"For your sake, we'll keep the rules simple," Vultaire said some time later, the challengers having gathered on one of the landing pads. He snapped his fingers.
Somewhere, there must have been birds keeping tabs on the situation in a control tower. At his signal, a line of metal arches flew out of a bay and positioned themselves in the air. One by one, they powered up, projecting an image of a large blue circle. Once they were all in place, Felline could tell what they were for: A racecourse for airships.
"The one who finishes with the most rings wins." Vultaire tilted his head at Tygra. "You can count, I assume."
"Shut your beak and fly," Tygra sneered.
Vultaire smirked. "Indeed. Then let the challenge commence."
One of the landing pads irised open and a small aircraft rose into view. Its narrow jet body and forward-swept crimson and cream wings gleamed in the sun.
"That looks fast," WilyKat said.
Meya! Snarf agreed.
Vultaire ignored them, turning instead to Lion-O. "I assume you are a cat of your word," he said in tones of supreme boredom. "When your brother loses, I expect the other Stones."
Lion-O's hands closed into fists at his sides. "He won't lose."
The birds had provided Tygra with a small craft to use. Unlike Vultaire's ship, this one looked more like something that Jorma might have built. Confident as only an angry tiger could be, Tygra leaped inside the jalopy without comment.
Lion-O leaned over the edge of the cockpit and whispered, "You'd better not lose."
"Don't worry," Cheetara said. She had taken Felline's advice to heart; she alone didn't look worried, just affectionate. "He won't."
She leaned in and kissed Tygra's cheek. Then, she and Lion-O backed away so that he could seal the cockpit. The jalopy's engines did start, at least, and Tygra held the craft at a hover. Next to him, Vultaire did the same in his sporty ship.
The floating arch directly in front of them displayed two red lights. Two yellow. One green.
The race was on.
Vultaire's ship shot off like a laser blast. Tygra's jalopy coughed a little on the starting line, dipped like a stubborn rat, and then grudgingly shot after Vultaire.
Meanwhile, Vultaire swooped through the first ring, turning it red. The watching birds cheered, whooping and calling.
The jalopy didn't seem to want to listen to its pilot. It bucked and swerved for a few seconds, and then put on another burst of speed. Incredibly, Tygra was gaining on Vultaire.
Who claimed a second ring.
The jalopy wobbled through the red ring, too late, and then backfired. It lost height. Sparks and smoke streamed out behind it. Vultaire claimed two more rings in quick succession, and headed for a third.
And then, silencing the bird spectators, the jalopy's exhaust burned clean and white. Tygra must have fixed it on the fly. It soared through three rings, turning them green. Vultaire claimed two. Tygra claimed three. Vultaire, two. Tygra, two.
Now the cats had reason to make as much noise as the birds.
"Yeah!" Kat cheered.
"Go! Go!" Kit urged, backed by Snarf's happy mews.
The two craft looped the city, claiming rings one after the other. WilyKit, keeping track on her fingers, cried, "They're tied!"
"And one ring left!" added her brother.
The two craft were nose and nose. They put on speed.
Vultaire turned his ship inexplicably up.
He released a flash bomb on top of Tygra.
Pumyra let out a feral snarl that caused a hen to jump backward in fright, and Felline hissed. "That's cheating!"
"It is within the rules," Horus calmly replied. It was the first thing the short, smooth-feathered pigeon had said since their arrival.
Without stopping to observe Tygra's distress, Vultaire sped toward the last ring.
He was there. He was about to pass through.
The jalopy appeared beneath him and slammed into his jet-black ship. Vultaire's craft went spinning out of control. Tygra claimed the final ring.
"He did it!" Pumyra cried in pleased disbelief.
"Of course he did," Cheetara said, smiling.
Tygra landed the jalopy, which was now behaving like a fine Thunderian mount. The ThunderCats jogged toward the small ship, cheering. Grinning, Tygra jumped out.
"Nice flyin', bro," Lion-O said.
Sparking and smoking the way the jalopy had at first, Vultaire's ship bore down on the celebrating cats and stopped at a hover above their heads.
"A barbaric violation!" Vultaire shouted from the cockpit. "And you dented my ship!"
"You gave him an unworthy craft," Felline said coldly. "You shot at him. Yet you were not in violation."
"You set the rules," Tygra said. "The one who finishes with the most rings wins."
"We'll be taking the Stone now," Lion-O said.
"Ha!" Vultaire cawed in derision. "You'll be lucky to leave with your lives. This agreement is void. You forfeit your wager."
"You made a deal," Pumyra snarled up at him.
Vultaire stood upon his hovering craft, wings wide. "Escort our guests to their quarters. Under heavy guard."
The ever-present ravenmen obeyed at once, leveling their crackling spears at the cats. They did not go quietly, but a zap in Snarf's rear convinced the twins to hurry the others along. Felline was last, and heard Vultaire say out of the side of his sharp beak, "I want them gone at daybreak."
Cooing softly, Horus nodded in compliance.
..::~*~::..
Felline wasn't sure what the room was used for, but as it had only one door, it made an effective prison.
Tygra threw himself onto one of the curved yellow sofas, crossing both his arms and his legs on the way down. "Can't believe that flying rodent," he fumed.
"At least we didn't lose the two Stones we have," Cheetara pointed out. Gracefully, she sat next to him. She looked around at everyone else. "That's something, isn't it?"
"For how long?" Felline asked her. "If Vultaire went back on his word about his Stone, what is stopping him from taking the War and Spirit Stones from us? They've already confiscated our weapons. They're in his hands."
The room was round, like so many in Avista City, but oddly flat – a disc rather than a ball. Potted plants added splashes of green and pink. The kittens and Snarf were once again at the window, their eyes following the progress of the patrols. Nobody answered Felline.
Lion-O held the Book of Omens in his lap. The compass pointed unwaveringly past the windows. The Stone was somewhere in the city, in another tower, another bubble. Unreachable from where they sat.
"We're so close," he muttered.
Pumyra had unknowingly mimicked Tygra's pose, but she was hunched over as if thinking hard. Her eyebrows twitched in annoyance.
"I say if they won't give it to us, then we take it," she burst out angrily.
Everybody stared at her.
"Isn't that, I dunno, kinda stealing?" WilyKit asked.
"And kinda stealing is still stealing," WilyKat said. "We have some experience with the whole kinda thing."
"Well, it's kinda moot," Cheetara said. "That hall is packed with armed guards."
Pumyra grinned and stood up. "Who says we have to use the hall?"
Without waiting for agreement, she opened her wrist bow, overlooked by the ravenmen, nocked a pebble, and let fly. The tiny projectile shattered a window behind Tygra and Cheetara. Shards of glass tinkled when they fell. Both cats stood up to survey the damage. Felline glanced at the door, wondering if the ravenmen outside had heard the noise.
There was a short silence.
"I say we use the hall," Panthro exclaimed. "I'm not goin' out there!"
"Who needs the birds' permission when the Book will take us right to the Stone?" Pumyra demanded.
She noticed Lion-O's shocked expression. Her lashes dropped over her stunning autumn eyes. She leaned into him, hands on his shoulders. "Orders, my king?" she purred.
A silly grin spread over his face, but Pumyra was right. They didn't need the birds' permission. There was absolutely no reason to sit here and wait for the world's destruction, when the only thing preventing them from averting disaster was Vultaire's unwillingness to share his power with another species. Avista's prefect hadn't offered up one single reason why it would hurt his people to relinquish the Stone for a little while. After all, Lion-O had no intention to keep all four Stones once this war was over. Of that, Felline was certain.
Tygra and Cheetara returned the grin. Kit, Kat, and Snarf presented themselves to Lion-O, ready and willing.
He shrugged. "ThunderCats –"
"Oh, no," Panthro interrupted. "Don't you say it. Do not say what I think you're going to say, Lion-O!"
"Ho," Lion-O said.
Panthro groaned.
Led by Pumyra, the cats boosted themselves out of the broken window. They scaled the side of the flattened pod, their feet disappearing over the lip of the roof. Kat did a front flip over the sill in front of Felline, but she paused, turning back for the general.
He approached the window at a wary sidle. When he saw nothing but sky beneath them, he winced. "Couldn't we just fight the blasted guards instead?" he pleaded.
"Come on," she said. She offered him a hand.
He gulped but brushed her hand aside, and then tripped more than climbed out of the hole.
"Kit. Kat," Lion-O said above their heads. "Get to the Feliner with Snarf. We'll be along soon."
Using Panthro as a stepstool, Felline hoisted herself onto the roof just as Kat produced his flink. He whipped the ring around in a circle and then threw it. Acting like a grappling hook, the flink's three claws snagged on the gutter of a neighboring pod. Kat tugged on the wire, testing the grip, while Kit knelt to let Snarf clamber onto her back. Clinging to each other, the two kittens and petcat stealthily rose as the flink reeled in the wire. Then, like a couple of monkeys, they clawed and jumped their way higher, finally disappearing from view.
Lion-O turned his back on the place where they had vanished. He pointed. "Book says that way," he said.
"Then let's go, we're wasting –" Pumyra started, but a crash interrupted her.
Panthro, hanging from the roof and apparently unable to drag himself onto it, whimpered. He looked over his shoulder. "I don't feel so good," he moaned.
Then, to Felline's horror, his mismatched eyes rolled up, his fingers loosened, and he slipped out of sight.
"Panthro!" Lion-O yelled.
"No!" Felline cried at the same time. She flung herself to her knees on the edge and felt Pumyra grab her arm.
Below them, Panthro smacked into an inclined wall, which seemed to bring him to his senses. He tumbled heels over head down the artificial hill, picking up speed with each revolution. His arms began to extend, but he couldn't slow his momentum enough to sink his claws in anywhere and they flapped uselessly.
Together, Lion-O and Tygra leaped after the general. They tore headlong down the slope, toe-claws screeching against metal. With all the racket they were making, Felline expected the bulbs to explode outward with vengeful ravenmen.
When Panthro ran out of hill and began to fall in earnest, the blue bola whip and the Gauntlet's claws spun out after him. The whip coiled around a wrist; the claws snagged an ankle; and Panthro bounced, suspended between them.
"Gotcha!" the brothers said in unison.
Panthro bounced a few more times, traveling shorter distances each time. He then settled into a slow swing, showing him how far he had fallen, how much farther he could have fallen. Distinctly green, he let out a sigh that even Cheetara, Pumyra, and Felline could hear, so far above him.
Felline sighed, too, and let Pumyra pull her to her feet. Apparently, the inclined wall wasn't part of the inner structure – perhaps it was a cloud scoop for collecting water – and the animals inside hadn't heard anything. For now, the cats were undiscovered.
Lion-O and Tygra heaved Panthro to safety. Without further mishap, the ThunderCats navigated across the skin of Avista City, hearts pounding, wondering each second when a patrol or a bird glancing out of a window would spot them. At the underside of the floating city, they reached the area the Book wanted. Several covered walkways and a cluster of pods were tightly sealed against the outside. Not a window to be seen – but this was familiar territory. Felline helped Pumyra kick in a ventilation grate and then led the way inside.
They emerged in a dim corridor, blinking to adjust their eyes. The corridor was small here, an unequal octagon of recessed lighting. Felline's ears twitched. This corridor was as utilitarian as those in the Black Pyramid. She didn't like the comparison, and she shivered.
The corridor ended at a sealed door.
"The Book says the Stone is right ahead," said Lion-O, holding it out. The wireframe compass spun, pointing at the door.
Tygra set to it, digging his fingers into the seam, but, "Can't get the door open," he said in frustration.
Meanwhile, Panthro poked experimentally at a circular dial set into the wall. It beeped at him but did not unseal the door. He made a face. "State of the art security system. Without passcodes, we don't pass."
A/N: Hello, friends! Another week, another update. Couple of things, though . . .
I realized, while writing the next chapter, that I completely forgot to have Pumyra tell Felline about the collapsing building when Thundera fell, when they were talking at the campfire a couple of chapters back. Just that she was trapped under it and couldn't help Pumilee. That was all - because Felline won't know this otherwise. It's added now. FYI.
Now, in this episode, the birds don't take the cats' weapons. I have no idea why not - and why the cats don't fight when they have their weapons. So, poetic license there. I couldn't think of why they wouldn't confiscate the Book too, so I just sort of left it there. I mean, wasn't the whole first part of the series about how important the Book was that animals went to war over it? We seem to have forgotten that. LOL
Reviewer Thanks! KelseyAlicia, Bookl0ver1998, Blacktiger93, Momochan77, Heart of the Demons, Seeds of Destruction, The Night Whisperer, Darwin, AndrianaWarrior7, St4rHunter, and SAK-96.
Always and Ever Yours!
Anne