Altaica's Story, part five-Sorrow
Author's note: Okay, Altaica and Ocenir belong to be, the rest of the characters belong to RUG, so just...don't sue me! Eh....just...enjoy! -Amber
Altaica awoke early, her eyes snapping awake and her breathing quickening, as though she was waking from a bad dream. They had left her while she slept, she realized, and for a moment she panicked, thinking that they hadn't let Ocenir stay, that they'd thrown him out into the street, where Macavity would surely kill him. She sat bolt upright, ignoring a shooting pain in her side, waiting for her vision to clear. When it was, she crawled on her hands and knees to the front of what proved to be a rather large pipe and looked out cautiously.
There were several cats around the Junkyard, Tugger with his usual troupe of kittens, cats with human homes arriving occasionally, Cassandra and the twins lounging on the Tire, Jennyanydots and Jellylorum knitting by the Old Ford, and.....Altaica's breath caught in her throat. Munkustrap talking with Ocenir.
She stood quickly, too quickly, her head beginning to spin. Another pain shot through her side in the same spot, and she knew that she must be sight. She felt herself sinking, falling onto the dirt. A furry black arm reached out to steady her. "Take it slow, Alta," he said, smiling as he helped her stand again. "Doctor's orders."
She grinned wryly. "Izzat so, Doc?" she asked, a hint of laughter in her voice. The owner of the arm was none other than her doctor, Mistoffelees.
He smiled. "I think I know where you're headed, so I trust that you don't mind if I come along?" of course he knew where she was headed, she realized. Stupid me! She threw up her mental shields, nothing strong, just a warning to keep out.
She frowned. "Ya 'ayven't bin siftin deah too deeply, 'ayve ya, Doc?" she asked.
He shook his head. "I know better. I've been helping Tanto keep Corico out, also...." She nodded when he said that. It made sense. "By the way, Taica, I meant to ask you something...."
"Whassat, Doc?" she asked, glancing around the Junkyard once more. Why oh why did something feel amiss?
"Why is it that your accent is so much worse than Ocenir's? It's so much thicker, and more pronounced. Just an observation," he added hastily.
She smiled. "Ahnd a good 'un. Ah'm from da innah city, ahnd 'Cenir's 'riginally from da suburbs. Dat's why he doesn't got da accent. Pity, really, onna conna da fact dat my voice sticks owt like ah soah thumb, whateva ah soah thumb is ta begin with."
He nodded. "It makes sense," he said, nearing Ocenir and Munkustrap. "Good morning, you two, we have a visitor..."
Ocenir's eyes widened. "Alta, shouldn't you be resting? You look like you need it."
She stuck her tongue out. "Tanks foh da complament, 'Cenir. Butcha know me, can't stay in bed foh a minute longah dan I want to...." He smiled and nodded, because it was true.
Munkustrap helped her sit down. "You shouldn't be walking around, Alta, in your condition..."
She stuck out her tongue. "Ah wasn't walkin, Munkus, ah was leanin 'gainst Misto heah....."
Munkustrap and Ocenir frowned with identical "you're-acting-like-a-kitten" faces, and would have protested if Etcetera's cry didn't ring across the Junkyard just then....."Where's Jemima??"
The four were over to her in a flash, Altaica moving a heck of a lot faster than she should have, but none of them noticed. With Macavity so much more ticked off at the Tribe and at Altaica in particular than he normally was, they couldn't be too careful.
Etcetera was crying. "W-w-we were playing hide-and-seek," she wailed. "Me and Jemima. She was hiding, and I was supposed to come and find her. Well, we have a twenty-minute rule and you're supposed to call out, but they twenty-minute-rule time passed a good fifteen minutes ago!!! She isn't HERE, Munkus, she's GONE!"
Alta went down on her knees, ignoring the pains in her side and head now as she gathered the crying kit in her arms. "Now, Etcy, don't cry....we need you to help us so we can find her," she whispered soothingly. Misto and Munkus exchanged looked over Alta's head. She had to be falling apart inside.
"What we need you to do," she continued softly, "Is show us where Jemi usually hides. If we can pick up a scent from there, then we'll be able to follow it until we find her."
Etcetera nodded, and, breaking free of Altaica's grasp, walked off towards a small pile of boxes and tires near the fence. She had none of her usual energy or bouncyness, The loss of her friend had hit her hard, Alta realized.
The thought chilled her to the bone. No, she said to herself, reassuring. No, she isn't lost, she isn't.
Munkustrap helped Alta stand, and they set off again, following Etcetera through the pile until they can to a small bookshelf.
"She liked to sit in the little cabinet in the bottom and read some of the books in here," Etcetera said with a sniff. "She always hid here. Always."
Mistoffelees nodded and patted her on the shoulder. "Etcy, it may be best for you to go back to the main Junkyard now," he said softly. The kitten nodded and was off.
Ocenir picked up the scents immediately. "She was here, all right," he said, poking around in the cabinet. And she left....blimey..." he straightened up quietly, holding a small book of poetry in his paw. It was opened to a page, and the page was dotted with fresh blood.
"Can't have been gone for more than twenty minutes," he aid, setting the book down carefully. Misto nodded.
"There are three other scents. Two are just regular cats, alley cats, but one...well, one is....is..." he couldn't say it, he couldn't. The only thing he was wondering about was how he recovered from such extensive injuries so quickly....
"Macavity." Her voice was flat and without emotion, as if every drop of feeling had run out of her body. No, it couldn't be, she thought numbly as she stooped to pick up the book. It couldn't be.
She scanned the poem, reading only a few lines. It dawned on her then, and she knew where she would find her cousin. She turned and fled, out of the junkyard, running for the quaint church that sat in the distance, atop a hill.
The three toms followed at a distance, worried, but not daring to tell anyone where they were going. They just watched the petite striped queen making her way through the streets, wincing every now and then.
It was raining again by the time that she reached the church, a steady, pouring rain that left the four felines soaked. Misto, Ocenir, and Munkus watched as Alta leapt lightly onto the fence, padded along it for a distance, and plopped down on the other side. They went closer, saw her slumped against the fence on the inside, slolwy pulling herself to her feet.
"I'll kill him" they heard her mutter before she set out into the yard. Among the rows....the rows of gravestones.
The three swiftly jumped over the fence and followed still. She seemed to be looking for something, and they saw her halt before a small stone, a child's stone. Ocenir shuddered inwardly. He could picture it, had seen the same thing in Boston....small children, tiny infants, dead, deep in the ground....cold. Unknowing. Never to wake again.
She let out a choked sob and fell to the earth, cradling something gently. They didn't need to be there to tell what it was, even in the half-light created by the storm, they knew. They knew.
"Bast..." Ocenir said in a choked voice. Just yesterday she had hid him, helped him, smiled at him. And now...she was dead, like the child beneath the headstone.
They walked forward now, forward to where Altaica knelt on the ground, sobbing, gently holding her cousin close for the last time. Her tears ran down her face freely, falling onto Jemima's already matted fur, mingling with the dried blood. She rocked back and forth, holding the smaller kit easily, whispering. "I'm sorry, oh my Bast I'm sorry, oh Jemi...Jemi...Jemi, wake up...I'm sorry...I'm sorry..."
Ocenir frowned. What was she saying? He looked at Munkus, and they stepped forward more. Ocenir took Alta gently by the shoulders, while Munkustap cradled Jemima's body gently in his arms. Ocenir helped Alta to her feet, and she stood quietly, tears flowing down her face silently.
"I'll kill him." Her voice was soft, deathly serious.
"I-I beg your pardon?" Misto could hardly believe his ears. He thought that it was a trick, maybe, a trick with the wind or something.
"I'll kill him. I swear it, I will." There was no trace of laughter in her voice now. No teasing, no accent...nothing. She had turned to a shell, a hardened shell, without emotions. She turned, grimaced once, and was walking back to the fence.
It was a somber procession that re-entered the Junkyard, Mistoffelees first, head hanging, tears shining on his cheeks. It shocked the cats to see him that way, he was never down.
Ocenir and Altaica were next. The patched tom carried Alta gently in his arms, and she kept her face turned toward his strong chest, soaking both of them with tears. His own fell soft and gentle on her head, fewer than the rest of theirs, for he had hardly known Jemima. Still, he cried, he cried for the loss of a sweet, innocent, kind child. Lost forever.
Munkustrap was last, carrying Jemima's limp form in his arms. A gasp went through the Junkyard then, as Munkustrap lay her down gently on a ratty couch, closing her large, brown eyes for the last time.
It was all she could bear. Alta took off then, tearing herself from Ocenir's embrace and running across the junkyard, forgetting her injuries, running blindly. Her tears flew behind her, she scaled the junkpile and entered the tiny cabinet in the bottom of the bookcase. Shakily, she picked up the book, and she began to read.
From Jemima's book of poetry---
"The daisy follows soft the sun,
And when his golden walk is done,
Sits shyly at his feet.
He, waking, finds the flower near.
"Wherefore, marauder, art thou here?"
"Because, sir, love is sweet!"
We are the flower, Thou the sun!
Forgive us, if as days decline,
We nearer steal to Thee---
Enamoured of the parting west,
The peace, the flight, the amethyst,
Night's possibility!"
-Emily Dickinson