Disclaimer: I do not own Xiaolin Showdown or The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe … obviously.
(A/N) This is sort of a one shot. I'm not expecting a huge response, but I read the story The Black Cat and it was so strange and creepy that it inspired me to write this. Some of the characters may seem different.
Let me explain, the story is from Raimundo's point of view. This story shows a darkness to him that hasn't been seen before and the image of the cat could be his growing anger towards Omi, or it could just be a cat. Depending on your own personal point of view. Please let me know what you think. In places it will be almost word for word to the story and in others it will have a bit more of a modern or XS twist to it.
The Black Cat
You are not going to believe this story. But it is a true story, as true as I sit here writing it – as true as I will die in the morning. This story ends with my end, with my death tomorrow.
I was once a kind, loving and playful person. I was the dragon of wind. Everyone will tell you this. They will also tell you how much I looked after and cared for the Shen-Gong-Wu, particularly the Shen-Gong-Wu with their own personalities. For soon we did discover Shen-Gong-Wu that were more than just objects, they could come alive of their own accord and I treated them as pets. While I grew up in the temple, I loved caring for them, cleaning them and keeping them in pristine condition.
I was young when I married my childhood friend, and she also helped me take care of these 'pets' as it was her duty as the Dragon of Fire. When we moved into our own house, she brought all of our most beautiful Shen-Gong-Wu to protect our home. We had the Jade bird, the golden dog and the black cat.
The cat was large and had the most personality. It would come to life and wander the house frequently. It was black all over and seemed to be very intelligent. It seemed so intelligent that my wife often laughed about what some people would believe; some people believe that this black cat is an evil Shen-Gong-Wu, an enemy in a cat's body.
We even named this Shen-Gong-Wu, we called it Pluto. Pluto was my favourite. It was always I who cleaned him and it would come to life and follow me everywhere as my own protector. I often had to stop him from following me out into the world. That cat became my closest friend and we lived happily together.
But slowly, I changed; the loss of my oldest friend (now also a cat) had driven me to drink. That evil enemy of Man called Drink who was changing me. I was not the kind, loving person people knew before. I grew more selfish. I was often suddenly angry about unimportant things. I began to use bad language, most of all with my wife. I even hit her sometimes, as she would never fight back. And by that time, I was doing horrible things to our pets. I would smash them and scratch their smooth surfaces, but never Pluto. But my illness was getting worse – oh yes, drink is an illness! Soon I began to hurt my dear Pluto too.
I remember that night very well. I came home late, straight from a fight and full of drink again. I could not understand why Pluto was not coming to life. He sat still as a statue in his fake form. My Pluto did not want to come near me. I picked up the black statue, holding him far too strongly. He was afraid and used his strength on my hand.
I was suddenly not myself anymore. It was like someone else was in my body, someone evil and mad with the drink that I had consumed! I drew out my knife and scratched at the black stone. I held the black statue by the neck and used my knife to scratch out one of his eyes.
The next morning, I woke with my mind full of pain and horror. I was deeply sorry. I could not understand how I could do such an evil thing. But the drink soon helped me to forget.
Slowly the cat came back to life and recovered. Soon he felt no more pain. There was now only an ugly dry hole where the eye once was. He began to go around the house as usual again. He never came near me now, of course, and he turned to stone when I went too near.
I knew he didn't love me anymore. At first I was sad. Then, slowly, the anger swelled within me and I did another terrible thing …
I had to do it – I could not stop myself. I did it with a terrible sadness in my heart – because I knew it was evil. And that was why I did it – yes! I did it because I knew it was evil. What did I do? I caught the cat and flung him at a wall until he shattered on the floor and was dead.
That night, I woke suddenly – my bed was on fire. I heard people outside shouting, 'Fire! Fire!' Our house was burning! My wife and me were lucky to escape. We stood and watched as the house burned down to the ground.
There was nothing left of the building the nest morning. All the walls fell down during the night, except one – a wall in the middle of the house. I realised why this wall did not burn: because there was new plaster on it. The plaster was still quite wet.
I was surprised to see a crowd of people next to the wall. They were talking, and seemed to be quite excited. I went closer and looked over their shoulders. I saw a black shape in the new white plaster. It was the shape of large cat, with gaps in it where it had shattered and cracked, like a jigsaw.
I looked at the shape in complete horror. Several minutes passed before I could think clearly again. I knew I had to try to think clearly. I had to know why it was there.
I clearly remembered the cat shattering on the wall and I threw it into next doors bin. However, when I threw the cat at the wall, it probably wiped away some of the new plaster in the places it struck, leaving the imprint of the cat in the new plaster so the old plaster could burn underneath, scarring the imprint of the cat on the wall. Yes, I was sure that was what happened.
But I could not forget that black shape for months. I even saw it in my dreams. I began to feel sad about losing the Shen-Gong-Wu. So I began searching for the sister Shen-Gong-Wu. I looked mostly in the poor parts of our town where I went drinking. I searched for another black cat, of the same size and type as Pluto.
One night, as I sat in a dark and dirty drinking-house, thinking of the two cat friends I had lost, I noticed a black object on top of the cupboard, near some bottles of wine. I was surprised when I saw it. 'I looked at those bottles a few minutes ago,' I thought, ' and I sure that object was not there before …'
I got up and went to see what it was. I put my hand up, touched it, and found that it was the second black cat – a large one, as large as Pluto. The sister Shen-Gong-Wu. He looked like Pluto too, in every way but one: Pluto did not have a white hair on his body; his cat had a large white shape on his front.
He got up when I touched him and came to life, and pressed the side of his head against my hand several times. He liked me. This was the Shen-Gong-Wu I was looking for! He continued to be friendly and later, when I left, he followed me into the street. He came all the way home with me – we now had another house – and came inside. He immediately jumped up onto the shelf next to the other Shen-Gong-Wu and turned to stone. He stayed with us and I tried to search for his purpose. All I could find on this second black cat was 'the future to be told'. He loved both of us very much and very soon became my wife's favourite Shen-Gong-Wu.
But, as the sands of time flowed, I came to dislike the Cat more and more. I do not know why, but I hated the way he loved me. Soon, I began to hate him – but I was never unkind to him. I was very careful about that. I kept away from him because I remembered what I did to my poor Pluto. I also hated the animal because he only had one eye. I didn't notice this until the morning after I took him home. Of course, this made my wife love him even more!
But the more I hated that Shen-Gong-Wu, the more eager to serve it became. It followed me everywhere, if not at my feet alive, then in stone form hidden on a shelf. When I sat down, it would be a stone statue at my feet, getting in my way, or in my seat so I would almost sit on the hard stone. I wanted to smash him when he did this, but I did not. I stopped myself because I remembered Pluto, but also because I was afraid of the power of the Shen-Gong-Wu.
How can I explain this fear? It was not really fear of something evil … but then how else can I possible describe it? Slowly, this strange fear grew into horror. Yes, horror. If I tell you why, you will not believe me. You will think I'm crazy.
Several times, my wife would take the statue and showed me the white shape on his chest. She said the shape was slowly changing and must have something to do with its power. For a long time, I denied this, but eventually I too realised that she was right. The shape was changing. Its sides were becoming straighter and it was beginning to look more and like and object … after more weeks, I saw what the shape was. It was impossible not to see it by now! There, on it's front, was the shape of an object I do not wish to name … I'm afraid to name … It was the terrible shape of that machine of pain and death – yes, the gallows! The place where criminals were taken to hang.
I no longer believed in happiness or rest. During the day, the Shen-Gong-Wu never left me. At night he woke me up nearly every hour. I remembered waking from terrible dreams of black cats and yellow cats and seeing him sitting next to my face, his heavy body pressing down on my heart!
I was now changing into a very different dragon. There was no good left in me. I now had evil thoughts – the darkest and most evil thoughts. I hated everyone and everything, my dear Kimiko too.
One day she went down into the cellar with me to light the boiler. Of course, the Shen-Gong-Wu cat followed me down the stairs and nearly made me fall. This made me so angry that I picked up an old axe and tried to cut the stone creature in two. But my wife stopped me as I brought down the axe. This made me even more angry and I pulled away before swinging the object down again … and buried it in her skull.
I had to hide the body. I knew I could not take it out of the house. The neighbours watched my every move. I considered cutting it up and burning. I thought of burying it under the cellar floor. Perhaps I could throw it into the river at the end of the river at the end of the garden. I thought of putting it into a wooden bow and taking it out that way. In the end, I decided to hide the body in the wall of the cellar.
It was quite an old building, near the river, so the walls of the cellar were quite wet and the plaster was soft. There was new plaster on one of the walls, and I knew that underneath it, the wall was not very strong. I also knew that this wall was very thick. I could hide the body in the middle of it.
It wasn't difficult to do. I took off some of the plaster, took out a few stones and put my wife in there, put back the stones, made some new plaster and put it on the wall. Then I cleaned the floor, and looked carefully round. Everything looked just as it did before. Nobody would ever know.
Next, I went upstairs to kill the cat. The Shen-Gong-Wu was the source of my bad luck. It had to be destroyed. I searched everywhere, but I could not find it. I was sure it was because of my wife's murder; it was too clever to come near me now.
I waited all evening, but I did not see the evil statue. He did not come back during the night either. And so, for the first time in a long time, I slept well. When I woke up the next morning, I was surprised to see that the cat still was not there. Two, three days passed and there was still no sign of the Shen-Gong-Wu. I cannot tell you how happy I began to feel. I felt so much better without the cat. Yes, it was that artefact that brought me all that unhappiness. And now, I began to feel like a free man again. It was wonderful – no more black cat! Never again!
Several people came asking where my wife was, but I answered their questions easily. Then, on the fourth day, the Dragon of Earth came. He said that he wanted to search the house for his friend. I was not worried. I went with him while he searched. He looked everywhere several times. Then he went down into the cellar. I went with him, of course. I wasn't a bit afraid. I walked calmly up and down, watching him search.
He found nothing of course, and soon he was ready to leave. I was so happy that I could not stop talking to my supposed friend while he prepared to leave the cellar. I did not really know what I was saying.
'Bye Clay,' I said, 'this is a well-built house y'know. Very well built. These walls – you're going now? – These walls are really strong aren't they?' I knocked hard on the wall where my wife, our friend, was hidden.
A voice came from inside the wall, in answer to my knock. It was a cry, like a child's. Quickly, it grew into a long scream of pain and horror. I saw Clay standing of the stairs with his mouth open. Suddenly, he ran down in a great hurry and began smashing the wall down. It fell quickly, and there was wife, the dragon of fire, standing inside. There she was, dried blood all over her head, looking at them. And there was the Black Cat, standing on her head, his mouth red and wide open in a scream and his one eye, shining like fire. The clever object! My wife was dead because of him, and now his evil voice, was sending me to the gallows.
(A/N) Tell me what you think of this. It's very similar to the actually story and if you feel like looking up his work I really would recommend this story and the poem 'The Raven'. They're brilliant. This is to make up for the late updates on my other stories.
Lots of luv, Becky.