Lucy strayed onto the cold ground of the twolegplace. She heard her claws clicking as she walked. The noise annoyed her. Here, she couldn't hide. She couldn't be safe. She tasted the air. Hundreds of scents flooded the roof of her mouth. It was impossible to tell anyone apart. She growled. She'd have to rely on her eyes to find Lion.
She scanned the area. Huge walls towered over her, red and unnatural, reeking of twolegs. There was no way Lion had disappeared into one of those. She continued walking the flat, stone ground, looking for a place a wild cat would bring their kits to murder. Shadows caught her attention. Between two blocks of twoleg walls was an alleyway that squeaked with mice. She heard rustling of alleycats. She couldn't tell if it was Lion, as a bitter scent was clogging her nose, but she decided to investigate.
She entered the dark path, heat from the sun fading away from her pelt as she went further.
"Lookit what we 'ave 'ere, huh?" Lucy hunched down, prepared to fight, but she couldn't locate the voice.
"She's a wildcat ain't she? Too plump to be an alleycat." Another voice.
An emancipated cat came out from behind a bin, fur torn out from all over his body. His stomach growled. "We haven't eaten in days." Lucy saw him lick his lips, and the other two alleycats appeared in the light. One of them had rotting teeth, another's eye was scratched closed, and all of them had ragged, smelly fur. They all had a bloody odor under their breath. They definitely ate a cat before, and they think I'm their next meal. Lucy smiled. They had no idea who they were up against.
The dark cat with the crooked teeth was wagging his tail, pinning Lucy for a moment of weakness, but she noticed him, and didn't give him that chance. The hairless cat was drooling now, and a snarl was growing in his throat. Lucy could tell that he was about to strike. She readied her stance. The hairless cat leapt at her, claws outstretched, slobber trailing from his lips. Lucy dodged him easily, scraping the underside of his belly with a sharp claw. The tom yowled in pain, and the other two alleycats attacked in unison.
They both landed on top of her, one latching onto her ear and the other biting at her scruff. Lucy rolled over on one of their faces until they let go before kicking him against the wall. The hairless cat recoiled from behind her and clamped onto her leg. Lucy whipped around, feeling her ear tear as the other tom fell away. She took this time to kick the dazed cat in the stomach while ripping into the tom at her leg. The alley was filled with screams of pain and confusion as this lean, mottled brown wild cat tore into each one of the three toms, anger of Lion and the desperation of finding her kits leading her on.
Bloody and battered, the three alleycats hissed a warning and fled the scene, a dozen times more messy than they had been that morning. Lucy fell to the ground, panting to catch her breath, the pain in her wounds starting to sting. Where is he? Lucy shut her eyes as blood leaked onto her eyelid. There was a trace of a familiar scent in the wind. She wiped her face with a paw before opening her eyes and seeing a blur of golden fur tugging its way free from the wall of the twolegplace. He left. She stood up and walked over to the strands, observing it.
She leapt to the top of the wall and looked outward towards the lush, green woods. Suddenly, she started to smell him again. The odor of the twolegplace dulled behind her. He went out into the woods. A broken smile creeped onto Lucy's torn face, picking up the trail of her mate once again. As much as it hurt to walk, she began an eager trot into the thick of the pine trees.
