What a complete and utter idiot he was. How could he have thought they could all simply walk out of here and be on their way? Of course nothing could be so simple… He ought to have considered this possibility. But he'd had a few other things on his mind…

"Which way now?" he muttered, glancing side to side in the dark hallways, searching for any lurking henchcats, every fiber of his being screaming at him to turn around and hightail it out of here. But to do that, he'd have to drag a wildly-protesting queen along with him: and he wasn't so sure he could win that fight.

"Left," Demeter answered, barely audible, in a vague tone that could have been addressing the empty air.

Obediently, he turned left. "Demeter…"

"You should have gone with the others," said the gold queen in the same tone.

"You should have gone with the others," MacVitie countered. "You could still…" he began, knowing already that it would be useless.

"No."

He and Bombalurina had nearly throttled one another in the process of determining who would make good the escape with Mungojerrie and Rumpelteazer, and who would stay to help Demeter. The gold queen, meanwhile, had tried to persuade them all to leave while she stayed alone. In the end, obliged to choose, she chose to have MacVitie stay. Bomba was livid, but no amount of arguing would change Demeter's mind, and they'd wasted enough time already.

Now MacVitie wondered why she'd chosen him, when surely Bomba was more acquainted with the situation and Demeter still would not even meet his eye. Perhaps she calculated that Mack was the stronger of the two, should it come to a fight—though Mack was not at all sure of that himself. Queens were strange.

Then again, Demeter had good enough cause not to be quite in her most reasonable frame of mind.

A kitten's life was at stake.

After navigating what seemed endless corridors of twists and turns (which MacVitie desperately hoped Demeter could find her way out of again, as he for one was hopelessly lost!), they came to what looked like the door to a storage closet, with a clumsily-installed kitty door. Demeter froze.

MacVitie glanced from the queen to the door and back again. "Is there anything I should know before…?"

The gold queen held up her paw and put her ear to the door. After a few moments she seemed satisfied and pushed her way through the kitty door. Not knowing what else to do, having no instructions apart from "get in, find kit, get out," MacVitie followed.

He wasn't sure what he'd been expecting… Griddlebone sitting on some sort of throne, throwing around orders to equally-evil-looking queens who rushed about to do her bidding? But no, she was supposedly 'kitnapped…' Evil humans walking around in white coats? Cages lining the walls with ten cats to a cage, perhaps? At any rate he expected something much more sinister than the scene that actually greeted his eyes. For a moment he had to pause, take stock, and remind himself where he was—still in the depths of a warehouse, on Growltiger's turf, nowhere near home-free yet.

For it looked like a scene straight out of the Junkyard: several queens lounging about, chatting together, napping, occasionally remembering to turn an eye towards the dozen or so kittens that ran about the room, climbing piles of boxes, jumping down from piles of boxes, purposely or accidentally creating avalanches of boxes, hiding in boxes… Just generally making up games with boxes, which were what took up the bulk of space in the room.

Noticing Demeter, a few of the queens called greetings to her, while others eyed her with…MacVitie couldn't tell if it was pity, disdain, or a mixture of both. As Demeter strode purposefully through the room, MacVitie paused uncertainly near the door, watching in case she should need any sort of assistance, but getting the sinking feeling that he'd just walked into a place meant to be off-limits to the likes of him.

The queen nearest him, a rust-and-black tortoiseshell, seemed to be thinking along the same lines. "Here, wot's this?" she demanded, standing up and fixing him with a threatening glare. "Don't stand there gawping, dunderhead. You knows the rules, the where and the when. It ain't here an' now, see, so just you clear off an' there'll be no trouble!"

"Just hang on…" MacVitie protested, though instinctively taking a step or two to move farther away from the queen who'd spoken. "I'm not here to make any trouble, apologies if this's your turf, I'll be gone in two ticks…" He stalled, glancing round for Demeter, heaving a sigh of relief when he saw her heading back towards the door, towing a small cream tomkit with a mixture of tiger stripes and brown patches.

"I don't think he does know the rules, Jezza," remarked another queen, with what sounded like a snicker. Or perhaps she was only clearing her throat… "I don't think he knows what you're talking about at all. Looks practically still a kit himself."

"'Spose yer right," the queen called Jezza muttered, eyeing MacVitie up and down. "New recruit, eh? Well, just you get back to whatever it is yer supposed to be doin'. Boss finds you here at this hour, we'll all be in trouble. Fun an' games starts after sundown, I'm sure one o' yer pals will tell you all about it an' show you the ropes an' you can visit when you ain't on guard duty. Now get along with you."

"Happy to," Mack nodded, pulling a very obvious 'time to go, now' face at Demeter and making for the exit.

"Just where d'you think you're off to, Lady Metta?" demanded Jezza. Mack was just about ignoring the queen and continuing on—when he glanced back and realized she was addressing Demeter. Metta?

Demeter stopped in front of Jezza, keeping a firm hold of the tomkit's paw, despite his wriggling impatiently to keep moving. "Listen, Jezza—"

"That's Lady Jezza t'you," Jezza interrupted, getting up from her seat to stand imposingly toe-to-toe with Demeter.

Refusing to be intimidated—the only sign of nervousness a slight trembling of her paws—Demeter stood up straighter and took on the no-nonsense tone she'd heard so often from her mother. MacVitie couldn't resist a slight smirk at the sound of it. "Let's just drop the theatrics, shall we? Neither the Boss nor the Lady is here at the moment, and…"

"If that's the case, all it means for you is that I am in charge until the Lady returns," Jezza informed her.

"So can't you just give me ten minutes to take Carbuckety out for some air?" Demeter asked, doing her best to sound unconcerned.

Jezza raised an eyebrow. "They gets names when they's old enough to take assignments from Boss, and not a minute sooner. An' as for this one…he's not likely to get a name at all. You know wot The Lady had decided for him. An' as I recall… No one told me you were off your punishment and free to walk about… I dunno wot yer playin' at, Missy, but you'd just better stick with me until the Lady returns and we can get this sorted…" She made as if to take Carbuckety's paw and pull him away from Demeter.

On a sudden, desperate impulse, MacVitie leapt into action. He dashed over to the two queens, scooped Carbuckety up in his arms, and fled the room, first shoving the tomkit through the kitty door and then following, hoping with all his might that Demeter would follow—could follow before the other queens could detain her. Once in the hallway, he tucked the squirming kit under his arm and ran—though in truth he was uncertain of the way. Still, the thing was to get the kit to safety—or at least to some temporary hiding place—and then return for Demeter if needed. Everything in him screamed to go back for her now—but he knew full well that she would refuse to go anywhere without the kit, and so what would be the use? The other queens outnumbered the two of them, could easily get Carbuckety from his grasp, and then they'd be back where they'd started… Only worse, because those other queens would have figured out what Demeter and MacVitie were up to and would toss them back in a cage and turn them over to Griddlebone when she got back. He couldn't exactly throw Demeter over his shoulder and run away with her the way he had done with the kit…

Speaking of… Little Carbuckety, having apparently overcome his shock and decided he disliked the situation he was in, began mewling and struggling so that Mack nearly dropped him. "Listen, kit," he muttered, pausing to get a better grasp on the little tom, "I'm trying to save your life here and you're not helping…" Suddenly, MacVitie heard the sound of pawsteps coming towards them—not from the direction they'd come, which he was expecting at every moment, but from the direction they were going. Panicked, he glanced about for a hiding spot. Seeing none, he shoved the kit behind him and prepared to take a stand against…whomever…

"What are you doing?" demanded a queen's voice.

"Bomba," MacVitie gasped, nearly crumpling to the floor in his relief. He was too glad to see her at the moment to even bother scolding her for returning when she'd been meant to stay with the twins. "Here," he went on rapidly, placing the kit's paw in Bomba's, "take him with you. I've got to go back for…"

"You left her?" Bombalurina snarled, pulling the kit none-too-gently towards her so that he let out a squeaky growl in protest.

"I had to…" Mack began to explain, then changed his mind. "Look, Bomba, there's no time now, I've got to…" Just then, he noticed two more felines coming up behind the scarlet queen. "And you two here?" MacVitie cried, exasperated. "What happened to the three of you escaping while—"

"I didn't think you two could manage on your own," Bombalurina informed him in a dangerously-low tone. "And it seems I was right. As for those two," she jerked her head aside to indicate Mungojerrie and Rumpelteazer, "they wouldn't hear of going on without me."

"Th'more we look about, th'more it seems yer right," Mungojerrie said quickly, grinning sheepishly at MacVitie, hoping to stop him scolding. "The place really is deser'ed."

"Not completely," Mack informed them all. "A few queens and kits… Jezza." The twins shifted nervously. "I take it you know her?"

"It's, er…a good fing we 'appen'd t'come back an' 'elp," Teazer said, trying to force confidence into her voice.

"Enough talk," Bomba snapped, "I'm going to find my sister. Here," she added, shoving Carbuckety into Teazer's arms, "you can guard little-bit…"

"I wanna help," Teazer protested, at the same time patting the younger kit awkwardly on the head to try and quiet him. He was thoroughly weary of all of these bigger cats and their pushing him around.

"The best way you can help," MacVitie rushed to tell the tabby queen, "is to look after him. Demeter won't go anywhere without him, so it's no good our rescuing her if anything happens to him. Please?"

"All righ'," Teazer sighed. "But on'y 'cause he's so cute. And cos yew ask me," she added, sending a glare in Bomba's direction, "not Miss Boss Lady over there."

"No matter who you do it for," Bomba rolled her eyes, "as long as you manage to keep him alive." She moved off in the direction from which MacVitie had just come. Jerrie looked uncertainly at Teazer and MacVitie for a moment, before hurrying to follow. MacVitie lingered a moment more.

"Do you know anywhere you can hide until we get back?" he asked.

"Oh, sure, sure," the tabby queen giggled nervously. "There's a nice ol' storage room a little ways up fr'm here. Jus' come an' fetch us when ev'ry'un's square. It'll be the first door on yer left. Now hurry up, the others'll need ya. That…" She swallowed. "Mind, that Jezza's a feisty one. She c'n do just as she likes when Lady Mother's gone, an' she'll take full advantage. Don't, er… That is, try not ta… Wot I mean is… Only fight 'er if'n ya really needs to."

"All right, all right, I get it," MacVitie chuckled, feigning carelessness to hide his real worry. He reached out and ruffled the younger queen's ears as if that were meant to reassure her. "Now go do your job and let me do mine." As they both turned to go their separate ways, he somehow felt the need to add, "In less than an hour we'll be on our way to your new home. There's nothing to worry about, Teazer, nothing at all."