She Can Talk!
Cat had been banished into the backyard for biting a door to door salesman and was now sitting on the porch sulking. She'd only been trying to help and this was the thanks she got? Ha. Well next time one of those manipulative bastards came to the door she'd just let him sell Quatre or one of the others something they didn't need and costed too much. Muttering bad temperedly to herself Cat finally got bored with that and decided to try and climb the tree again. There was an annoying bird that had taken to living there and singing all the time. Badly. Well Cat would just inform that bird that singing wasn't allowed at two in the friggin morning. Not that she'd kill it, oh no then Quatre would get upset and call her a bad kitty and likely try to make her eat cat food again, Cat thought with a sniff as she made her way up, looking around for a bird that sang like it was being strangled. There were a couple birds but they were sparrows and sparrows didn't sing. Or at least she'd never heard one sing before. Maybe one had and that why it was so damn terrible. After all if you were a sparrow you weren't meant to sing so they weren't able to. At least not able to well. But they were just sitting there and since Cat couldn't justify scaring them to death without proof that one of them was the culprit she just shrugged and was working her way further up the tree when she heard loud yelling which made the birds fly away. As the yelling turned to loud crying of the child variety Cat made her way back down the tree to investigate this new sound. Getting down far enough she could see enough to know it was her little neighbor Michael making all the racket. And of course there was no one coming to hug him or find out what the blazes had set him off, Cat thought darkly as she moved along the branch then hopped from there onto the fence then down, trotting over to the kid while keeping a weary eye out for the kid's mother and lawn mowers. Walking over Cat's ears twitched painfully as the boy continued to sit on his chubby butt, crying his eyes out.
)
What on earth was the matter with the kid? Cat wondered as she sat in front of him, her head tilted questioningly to one side. He wasn't even paying attention to her and..and was that blood? Eyes widening Cat moved closer and stared in horror at the small streams of blood coming from the boy's clenched closed right hand. OH MY GOD! Cat thought as her eyes wheeled around with panic. He's hurt! He's HURT! HE'S HURT! What am I going to do? Oh dear God what am I going to do? Cat thought as she moved around frantically, looking for someone to help as the child continued to wail. There was no one around to help and what if the kid had been bitten by something poisonous or ripped his hand open on glass? What if his mother had done this then left him outside while she cleaned up the evidence? Where the hell was this boy's guardians? His father? His guardian angel for Christ sakes! Angel..angel..she had an angel. Her pyro maniac angel Colin. Where the hell was Colin? Colin, get your winged ass down here right now or I'm going to pop out your eyes and make you eat them. I'm going to cut you open like a fish and use your rib cage to make a new bed for Cuddles. I'm gonna rip out your- Cat began then stopped when she saw the angel in question appear in front of her.
"I'm right here, Miss Ghastly Minded." Colin said dryly with a shake of his head before reaching out to pat Michael's head which seemed to soothe the child into only whimpering.
Where the hell is this boy's guardian angel or whatever you call angels who are supposed to look after little kids, Cat demanded to know. Why isn't that angel here taking care of Michael? If they give me an angel why the hell can't they be bothered to get this kid a half decent one!
"He does have a guardian angel but it's his destiny to cut his hand open with that jagged rock just as it is his destiny to be out here without help." Colin said, understanding the look and thoughts Cat sent his way. "I know it's not nice or pretty but we can only do so much."
You mean you can only be menaces upon former bad guys, you can't be bothered to help a little boy who should be inside, watching some stupid and brain cell destroying cartoon while his mother makes him cookies for a snack, Cat thought with a dark look on her face then brightened slightly as an idea came to her. The mother..the mother hated her. If she could get the mom to come out here then Michael would get help! Turning Cat raced towards the house, jumping nimbly up the stairs and was soon on the front porch body chucking the screen door. When that didn't work she got up on the railing and started pushing over flower pots which fell and crashed to the ground. That got her attention.
)
"What the?" Came the mother's voice as she opened the screen with coffee cup in hand. "Why you..you stupid cat I'll..oh those boys are so going to-shut up, Michael! You're fine so quit crying!" The mother yelled over to her son who was back to wailing. Heaving her cup back the mother threw her hot coffee at Cat, Cat jumping off the porch for cover. The mother screaming at her to get lost the woman slammed the screen door shut again muttering about the bill she was going to be sending her next door neighbors.
I am so going to kill her if it's the last thing I do! Cat yelled as she tried to ignore the pain the hot coffee had caused as well as the fact that she now smelled like the crappy stuff. COLIN! Colin you have to do something, Cat thought as loud as she could as she raced back over to her angel. You've got to take human form or something and go tell someone he's hurt. Please! I'll do anything! I'll behave for the rest of the month I'm here! I promise!
"I can't do anything, Cat. I wish I could and I do mean that. I wish it from the bottom of my heart but there's nothing I can do." Colin said with a shake of his dark head. "There's really only one thing I could do but it would be dangerous and we'd get into so much trouble and.."
Just do it and quit bellyaching, Cat demanded as she glared at him.
"All right then. Lord help us." Colin said as he leaned forward and placed a hand on her head, the both of them glowing for a minute before he removed his hand again. "There ya go."
"What the hell did you do?" Cat demanded to know and if she could have she'd have put her hands on her hips. "You didn't do anything but make us glow all weird and..and..I'm talking. Colin am I talking...outloud?"
"Yup. Now everyone can hear you. Including being able to hear you tell them that Michael is hurt." Colin said with a faint smile on his face. "Though I'd be careful who you tell since a talking cat is not normal thing remember."
"Quatre or Duo...Quatre or Duo would believe me." Cat said as she took off running, climbing up the fence then over into her yard, racing across the lawn Cat climbed the stairs then started body chucking the door, Duo finally coming to open it. "DUO! Duo listen to me now! I know I'm talking and that's really weird but you have to go next door. Michael is in the yard and he's bleeding. If you don't come and help him now I'm going to.. to slice out your tongue with my claws and force it down your throat for you to choke on."
)
Thirty minutes later the boys were all in their car on the way home from the hospital with Cat sitting in Quatre's lap, all the pilots dead silent. Cat had finally managed to get Duo to come over to the fence which he'd jumped when he saw Michael was actually there and in pain like Cat had said. Duo had checked it out then called over to the guys in the house to get the car started and ready to go, plus that they needed Quatre to deal with Michael's mother. The other four boys had all hustled over with Quatre taking control of Michael's mother who hadn't believed them at first but had been made to believe once she saw the blood. Getting everyone to the hospital no one had noticed Cat slipping into the car until it was too late. After delivering Michael they'd stayed to make sure he was okay and now they were driving back home having just heard Duo's explanation as to how he'd known Michael was hurt.
"As much as I would find it amusing to let you all think Duo's started hearing voices in his head he hasn't." Cat finally said, not surprised when Heero nearly drove them into another car and everyone else but Duo gapped at her in shock. "Uhm..hi. I'm Cat and I can talk now ....Surprise?"
"Holy mother of Mary." Trowa breathed out as he stared at the cat calmly talking to them. "She talked."
"See I told you she was a possessed cat but none of you believed me." Duo said as he crossed his arms in front of him from the front seat. "I told you that she wasn't normal but no, you said that I was just letting my imagination getting to me. You all said I was nuts. Well ha! I was right and you were wrong!"
"But..how...?" Was all Quatre could get out, the shock too great.
"Well you see, Quatre I use to be a regular human being but then I sorta died. Because I pissed Saint Peter off royally I've been stuck in this cat's body till like the end of this month or somewhere along those lines. The day you guys found me was my first day in this body. Needless to say it has not been a piece of cake living with you guys. And before we go any further lets make one more thing clear. My..name...is..CAT! And I will not tolerate being dressed up in any more cute outfits or being fed cat food! Do you guys have any idea how disgusting that stuff is or what's in that crap?"
)
"So there really is a God and saints and everything?" Duo wanted to know having gotten over his shock already since he'd had more time to recover. Now this was almost kind of cool. "And you're actually dead? Then why aren't you in hell or heaven? Or are we really just reincarnated as animals? Wow..that would mean we eat people on a regular basis." Duo said looking a tad sick at the idea that every pig and cow he'd ever ate was once a person.
"No, there is a heaven and a hell and all the crap. I don't think there is reincarnation or at least that wasn't mentioned." Cat said, glad that that was true. She'd hate to think of everyone she'd ever known coming back as animals to be eaten or run over. "See what happened was I was an assassin so you'd think I'd go straight to hell right? Well the problem was that I died saving this kid's life which is usually an automatic entrance to heaven. Anyway Heaven doesn't want me so the evil Petie said that I had to come down here for three months in this body and earn the right to go to heaven. Like that's possible in this body." Cat grumbled bad temperedly. "Basically I think he did it to shut up the few people who were on my side."
"So after three months...or I guess this month..what happens to you?" Quatre asked as he looked down at her, trying to comprehend that his lovable fluffy kitty was really this assassin who'd recently died. The fact that he could sorta see that was disturbing.
"I go to Hell." Cat said with a shrug of her shoulders. "No biggie though since I never imagined I was going to go anywhere else. Besides it hasn't been so bad living with you guys even if you do get me into loads of trouble."
"WE get YOU into trouble?" Duo guffed and was all set to launch into a long list of all the things she'd done since they found her when her meaning hit home. "You mean at the end of this month..you're going to die? Really die?"
"I think so. Though maybe my soul, if there is such a thing, will just leave this body and the cat soul this body had before will return..or resurface or something. I have no idea actually but I'm pretty sure I'll be gone." Cat said with a smirk in her voice. "I bet you guys will be glad to be rid of me huh?"
"I wouldn't say that." Trowa said not quite sure what to say about all this. "You make things interesting at least."
"Well at least this explains a few things. Speaking of which was I right about the whole nails thing? Did you somehow get a hold of them and put them under Dorothy's wheels?" Duo wanted to know as he turned in his seat to look at her curiously. "Everyone said I was crazy but it had your paw prints all over it."
"Human in a cat's body or not there's no way she could have done that for the last time, Duo." Quatre said in exasperation then getting a funny feeling looked down at Cat who seemed rather interest in staring out the window. "You didn't..did you?"
"I never leave prints, Duo." Cat said smugly, not about to admit to it one way of another. "Unlike some people I actually know the meaning of planning and thinking things through."
"I told ya she did it, Q man."
"Sass-Cat..how could you?"
"I didn't say I did it ya know, Quatre. I plead the fifth."
"In other words she did it."
"Shut up, Duo."
)
Arriving at the house Quatre, Duo and Cat were still arguing about the whole nails thing as they all headed up the stairs and into the house, Duo and Quatre giving a yell when a pale form suddenly appeared in front of them look more then a little nervous. "Uhm hi. I'm Cat's watcher, her supervisor I suppose you would say. My name is Colin."
"Jesus, Mary and Joseph! It's a..a ghost?" Duo said not sure exactly what to call this man who looked just like them only paler and faded sorta.
"I suppose that works. Anyway I just came to give you some good news and some even better news, Cat. The good news is that you can keep talking but the only people that can hear you will be people who care about you like these guys and Maia. This is to insure that strangers don't hear you and report you to people we don't want involved." Colin began, wanting to get this out of the way. "The even better news is because of your actions today it's been decided that you will continue to live here until the beginning of the new year. I told you that behaving would have some benefits. The guys above were very touched by your concern for Michael and thought you deserved a reward."
"You mean a small reward now so that they can justify throwing me into the pits of hell later on." Cat said dryly, not in the least surprised by that though she was surprised by the whole caring thing. Quatre she could understand and even Maia but the rest of them? They all cared about her too? Getting a strange and foreign fuzzy feeling Cat couldn't say that she cared for it overly much.
"So you watch over her and record all the good things she does? Can we help her do good things to insure she goes to heaven instead?" Quatre asked, his mind already racing with ideas of how to save Cat's soul by New Years. "And would that be regular New Years or Chinese New Year?"
"Regular New Year and you can help her but she has to do it of her own free will. You can't make her do anything good or do it for her without her cooperation. Your soul is in perfect condition and destined for heaven, Quatre. Hers on the other had is far from being as pure though we're getting it there, aren't we, Cat?" Colin said as he looked down to smirk at the cat standing at Quatre's side.
)
"Go hang yourself with your halo, Colin." Cat said before sticking her tongue out at him. "I'm not getting into heaven so quit getting Quatre's hopes up. Besides I don't see any point in changing my fate anyway. What few dead friends I have are likely down there anyway."
"True but you have several friends who are still alive who are going to be looking for you when they get to heaven." Colin pointed out, trying to reason with her which was like trying to reason with a block of wood. Hell arguing with the wood would have likely been easier in his opinion.
"None of my good friends would be stupid enough to think they'd find me in heaven." Cat shot back, not about to let him twist things around so it looked like she had a chance to enter those Pearly Gates. She wasn't stupid, she knew she was never seeing them unless it was from a distance. "And besides, the only reason you want me to succeed is so that you can advance in your mission to become a stupid angel. If you want I can have Duo here find a bell and ring it, then maybe you'll get a pair of wings and leave me the hell alone."
"Her name is Catherine Rorake and her human body is currently a resident in St Catherine's Hospital in Spain. Fitting no?" Colin said with a grin before disappearing into thin air as though he'd never been there.
"My...my body? My body hasn't been buried or cremated?" Cat said in surprise having figure her body for cremation or an unmarked grave. "Why the hell would my corpse be in a hospital? I've been dead for a couple of months!"
"Well I guess that's just something we'll have to find out." Wufei said quietly, not sure what to make of all of this. He'd think he was dreaming but it was in the middle of the day and they were all having it at the same time.
"Hey maybe the cat who's body you took over is living in your body till you die, Cat." Duo said with a chuckle as the idea occurred to him.
"Funny, Maxwell. So funny I forgot to cough up a hairball laughing."