide from the reunion that she knew was coming. Finally passing through the double doors into the terminal she lifted her gaze to try to find the accusing eye's of her former friends, instead there was only a single solitary familiar figure there waiting for her. Anticipation dancing in his eyes her mate ran towards her and swept her into an embrace. "Don't you ever do that to me again" came the Australian accent of her mate. "Never leave me like that. I was so worried I'd lost you."

Rumpleteasers reply was lost in the clothing at the nape of Jerries neck. Pulling her face away she tried again. "I won't. I won't ever do that again." She burrowed herself into the chest of her mate and was squeezed until she was sure she heard her ribs creaking. The two cats stood there holding each other for what seemed like an age, simply basking in each others presence, before reluctantly letting go.

"Where are the others?" Teaser queried. "I thought I asked for the pollicle elders to meet me as well?"

"We, well that is me, didn't want you overwhelmed just as you returned so I kind of snuck out without them. Seeing as I was the only one who knew which flight you were coming in on, nobody else has shown up." Jerrie replied. "We can go and catch a taxi out to the hotel and everyone should be there."

"Damn. I needed to let them know about what happened, but I guess it can wait until we're in private. Probably best that way anyway." Teaser took her mates hand and began to drag him towards the exit.

"What about your bags?"

"I didn't bring anything apart from this backpack. I lost it all in the fire."

"Fire" wondered Jerrie to himself, "what the hell happened back at home?"

…

The green and orange four wheel drive pulled up in front of the Eagle Point resort and two figures rushed from the stopped taxi, and into the foyer.

Waiting for them were the disapproving stares of Toby, Dom and Namihira. "You!" Toby pointed a finger into Mungojerries chest "were supposed to wait for the rest of us, and you!" he turned to point the accusing finger at Rumpleteaser with a scowl creasing his features that rapidly changed into a mischievous grin, "welcome back! We missed you."

"Now get in out of the cold and out of those wet jackets." Admonished Namihira.

The two cats were led through the airlock like foyer where they were able to shed their snow covered jackets and proceed into the warmth of the hotel. "Sorry for the joke, Tease" apologised Dom. "I tried to talk him out of it, but he can be such a kitten sometimes."

"It's ok. I deserved all that and more, but is there somewhere we can all talk? I need to tell you all about what is going on." Teasers voice had begun to take on a certain amount of urgency. Now that she had arrived, the need to get the events at home out had asserted itself with a vengeance.

"Of course." Namihira responded and guided the group towards the conference room. "Who do you need my dear and I will send for them?"

"All of our group, together with any pollicle elders you may have here, and those that you trust to help out with making decisions" replied Tease.

Namihira sent for the required individuals and shortly after they began to file into the room.

First to arrive in a rush were the member of the group that had travelled the globe together. They crowded around their wayward compatriot, until they were herded into seats to await the arrival of the others. As the pollicles filed in Tease busied herself setting up a laptop computer that she'd pulled from her backpack and plugged it into a projector that had been provided.

Shortly Jericho closed the door and took a seat.

"Is this all that is coming?" Teaser asked. At Namihira's nod, she continued "then we may as well begin. There is no easy way to say this. A little over 10 days ago an unknown group of humans conducted a raid upon the Jellicle Junkyard and captured nearly all of the inhabitants."

The uproar began. The Jellicles began to shout out queries about their families and friends. The pollicles wanted to know how this all could happen and everyone wanted to know who could have done it.

Teaser tried to continue with the briefing to no avail, finally getting frustrated she fell back on a the tactic employed by her grandfather before the journey had begun. Pursing her lips, she let out a piercing whistle, which cut through the din like a hot knife through butter.

"Please everyone. Let me finish and I will tell you everything I know. Please leave any questions until after I have finished. As I was saying, an unknown group raided the junkyard and carried off nearly everyone. They used gas bombs and grenades and to our knowledge only caused the victims to lose consciousness. The cats that escaped were Electra and her daughter Chamolie and my nephew Jet. Jet managed to rescue my mother and sister, Demeter and Jemima, Admentus and also Tumblebrutus. I'm also glad to say that Old Dueteronomy was away from the yard at the time and has rejoined the remainder in hiding. I was also caught upon returning to the yard, but managed to free myself shortly afterwards and deal with my assailants. To hide any evidence of my escape I was forced to set a fire within the yard which has caused a large amount of damage to our home."

Teaser began to cycle through images from the computer which were projected onto the screen behind her. "In the process of my escape I also came into possession of a computer that belongs to this group. Within it we found the location of a safehouse, which we proceeded to scout. We found that this building had been vacated in a hurry but there was evidence that our friends are being fed and looked after somewhat. We discovered nothing that indicates that these people know we are onto them. No other usable information was discovered on the recovered laptop, but I have brought it along for your own people to have a look, with the exception of this symbol." Teaser brought up the Ankh on the screen. "We do not recognise it, but we are hoping that together we may be able to discover who these people are. I was told to return here with this information and Old D was going to endeavour to contact the eagles and dolphins to warn them to keep on their guard."

"Does anyone have any questions?"

Jericho raised his hand, "You said that this group seemed to have no idea that you were aware of them, yet you also said that you'd dealt with two assailants at the yard. How can you be sure that these men won't be able to contact their brethren?"

"They are dead. In the course of my escape, I killed them." Teaser deadpanned. Jericho nodded and resumed his seat.

Jerrie was the next to ask a question. "Where are the survivors hiding?"

"In the basement of the warehouse. Not ideal, but it is safe and nobody would think of it."

Jerrie nodded thoughfully and sat back.

Next it was Christo. "How did these people find us? I thought the masking spell was nearly foolproof?"

This was the question that Teaser was dreading. She'd gotten over her feelings about her future son-in-law and thought that she knew how the next part of the story would be taken.

"I discovered years ago that the masking spell will not affect recordings or the effects of a highly disciplined mind. I can only envision that they used both of these in the planning and execution of the raid."

"Yes, but how did they even know we existed?" Chris asked.

Teaser looked down and then glanced over at Twitch. The look was not lost on the big tom. "It was that bloody hospital room, wasn't it?"

"I'm afraid it was" replied Teaser. "The police took the junkyard phone number out of your wallet, and it was put in the file. When Toby turned up nobody thought to remove it and the file and phone number were later stolen by someone, I think we all know who now. Dem and Jemima told me about some prank phone calls made to that number in the days leading up to the attack. We think that was how they knew to come to the junkyard. I'd just like to make it clear though, that what happened in Sydney, could have happened to any one of us. You did what you needed to do at the time and nobody could have forseen the repercussions."

"Thanks, but it doesn't really help much" came the response from the now dejected Tom. Jacaranda wrapped her arms around him and glanced at her mother with thanks in her eyes for the kind words.

Namihira had gathered towards the rear of the room with two of the truly ancient pollicle elders, they had their heads together whispering tightly, occasionally looking up at the symbol on the screen and consulting a large book that one had produced, before going back to their discussion.

The three pollicles broke off their discussion and Namihira approached the queen at the front of the room. "I have been talking to Virginia and Tolitana, who are our archivists, and we believe that we know who this symbol represents."

"Please go on." Teaser gestured for the Pollicle leader to take her place at the lectern and opened the tome that she'd brought to the front.

"Nearly four thousand years ago, in ancient Egypt there were humans who worshipped animal deities. They named these gods, Bast the cat goddess and Anubis the Jackal god. These two gods originally were beneficial and the religions existed in a kind of a symbiotic relationship. The Jellicles and the Pollicles were both considered to be avatars and the chosen of the two gods, the humans simply could not comprehend that the beings they worshipped were one and the same, just different aspects of the Great Pack Leader or Everlasting Cat. As time went by and we approached the time of the pharaohs a schism began to form between the two. A militant faction had taken control of the worship of Anubis and it shortly developed into open war between the two. This continued for over a hundred years and the end result was the complete defeat of the Anubis religion and devastation for that of Bast, from which they did not recover. It was during this conflict that the Jellicle and Pollicle tribes formed their own mistrust of each other and went their separate ways. One thing that both agreed on was to removed themselves from public sight and to let ourselves fall into obscurity and legend."

"Unknown to anyone, the worship of Anubis had survived and over time reformed into a cult that managed to spread its subtle influence into many areas of Europe over the next 3500 odd years. They went by many names and titles and were responsible for many things that benefited mankind over the millennia, however they were also responsible for a great many of the famous atrocities as well. Many of you may have heard of the Knights of the Temple, more commonly known as the Knight Templar. They were formed from this cult and went on to perform a great many noble and charitable acts. However the cult was also responsible for inflaming the crusades and causing the sack of Jeruselum in the first crusade where every inhabitant of that great city was put to the sword."

"The cult was also responsible for the betrayal of their fellows in the Templars. Their paws can be seen in the attribution of the symbol of Friday the Thirteenth, which was the day the Templar leaders were burned at the stake for witchcraft, of the black cat. They also led the inquisition which was responsible for the torture and execution of hundreds of women and cats throughout Europe."

"After the inquisition had been disbanded we lost track of the cult and believed that it had finally died the death it deserved. However somehow it has survived and has resources greater that we know. My friends. The sign that Rumpleteaser found in the computer can only be the ancient symbol of the Cult of Anubis." With that statement, Namihira turned her open book to the audience and there drawn on the ancient pages was a drawing that was next to identical to the image on the screen behind her.

…

Well that's it for this chapter.

Please let me know what you think.