Кэрол Дуглас - Cat In An Alien X-Ray

A fifth black shadow from the hall took a hard right turn and walked right between Matt and Temple and Kitty the Cutter. Midnight Louie sat right down in front of her and stared straight up at her, as if expecting a treat.

He got it sooner than expected as a gunshot exploded in the room … just as Max’s hand shot out from the floor and jerked Kathleen’s ankle out from under her … as Matt pushed Temple behind him and rushed the falling woman, grabbing her flailing wrist … as Midnight Louie leaped for the gun-toting hand and sank his one-inch fangs into it … as the cat on the chair arm leaped straight for Kathleen’s face with a Viking battle cry, and as the other three cats pooled on the floor around Kathleen, attacking anything black spandex or white flesh they could claim.

Matt grunted and fell back in front of Temple. She had gone down on her knees beside him before he had completely landed.

“Matt, my God! Matt! Did she shoot you?”

Temple heard another curdling scream and looked up to see Midnight Louie leaping at the half-fallen Kathleen and leaving four deep claw marks across her ivory-white cheek.

Max was crawling across the floor, one hand slamming the gun it held down like a peg leg as he came, blood pouring down his determined face. “Where?” he demanded.

Matt had fallen back, one hand waving over his chest, searching a source for the pain. Blood blossomed when he pressed the shirt down over his left side. Temple was using her cell phone to call 911.

Max hefted himself up on his hands and leaned over Matt. “Left side.”

“The heart,” Temple gasped.

“Way down.” Max shook his head and shed blood drops like a wet dog. “Sweet spot. Okay.” He patted Matt’s arm and rolled over on his back beside him.

“Max?” Temple asked through the shakes and her soundless tears.

“Too hardheaded to kill.”

Sirens were already screaming in the distance.

Temple looked up. The cats were gone, and so was Kitty the Cutter, only some spots of blood on the hardwood floor showing where she’d been.

Chapter 52

Astral Protection

The sirens of the ambulances and cop cars have faded for good.

The front door is shut, the neighborhood peaceful again.

A sliver of light halos the rooftops.

Dawn is on the way but the streetlamps are still lit.

It is the magic time between dusk and dawn, night and day, hunting and resting from the hunt.

One by one, the Cat Pack reassembles on the front doorstep.

I was first to arrive, and am tending my right mitt, where several nail sheaths have been yanked out untimely. Miss Kitty the Cutter will bear my brand for life.

“Quite a right cross, Pops.” Midnight Louise has sat down beside me.

“Not bad boxing,” says Ma Barker, coming up on the other side, “for a domestic layabout.”

“I keep telling you, Ma, I am no domestic slave, but a roommate with rights to come and go as I please.”

“Your roommate is lucky to have you,” adds Blackula, who has reappeared too. “But did we not do good? Pitch and I, we slip into that risky joint like Persians fresh from fancy manicure jobs at the groomer’s.”

“Yeah,” says Pitch, “we were like pitty-pat—whatchamacallit?—ballerinas.”

“Not that fancy,” Blackula growls.

It is the usual after-rumble mumble-grumble among the guys. Ma gives me a parting cuff. Among the guys, and gals.

I amble to the curb where the Jaguar was parked. Miss Temple drove it along after the ambulances. Very gingerly.

The EMT people were swift, efficient, and talked loud enough to overhear.

Mr. Matt was all right. The bullet entered and exited side tissue. Mr. Matt will be fine. Mr. Max is going into observation to ensure he will be fine. I must hurry home to comfort Miss Temple when she finally gets back there.

I am proud that we guys did not allow one hair on her head to be harmed through our conjoined efforts. I am also pleased that the Cat Pack under the direction of Midnight Investigations, Inc., played such a key role in the view of all concerned, especially Miss Kitty the Cutter. Shudder. It is ironic that she bears a nickname that falsely connects her with us of the superior breed. I am hoping if there are little gray men out there somewhere, they will abduct her to another solar system.

Maybe the humans could have handled it without us, but we added a nice note of distraction, not to mention drama.

I look back to see Ma Barker and her Cat Pack members and Miss Midnight Louise have vanished to make their secret ways home, as I should be doing.

Something strange shimmers in the fading oval of illumination the nearest streetlight casts on the pavement. I amble toward the phenomenon, hoping it is not extraterrestrial. I have had my ration of otherworldly visitors. I grow alarmed to see a familiar shape becoming clearer with every step.

“Greetings, Louie,” says Karma. Her blue eyes and pale golden coat and white feet seem almost translucent in the waning light.

“What are you doing here? You are a recluse. You never leave the penthouse atop the Circle Ritz, like the snobby Sacred Cat of Burma you claim to be.”

“Who do you think drew Blackula and Pitch to the scene? Who do you believe coordinated the ancient Five-Cat Surround-and-Overwhelm strategy my breed used for hundreds of years to protect the temple priests of the mountains of Burma?”

“Yeah, yeah, I heard the legend that the Birman’s coat coloring went from white to golden overnight after raiders killed an old temple priest, but the toes of their feet kept the pure white of his soul, and they also got the goddess’s sapphire blue eyes. It is actually quite a tale. I helped an ex-priest survive here tonight, but I do not expect to get white tippytoes out of it, and am glad. That would be a real cleaning problem for a street cat like me.”

Karma sighs. I have never heard a cat sigh like a dog so much. Her eyes grow as sharply blue as Miss Lieutenant Molina’s when she is on the warpath.

“The legends ends,” she intones, “‘Woe to he who brings the end to one of these marvelous beasts, even if he didn’t mean to. He will surely suffer the most cruel torments until the soul he upset has been appeased.’”

“That’s pretty definite, but I have no intention of ending anything about you besides this conversation.”

“Why do you resist the mystical side of life, Louie? Perhaps you do not realize what my breed has survived. Only two Birman cats were alive in Europe at the end of World War Two, Orloff and Xenia.”

“Manx, there must be a lot of cruelly suffering souls for that. News to me, but it definitely sounds like your breed lucked out, since Xenia is obviously a foxy lady and Orloff is definitely a boy’s name.”

She nods graciously. “So our breed has been reborn to thrive and be prized, in the process acquiring a certain mystical cachet.”

“Yeah, my people and me are all after a hidden cache ourselves.”

Karma sighs and dabs a white glove over one ear, as if my words are too, too lowly to penetrate that precious orifice. “The wisdom of catkind is lost on you, Louie, but after the stresses of this night wear off, you may thank me at my customary shrine.”