MISSING! HAVE YOU SEEN ME? (on hold lol)

PROLOGUE - April Showers

The weathermen are never right.

On the news, on the radio, whatever TV channel or radio station they were on, it was almost as if they were purposely trying to contradict the actual meteorological conditions. "Sunny spells" they say, as the clouds open fire on the earth. "Heavy rain" they say; you can bet that there'll be boiling sunshine turning the grass brown. It's hard to blame them though, really, when the weather as of late had been constantly flip-flopping between blistering heat and mini ice-age. April around these parts is often unpredictable.

Tonight, the televisions and radios had all claimed that it was to be a warm, dry evening.

That is to say, it was raining.

And not just that sort of pathetic, miserable drizzle that was so common, oh no. The kind of rain that soaks through your skin and leaves you cold for hours after you come inside. The kind of rain that makes you stop and think "Wait, isn't this hail?" the kind of rain that no domestic cat in their right mind would stay out in for any amount of time.

This cat was clearly not in her right mind.

Eyes wide, ears pressed flush against her head, every black-and-white hair on her body standing on end despite the deluge, she tore down the otherwise quiet, streetlamp-lit lane like death itself was snapping at her tail. The driving rain lashed at her face, tearing at her whiskers and fur as she forced her legs to move ever faster.

A horribly loud clack seemed to pierce directly into her brain, as a stone the size of her head narrowly missed her and clattered onto the pavement. She squealed, skittering around a corner into a grimy alleyway, trying to lose her pursuer in the darkness and the dirt. She buried herself in a pile of filthy refuse bags, trying not to retch, and held her breath.

Jazzy was no stranger to the occasional stone-pelting from bored teens or bratty kids. A small, nervous-looking young cat always seems like an easy target. Jazzy didn't mind, her assailants were always horrible shots and it was rather entertaining watching their frustrated expressions when this scraggly little kitten was faster than she looked. But this? She shuddered, backpedalling even further into the wet, foul-smelling heap. This was different. This particular human was on a mission.

Something tugged at her neck. Jazzy felt a huge, rough hand grasp her collar and heave her out of the mound of rubbish. Jazzy had always detested that collar. It was itchy, quite frankly an awful shade of baby blue, and it gave psychotic cat-hating murder-humans something to grab her by. She writhed and hissed, sinking her teeth into the thick glove of her aggressor.

Glove?

The human holding her didn't even flinch. He pinned her against the wall of the alley by her neck, unblinking, and whipped something sharp and metallic from a pocket.

Jazzy's heart completely stopped when she saw the lethally sharp, serrated hunting knife being brandished in front of her face.

She screamed.

She screamed and screamed and screamed until the knife turned it into a hideously guttural, rasping gurgle.

Until all the puddles ran red.

Until a rain-soaked, blood-soaked heap of fur hit the ground with a squelch.