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| Photo: Directed by GTM, produced by JTM. |
The last and final part of The Cat's EasterCon EasterEgg.
Soon the party moves from the bar to the roof, as it always does on these occasions. The darker more lugubrious sorts have gone to seek out some borderline legal den of iniquity called ‘Catnip it in the Bud’. But most are up here, on the tiles. It is madness, the cats bounding around in a frenzy, climbing the chimney stacks, racing around the wrought iron balconies; there’s even some kind of confrontation happening on the very top of the lead-lined cupola. I hope it isn’t Ziggy.
Tiring of all this, I sneak away from the party, leaving the Majestic behind and setting across town to where my Slaves are staying. It isn’t far. But there is a big road in the way. Not that there are cars in this ‘verse, but I can still see their shimmering shadows, and old habits die hard. Which I guess is just as well. Although it is early morning and in the Slaves’ world, the traffic has thinned. Darting across between the shadows of taxis and late night buses, I soon find myself at the Slaves’ hotel. The Old Swan. Just looking at the signage outside makes me feel hungry – I haven’t had swan for ages.
I ignore the reception, and clamber up the creeper which adorns the hotel’s walls. I know where they are of course. My tall Slave left me ample opportunity to rifle through his emails and check out where they were staying. But in any case, I can almost taste that damn ghost. My appetite for that swan is suddenly diminished.
I creep through an open window into the room next to my Slave’s. I have a few issues opening the door, but manage it with a few leaps and hangs. The key card system which the Slaves have in their ‘verse, we don’t have in ours, thankfully. Where we have to have doors, we prefer the older traditional kind, that we learnt to open over centuries. None of this new fangled anti-cat technology, thanks.
I use a similar motion to enter my Slaves’ chamber. Where I spy the ghost, sitting on top of my tall Slave while he sleeps. I flex my knuckles and examine my claws, crouching down flat on the floor. And then I jump, tearing at the fabric of the metaverse, ribboning our dual realities. My claws make purchase, and I feel the resistance of the ghost’s being, as I rip into its substance. Wisps of it begin to leak out, like drops of ink in a bath. I continue to attack, the ghost fighting back, its multitude of arms flailing around, but failing to reach across to the right ‘verse. Its six heads shriek, its dislocated jaws open wide.
I land a punch to one of its heads, knocking it senseless. Then tendrils of it begin to leach into my reality. I swipe them away, but it knows where I am now. Filled with a new burst of energy, I hiss and growl, leaping upwards and landing on the spectral figure with all four feet. I bite down on one of the other heads and rip it clean off.
Now haemorrhaging its substance, the ghost begins to swish around the room like a deflating balloon. And then, in a shimmer of light, it vanishes. I sit on the floor, exhausted, and curl up at my shadow Slaves’ feet. When I wake, the ghost hasn’t returned, and I don’t think it will now.
I slink off back to the Majestic as dawn begins to break, feeling the pain of exertion in my old bones. A few other convention members also returning after the night’s revelries. I speak to one, whose eyes show the effects of Catnip intoxication. Inside, the bar is already open, and the hard core felines are already beginning again. Not me though. It’s been a busy night, but I’ve still got my speech to prepare for my CoH slot later. But before I do that, I remember it is Caturday as well, so I spend a while writing this.
And now the CoH slot is imminent. I guess I’m going to have to wing it. Improvise, extemporise. Or perhaps even, play it by my funny flattened Scottish Fold ears.
END
Cheers to Cat for the great Easter treat with a pint of finest Holstein Friesian!
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