Scars (Part II of J.H. White's Puss in Boots)

Chapter Twenty-Nine: Kitty's Trial

Kitty was scared, even though she probably wouldn't have liked to admit it. She walked around in the darkness until she came to a house that had appeared out of seemingly nowhere. "No," she breathed. She knew this place all too well. Scars' voice came out of the darkness, Scars himself nowhere in sight.

"Watch," he said. She was pulled inside the house, where she saw her old owners walking around, arguing about money, while a golden brown hamster scurried around in the confines of a cage.

Then she saw her; her mother, sickly and reduced from a warrior to a frail coughing state. "Mama," she choked. "I'm here."

"She can't hear you," came Scars' voice. "Nobody can." She saw herself, curling up against her mother as her father watched forlornly, her two brothers at his side.

"Mama," her younger self whimpered. "Are you dying?"

"I'm fine, pequena. Mama is fine," her mother said calmly as she hacked violently. Blood dripped out of her mouth, and she coughed a wad of phlegm and red onto the floor, uttering her final breaths.

"I...love you," she said. Then, she was dead.

"MAMA!" the adult Kitty cried, feeling the same emotion she had as a kitten, when she had felt her mother's slow heartbeat crawl to a stop.

"You have survived the first challenge," Scars said. "On we go." Kitty looked for him and saw nothing, tears streaming down her face.

"NO!" she screamed. "I HATE YOU!" There was no response. Instead, she was transported to another place. This time, it was the San Ricardo town square.

She saw Humpty and Puss, and replayed this moment of her life in her head. The sting she had felt betraying Puss, and the fear from Humpty's threats. But this time, the police retrieved guns and swords as Humpty smiled villainously.

Kitty shrieked as the first blade pierced Puss' chest. "STOP!" she shouted, knowing it would be no use. Three blades stabbed through his stomach, his arms. Then they started firing, and Kitty turned away from the absolute horror. An invisible force turned her back around and she saw Puss' corpse, covered in bullet holes and sword marks.

She knew this wasn't real, but it seemed to be. Humpty made the police step aside, and then held up Puss' dead body, snapping his neck with one twist. "ALL HAIL THE MASTER!" he screamed as the citizens of San Ricardo bowed down to him as if he was a deity.

Kitty felt like she was going to die, and with a pure sadness and ferocity, she lunged at Humpty and tackled him to the ground, hearing the sound of cracking shell as he slammed into the cobblestones.

She punched a hole in him and yolk stained her paw, but she didn't stop, breaking him apart with all her might until he was completely finished and yellow fluid spilled out onto the street.

"Impressive," Scars' voice said. "But we are not done. We have one more stop to go."

Kitty was filled with dread as she imagined the coming atrocities. But what she saw next she never could've fathomed.

She was limping through a town, her abdomen bearing a bullet hole leaking blood. "SOMEBODY HELP!" her simulated doppelganger cried. Then, she saw a younger Scars come to her aid, setting her down against a fountain.

Their dialogue was inaudible, but then she saw them kiss and something shoot out of Scars' paws, something that was beyond his control. It killed her, and Scars pulled off a pair of goggles she was wearing in horror as to her true identity. She remembered her first experience in the SIM vaguely, but why was Scars showing it to her?

That was when somebody approached Scars from behind. "YOU!" the voice of the figure shouted. It was Puss. "WHAT DID YOU DO TO HER?!"

Scars laughed directly from the black pit of his satanic heart, and he bore down on Puss, preparing to kill him again. "You will never see her again. You don't deserve her; I am superior. You are meaningless, a tiny speck in the multiverse."

Kitty ran at him while he was caught slightly off guard, unsheathing her dagger. She grabbed Scars and strangled him, lifting him off the ground.

"Die," she seethed as she cut off his head. Puss ran towards her and cried as he approached her.

"I'm sorry for whatever mess I made that led us here," he said. Kitty smiled, tears in her own eyes.

"Apology accepted, mi rey," she replied, and they pulled each other into a strong kiss. After it was over, she buried her head in his chest. "I will never let you go again."

"I know, mi reina," he said, vanishing. Kitty opened her eyes from what had felt like a nightmare in the desert outside the castle. The landscape wasn't barren any longer, and instead had taken on a dreamlike warmth. On the steps leading up to the throne room she saw Scars' body, his blood-soaked head lying two feet away from the neck. Then, Puss was there like an apparition, standing in front of her, looking brave as ever. 

"Thank you for rescuing me, mi amor," he said with a grin. Kitty ran to him and they embraced, the sky's intense rays illuminating them like golden angels. Then, they held each others' paws and walked into the horizon as the sun began to set over the desert.