King of Rats

Pumpkin Day: Part 3

Without warning, all of the lights around Giles went dark. It was almost warren-dark, which rarely ever happened on the surface world, even in the deepest night. A feeling of peace and safety overcame him as a human stepped out of the swirling blackness behind his captor. Giles had never known humans to feed on each other, but this one lowered his face to the first human's neck, and sank his pointy teeth into his flesh.

His captor didn't even cry out. It just dropped Giles, and stood there, letting the darker, friendlier one feed on him. The barking dog whimpered, and fell silent, and the cat cowered near the building's door. Giles landed pretty hard, but he wasn''t hurt. He felt an odd kinship with the second human. Looking up at its face, he heard it speaking in his mind.

There were no words, but he knew this was no ordinary human. He was a creature of the earth, too; a friend to rats and burrowers. His new friend turned into a dark mist and vanished as he had come, leaving the first human in a daze with blood leaking down its neck.

The lights came back on, and shadows leapt away from them in all directions down the deathly silent street. No dogs barked, no humans laughed or screamed. It was utterly still for several seconds. Giles hoped the mouse was using this opportunity to get away. Tom was coming out of his stupor, and next door, the dog whimpered. Maybe his plan wasn't going so well, after all.

He raced through the wall and saw his mouse sneaking along the base of the steps, unknowingly watched by the cat from the step above. A strange feeling overcame Giles, and he raced through the grass to the paved walkway and leapt at the cat, teeth bared and ready for action. The cat was quick, though, and swatted him with its paw, knocking him sideways. Luckily, its claws were retracted. It wanted to play.

"Run!" he yelled at the mouse, and of course, she ran towards the dog's yard.

As she approached the wall to pass through, the dog on the other side resumed its yapping. Terry bowled through the gap, barely noticing as he knocked her flat and trampled her on his way towards the cat. Right behind him, the rat terrier squeezed through, saw Terry, and gave chase, a freshly gnawed leather leash dragging behind.

The cat arched its back and hissed (rather rat-like, Giles thought), the dog crouched and growled at the cat, and Terry stood on his back legs, looking very large and fierce as he gnashed his teeth. Giles saw the mouse on the opposite side of the garden, with the dog, the cat, and Terry between them. He fought the urge to go get her and carry her away. He knew nothing about her, but with a face like that she had to be as sweet as bakery trash.

But too much was riding on his success to throw it all away for a girl.

Or was it? He pictured the two of them in a tiny den on a farm, as he had imagined earlier, but the thought vanished as the fur started flying. Terry maneuvered to keep the cat between himself and the dog, and it seemed to work. The two surface beasts fought each other for the privilege of killing him.

Terry seized Hilary's severed head, and slipped away from the battle, but the cat wasn't giving up its prize so easily. It bit hard and deep into Terry's leg, opening up an opportunity for the dog to attack. The terrier bit the cat's tail, tugging, and shaking ferociously. The cat yowled and spun to claw the dog, but Terry was lodged in its mouth, dangling from its fangs. The tip of the cat's tail came away in the dog''s mouth, and Terry fell as it jumped back to the top of the wall.

The terrier gave chase, forgetting about Terry, to run back and forth beneath the cat. Terry limped over to Giles, his bloody leg dragging behind him, but he still had Hilary's head. The barking continued as they made their way slowly through the maze of potted plants and garden gnomes in the last yard, to the drainage grate where Skit patiently waited.

"You are a true beast, Terry," Giles said, full of brotherly pride. "What kind of rat squares off against a dog and a cat? It just isn't done, you know. Now look at you. Covered in your own blood, and limping like a three legged spider."

"I'm alright, Giles. I just did what you would've if you wasn't busy with that mouse. Who is she, by the way?"

"Her? Oh, well ... Nobody. I just met her." His eye itched, and Terry took his reflexive wink as something meaningful.

"Oh, she's a spy. Like Skit. I get it. Shhh."

Giles was torn between disgust for his brother's stupidity and gratitude for his simple, honest loyalty, and his nearly insane bravery. He chuckled and turned toward the grate where Skit gave him the all-clear sign.

"Come on, then. Can you walk?"

Terry carried Hilary's head in his mouth so he could walk on three legs. It only took a few steps for Giles to notice the cat's broken fang still impaling his leg.

"No wonder that hurts," Terry said. He grabbed the fang to pull it out, only to squeal in pain. "I can't. Giles, you'll have to do it."

An angry hiss came from above them, and Terry rolled aside as the bloodied, but not beaten Tom pounced.

Giles dove into the drainage pipe and starting crawling, as the screams and sounds of battle erupted once more behind him. Skit had already gone ahead to scout, since he was now trespassing in the Sewer Rats' territory, but Giles wasn't worried. No rat messed with an Alley Rat, much less their king.

He passed connecting pipes, and thought he heard other rats moving about, but the way noises bounced around, they could have been miles away. When the pipe finally emptied into a square drainage channel under the street, he could tell something was following him.

Since it wasn't very likely to be Terry, it had to be either a Sewer Rat or the monster with the hypnotic red eyes. Not keen to meet either, he raced to the place Terry called the gates of Hell.