Catopolis

GUT FEELING by Esther M. Friesner

The small, plump tabby female sat before the massive black and white tom and did her best not to let him see her shiver. Courage, Lulu! she told herself. He can’t kill you. He wouldn’t dare. But even as she did her best to hold onto her last few shreds of valor, an insidious afterthought whispered: He can’t kill you… yet.

Unaware of the female’s fear, the big tom gave her a long, cool stare from beneath half-lowered eyelids. “Well, kit? Have you reconsidered my… request?” he drawled.

“I have,” Lulu replied, keeping her voice steady. “My answer’s unchanged. I won’t betray my gift by making a false prediction.”

“Ah, but would it be false?” The black and white tom licked one paw lazily, then opened his mouth so that one of his minions could pop in a KrunchiYum cat treat. “I will be the sole, undisputed ruler of Catopolis. It is fated. Your prediction will simply hasten the happy day.”

Despite her fear, Lulu scowled. “If you’re so certain it’s predestined, you don’t need my services.”

“Oh, but I do,” the tom replied. “You see, kit, I am not the most patient cat in this city. Even nine lives end some day. I want the power I deserve while I can still enjoy it for a long, long time. You are this city’s respected Seer. Your prediction will make all accept the inevitable immediately! You shall perform the Reading I desire at the next full moon, when-”

“No,” said Lulu. She pressed her forepaws closer together to steady herself. “If I don’t interpret the omens truthfully, I dishonor the goddess Bast, who gave me my powers. I’d-I’d sooner die.”

A low, warning ululation welled up from the big tom’s throat. It was echoed by his attending minions, a cadre of seven muscular felines, scarred victors of many battles. The most vicious looking of them all, a street cat born and bred, took a step toward Lulu, fangs bared, eyes flashing. She cringed, awaiting the slash of pitiless claws.

“Stop!” the big black and white tom commanded. “Don’t lay one paw on her, Hss’shah! She is still of use to me.”

Lulu opened her eyes in time to see the black and white tom looming over her. He was smiling, and it was not a comforting smile. “Did Hss’shah frighten you, my dear? It was his idea of a joke. A crude one. What do you expect from a feral?” (Lulu’s stomach churned at the subtle insult. Her mother was a feral cat, too.) “But if you were so afraid, why didn’t you call upon Bast to protect you?”

“I-” Lulu bowed her head. “Lady Bast is a great goddess. She has more important things to do than look after me.”

“If she looks after any of us,” the big tom purred. “If, in fact, she even exists as more than just a story to make kittens behave.” Lulu stared at him, horrified at such blasphemy. This only made him laugh. “Why don’t you stop worrying about our so-called goddess and look after yourself? Reconsider my request. I’ll make it worth your while.” She answered him with silence. He lifted one wispy eyebrow. “No? Then go. We shall meet again soon enough. Oh, and don’t bother running to tell the Elders about our little meeting tonight. My comrades here will swear I was nowhere near you. You’ll have no proof to back up any accusations against me. What do our human servants say? That the proof of the pudding is in the eating?”

For an instant, his urbane smile turned into a grimace of such deadly menace that even the street cats in his service were taken aback. Then, as swiftly as that demonic expression had flashed over his face, it was gone. He brought his muzzle close to Lulu’s ear and murmured, “In the eating, kit. The proof of many things is in the eating.”

As soon as he stepped back, she bolted, but as she raced away, she heard him calling after her, “Whether or not you wish to serve me, you will. So speaks Señor Pantalones!”

In the days and nights that followed, Lulu’s mind was haunted by apprehensive thoughts of Señor Pantalones’ sinister intentions. If he can’t have my cooperation, he’ll twist things so I have to help him, whether I want to or not. But how will he do it? O great Bast, help me! Such anxieties wreaked havoc with her disposition and her digestion. Thus it was nothing extraordinary when the two-days-from-full moon looked down on a city alley and saw Catopolis’ Seer in an all-too-familiar position.

“Argh!” said Lulu as she crouched, bug-eyed, in the lee of a garbage can. The sentiment was soon followed by deeper, more throaty sounds. Had the humans with whom she deigned to reside been within earshot, they easily would have read the omens in those guttural eruptions.

This did not mean that Lulu’s humans shared her wondrous powers. It merely meant that after two years of living with her in an apartment of pure white wall-to-wall carpeting, they could instantly foretell an incipient regurgitation and shot-put her into the tile-floored bathroom or kitchen before you could say “Jack Robinson” or, more likely, “Not on the rug, goddammit! Not on the rug!”

There were no rugs in the alley, nor any fussy humans. Lulu let nature takes its course uninterrupted, unmolested, and-so she believed-unobserved. When she was done, she set to tidying herself. She had a fair distance to cover between this night’s lonesome rendezvous point and the high-rent East Side apartment building her humans maintained solely for her pleasure and comfort. She would not-could not-be seen on the streets in an uncleansed condition. She had her pride.

She was almost done with her ablutions when a small, sarcastic voice from the darkness caught her with her right forepaw up and her tongue in midlick extension. “Well, that was disgusting,” it said. “And by ‘disgusting,’ I mean ‘disgusting even for a barfing cat.’ That, my friend, sets the bar damn high!”

Lulu tensed. “Who’s there? Show yourself!”

The small voice chortled. “Who died and made you the boss of me? No, let me rephrase that: I know who died. I saw her die, and then I followed the cats who killed her. I watched them bring her to you and I saw you rip her open, guts and gizzard. Say, do mice even have gizzards? Ah, what the hell, you get the picture. And then you ate the picture. I mean the mouse. I mean Shirley. Poor critter never knew what hit her, thank Seeds.”

“Shirl-the Reading I just gave was a friend of yours? I’m sorry.” Lulu felt odd, apologizing to the unseen critic, but the words escaped her mouth unbidden.

“The Reading? Is that how you think of her? As a thing? Look, furbag, there’s more to our lives than being your toys or your four-legged pu-pu platters!” Abruptly, the voice changed its tone from harsh to conciliatory. “Y’know, I want to set the record straight: I’m not cheesed with you for eating Shirley.”

Lulu was puzzled. “You’re not?”

“Nuh-uh.” The hidden speaker was firm. “Cat eats mouse, that’s the way it goes, the big, bad food chain, the balance of nature, the circle of Disney copyrighted songs, the end of an old life, the beginning of a new heartburn.”

“If you’re not mad that I ate her, then why-?”

“You couldn’t have done her the courtesy of keeping her down?” the small voice shrilled. “It’s no shame to die if you’re going to become nutrition, but what’s Shirley now? Wasted. And not in the good party-hearty way! It’s one thing to kill my friends when you’re hungry, but it was pretty obvious that you were already stuffed when you gobbled her down in two big gulps, mostly because you horked her up again just as soon as the other cats got their ugly mugs outta here. She was nothing more than a snack to you, but she was my friend, and she deserved better treatment than you gave her. She deserved to be appreciated. She deserved to be savored. She deserved to be digested. She deserved to be-”

“I get the idea.” Lulu was under enough strain without the added agita of dealing with this strident phantom. She switched her bushy tail angrily as her pale green eyes plumbed the shadows. As excellent as her night vision was, she could not locate the source of the snide diatribe, and it made her bristle. “How about you get the idea of shutting up?”

“If you can’t take the truth, move your overfed butt out of my alley.”

“Your alley? You don’t sound big enough to lay claim to a sock drawer. I don’t take orders from mice.”

“Shows what you know.” There was a soft, rustling sound followed by the faint tap-tap-tap of miniscule paws trotting across pavement. Only a few ragtag splotches of light touched the alley-the glow of moon and stars, the faint radiance of not-so-distant streetlamps, the borrowed wattage from apartments with less than desirable views. Now, as Lulu watched, a ball of golden fluff sauntered right into the middle of one such splotch with as much devil-may-care attitude as a rock star claiming his place on stage.

“I am not a mouse.”

Lulu narrowed her eyes. “So what are you, then?” she growled. “A tailless dwarf rat? A stunted groundhog?” (She had seen the beast in question when her human servants watched a February 2nd newscast, and she hoped she’d never have to behold such a monstrous rodent again.)

“I’ve never been so insulted in all my life!” The downy-furred golden animal sat up on its haunches. “I’m a hamster, you preshrunk puma!”

This latest insult was one too many for the badly stressed young cat. “Oh, so what?” she snapped. “Go away before I pounce on you where you stand and flatten you like a pizza!”

“I’m shaking,” the hamster replied dryly. “And I’m not going to go away. I’m the one who lives here, not you.”

“I don’t have time for this.” Lulu stood up and started back for the city streets. “Good luck not becoming someone’s lunch, with that attitude,” she declared as she stalked off. “Good luck and goodbye.”

“And good luck to you with Señor Pantalones!” the hamster hollered after her.

Lulu froze, every hair on her body standing upright. She could scarcely draw a breath. Her paw pads felt dank and cold. “How-?” The word was a hoarse whisper. She turned and regarded the hamster nervously. “How to you know about Señor Pantalones?”

“Same way I know about lots of things.” The hamster met Lulu’s curious gaze with a complacent smile. “I know that the thugs that killed Shirley are Señor Pantalones’ minions and that he sent them here to test your limits. Again. They’d rather see if you can read the future in your own entrails, but they’re willing to wait for that. No matter what you see in the omens on the night of Catopolis’ full moon conclave, the final score’s going to be Señor Pantalones, 1; you, dead.”

“Why-?” Lulu’s voice was barely a whisper. “Why are you telling me all this?”

The hamster ran its dainty pink paws through its whiskers. “Because you’re my best hope for payback on Pantalones for Shirley, even if you are a cat. The enemy of my enemy, right? I was just a pup when I escaped from my cage and found my way here. I didn’t know the first thing about surviving in the wild. Shirley taught me how to keep my freedom without ending up as kitty chow. Funny how I wound up learning that lesson better than she did.” He wore a wistful smile. “I told her to stick close to her nest tonight, but she said, ‘And miss toss-out-the-stale-cheese day at the corner deli? I’ll be fine.’ Sure, now she wishes she hadn’t been such a know-it-all. Now she’s all, ‘Oh, if only I’d listened to you!’ Now she’s-”

“-dead,” Lulu cut in. “Why do you make it sound as if she’s still speaking to you?”

“Uh, because she is.” The hamster gave Lulu a let’s-not-allow-you-near-any-sharp-things-just-yet look. “And she’ll keep on speaking to me until I manage to give her remains a decent cover-up.” He cast a mildly sickened look at the spot where Lulu had relieved her belly. “I can’t say I’m looking forward to it, but if I don’t send her off properly on the Last Cheese Hunt, she’ll be on my case about it until she decomposes all the way.”

“This is nonsense.” Lulu shook herself vigorously, as if she’d been caught in a rainstorm. “I refuse to believe that your dead friend talked-still talks to you!”

The hamster uttered a contemptuous sniff. “And how many cats believed you the first time you claimed you could read the future in the entrails of dead rodents, O Oracular One?”

Lulu’s eyes went wide. “Oracular One? That title is secret! It was Lady Bast’s gift to me when she consecrated my powers! How do you, a mere rodent, know it?”

“Well, duh,” the hamster said, quite calm. “There’s nothing mere about reading minds.”

“You can do that?”

“How do you think I knew about Señor Pantalones and his moggy mob? I can’t see everything going on inside someone else’s head, but accessing their life story’s always a piece of seed cake. You’re Lulu, child of the feral female Yurrrrr and a miscellaneous tomcat. You and your litter-mates were discovered behind a bookstore, in a discarded shipping box for one of the Harry Potter novels and taken to a no-kill shelter from which you were all happily adopted. You discovered your special gift at six months old when you had some kind of vision.”

“The dream,” Lulu whispered, awestruck. “The dream Lady Bast sent to me.”

“You and a couple of other cats. They were your witnesses, right?”

Lulu nodded. “When I told the Elders about the dream, the other two cats confirmed it, as Lady Bast commanded.”

“All of which mystic hoo-hah officially made you the Seer of Catopolis. Nice work if you can get it. You have the admirable power to gaze into the future, though I can’t say I care for your methods. Ever consider using something besides my kinfolk’s entrails? You know, there’s more than one way to skin a-”

“Who are you?” Lulu demanded. “

What are you?”

“My name is Huey. As for what I am-”

“Besides a hamster,” Lulu put in quickly.

“Shush, you’re ruining the moment.” Huey struck a dramatic pose. “What am I? I am, like you, one of the few, the gifted, the chosen, the Oracular!” He paused for a reaction from his audience of one, but Lulu only stared, gape-jawed and gobsmacked. At last he said, “Kitty, close your mouth before someone sticks a cheeseburger in it. This is real simple: I am an Oracular hamster, you’re an Oracular cat, together we fight crime!”

That fetched her. “We do what now?”

“It’s not a crime to eat rodents you’re only going to barf up two seconds later? I saw how miserable you were when you ate Shirley. The cats who brought her were watching every bite closely, as if they wanted you to quit. Hey, you looked like you wanted to quit, too! Why didn’t you?”

Lulu sighed. “Once a Seer has examined and interpreted the pattern of the entrails, she must ingest all traces of the Reading.”

“And if you don’t, won’t, or can’t eat the whole thing?”

“Then it’s a sign that the omens in the Reading are reversed inescapably. Seekers who don’t like what I see in their future always hope I’ll overlook the last bite.”

“Like the cats who brought you Shirley’s body,” Huey concluded. “I could tell they were really dissatisfied customers even before I read their minds.”

“Reading minds… speaking with the dead…” The impact of being in the presence of such power was too much for Lulu. She pressed her belly to the ground and hid her face against outstretched paws. “Huey, your gifts outshine my own. I am but a dust-bunny in your presence.”

The hamster affected a modest look. “ Reading minds and talking to the dead just lets me know about what’s going on in the here-and-now.

You can see the future. Closest I come to that is a little recreational seed-reading. The results are unreliable. That’s why Shirley laughed off my warning tonight.”

“Seed-reading?”

“That’s the way my kind foresee the future. It’s a lot like your method, finding the answers to a Seeker’s question in a pattern, only the Reading material’s not so messy-bloody-sticky-hork-hork-hork- bluargh!” He winked at her. “The Seeker brings me some sunflower seeds, I throw ’em into the air and interpret the design they make when they fall. Then I have to make the Reading vanish, just like you do, or it won’t come true.” He puffed out his cheeks happily. “Being Oracular rules; we always get to eat!”

Lulu murmured something under her breath.

“Say again?” Huey pricked up his ears.

“Don’t like…” The rest was lost.

“Don’t like what?” the hamster persisted.

“I don’t like-I don’t like eating rodents, okay?” Lulu yelled so loudly that Huey was bowled backwards, tail over toes. “I loathe having to eat the Reading afterwards.” She shuddered with revulsion. “The smell, the taste, the fur in my throat, the crunchy bones, the way the liver always pops in my-”

“Enough!” Huey groomed himself frantically, a sure sign of anxiety in hamsters. “These are my kin you’re talking about! Our lives are short enough without you making them shorter and dissing our livers! Do you know why so many of us have died for your stupid Readings lately? So this Señor Pantalones creep can find out just how big a Reading has to be before it’s impossible for you to eat it all!”

“So that’s it.” Lulu looked grim. “I thought that they were getting larger, night after night.”

“Yeah, you’ll probably have a wharf rat on your plate before this is over,” Huey said bitterly.

“They can’t do that,” Lulu said. “The holy rules that govern Seekers and Seers alike come from Lady Bast herself, great goddess of cats since the days of ancient Egypt. Her words must be obeyed, for she commands the kitty-flap in the doorways of space and time, and is mistress of the Broom of Admonition and the Water Pistol of Chastisement! She decreed that because we assured our future as treasured masters of the human race by keeping the granaries of Egypt free of mice, only mice can bring us the secrets of that future.”

“A big, fat future, in your case, if Señor Pantalones gets his way,” Huey put in. Abruptly, he frowned. “Uh-oh.”

“Uh-oh?” Lulu repeated. “I don’t like the sound of that.”

“You shouldn’t.” Huey chewed one claw, agitated. “There’s this mouse I know, Big Rudy. His mama was pet store stock. Lucky girl escaped on snake-feeding day, but rumor has it she got a little too…

friendly with one of the Guinea pigs in the shop before that.”

“Is that even possible?”

“Seeing is believing, and if you ever saw Big Rudy-which no one has, lately. He vanished a week ago.” He gazed at Lulu with bleak eyes. “

They’ve got him. I’ll bet my last seed on it! If Señor Stinky Pants wants a mouse fat enough to turn your prophecy on its ear, he’ll never find one to equal Big Rudy. That’ll make two good friends of mine he’s killed.” He began to cry.

Very carefully, so as not to alarm him, Lulu patted Huey gently with the tip of one paw. “Maybe not. Even if they’ve got him, that doesn’t mean they’ve killed him. If he were dead, wouldn’t you be able to ‘talk’ to him?”

“Not if they ate him.”

“But they can’t eat him! They need to keep him alive and gaining even more weight until the full moon conclave. That’s when Señor Pantalones is going to turn your friend into a weapon of mouse destruction for me. I don’t need a glob of entrails to see what’s coming: as a Seer, I answer all Seekers’ questions, but at the conclave I only perform Readings concerning the future of Catopolis itself. As soon as the Elders ask if anyone wants such a Reading, Señor Pantalones will claim he dreamed that Bast appeared to him and named him our sole ruler. His minions will swear they had confirming dreams, but because of the magnitude of his claim, my gift will be called upon to verify it.”

“Except there was no ‘I’m king of the cats’ dream for Señor Stinky Pants. Game over, right?”

“Not until I eat the Reading,” Lulu said. “All of it. Him. Big Rudy.”

“Oh,” Huey said. “Oh, crabapples.”

“And thus the Reading will be deemed reversed and binding. Every Reading is a word spoken in the goddess’ own voice and must be obeyed. It won’t matter that we’ve never had a lone ruler before. If it’s the ‘will’ of Bast, it must be made so.” Lulu laughed without joy. “After he’s in charge, it’ll be simple for Señor Pantalones to have me killed. He’ll replace me with a false Seer, one whose predictions will always ratify his desires. I’m doomed.”

“But you look like a house cat,” Huey said. “You could stay safe at home. He’d never be able to get at you there.”

“I am a

Seer,” Lulu said staunchly. “It’s my duty to make my powers available to my kin. If I die, I die, but I will always honor Lady Bast’s gift as I honor my goddess.”

As she finished speaking, she glanced to where Shirley’s body lay. Her chin rose. An air of purpose possessed her. She strode toward the mouse’s remains and began gathering bits and pieces of alley debris around the corpse.

“What are you doing?” Huey asked, scuttling beside her as she worked.

“Giving Shirley the best burial I can manage,” Lulu replied. “I feel responsible for her death.”

“You didn’t kill her!”

“But she still died because of me. Let me do this, Huey, for your friend and for you.” She found a half page of old newspaper and dropped it onto the pile of blown leaves, discarded candy bar wrappers, and crushed soda cans covering Shirley.

“That’s-kind of you, kitty.” Huey cocked his head as if listening for something. “And it worked. Her spirit’s moved on. I hope someone does the same for Big Rudy, when the time comes.”

“You’re my colleague, a fellow Oracular One. It was the least I could-” Suddenly, inspiration flashed in Lulu’s agate eyes. “Yes,” she said, half to herself. “It was the least I could do. But the least is not enough! I am a Seer, an Oracular One, a servant of the goddess! If I stand back and let Señor Pantalones fight me on his terms, I might as well show him my underbelly. No. Never. By Lady Bast’s sacred name, I’m going to take the battle to him.”

“Oh, my Seeds, you’re gonna try to save Big Rudy!” Huey exclaimed. He raised his forepaws to his temples. “Your thoughts are blaring about how you know where Señor Pantalones’ hangs out with his minions, how that’s where they’re probably holding Big Rudy, how if he’s set him free, there’s no way they’ll be able to catch another mouse his size in time for the full moon conclave.” He lowered his paws and grinned at her. “Good plan. Let’s roll.”

“I don’t remember inviting you,” Lulu said.

“You need me and you know it!” Huey declared. “Any lookout can keep his ears open, but I can keep my mind open and let you know if Señor Stupid and his goons are heading your way even before they do! Whaddaya say?”

Lulu thought about it for a moment. “I say… let’s fight crime.”

“Well, that could’ve gone better.” Under the icy moonlight, Lulu raced down the center of one of many paths snaking through the city’s foremost public park. “Did we lose them?”

This question was tossed back to the hamster clinging desperately to the red collar around her neck. Huey cast a fearful look behind them. “I can’t tell. All they’re thinking about is what they’re gonna do to us when they catch us.”

“Son of a-” Lulu grumbled and put on a little extra speed.

If only I didn’t have to stick to the open road! she thought. I’d have a better chance of shaking them if I could dive into the shrubbery. None of those toms is small enough to follow me there.

“Why don’t you?” Huey asked.

“Why-? Hey! You’re supposed to be reading their thoughts, not mine!”

“You should go into the bushes,” the hamster persisted. “That’s what saved Big Rudy, once we upended his prison box. Man, I never saw so much mouseflesh move so fast! If only he could’ve made his getaway a little more quietly-”

“The important thing is, he’s safe, and Señor Pantalones is left empty-pawed for the conclave,” Lulu said. “We did it, Huey! We thwarted his plan to corrupt my Reading!”

Huey was not sharing her optimism. “Ever think he might have a Plan B? I’m telling you, get the heck off the road and into the bushes, unless you want Señor Pantalones’ minions to rip you open like a Christmas present! Are you even listening to-? Oh!” Huey’s paws tightened convulsively on the fur under Lulu’s collar. “Oh, no, you don’t mean it. That’s just too stupid to-”

“What are you babbling about?” Lulu snarled. Her paws were hurting, her ribs were on fire, and she felt ready to hit the wall.

“You’re doing this for me!” Huey cried. “Don’t deny it; it’s screaming at me from your thoughts. You’re afraid that if you hit the underbrush, I’ll be knocked off your back by a branch and the Pantalones mob will get me.”

“You’re welcome,” Lulu said, her voice hoarse with weariness.

“Have you lost your mind?” the hamster squealed.

“You… are not the boss… of me.” Lulu slowed, then stopped. She sat down in the middle of the path, breathing hard. She looked unable to move, but Huey learned differently when he tried to make a break for it. Her paw fell on him like Divine Judgment. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“Away from you, crazy cat-lady! I won’t let you put yourself in danger.”

“Tough seeds, rodent,” Lulu countered. “We’re in this together.”

“Oh, please. Teaming up to put a kink in Señor Pantalones’ tail is one thing, but a cat protecting a hamster? That’s like a cop protecting a donut!”

“Huey, you’re no donut,” Lulu said solemnly. Then she frowned. “Did that sound as dumb as I think it did? Never mind. What I’m saying is, we’re not just cat and hamster any more, predator and prey; we’re partners. We share a gift. We can see and hear things that others can’t. The power’s the same, whether it touches a hamster or a cat.”

“Cue violins,” Huey said wryly. “As long as you’re not related to them.”

“Look, if you want to be snarky, fine, but all the snotty one-liners in the world won’t change what I know: Lady Bast gave me my powers for a reason, and I worship her best by using them rightly.”

“By throwing away your own life to save mine?” The hamster was not convinced. “Why would a cat goddess want you to take care of a rodent?”

“I believe that Lady Bast is a goddess first, a goddess of cats second. What kind of god or goddess places a limit on love?”

Huey looked up at Lulu in awe. “Is your faith that strong? I can hardly-”

Before the hamster could finish, the shrubbery to either side of the path erupted as seven lean, muscular tom cats shot out of the darkness. The foremost one knocked Lulu to the ground. She lost her hold on Huey in the tumble, but before the hamster could gather his wits and run, a second feral sprang forward and pinned him down. As Lulu squirmed impotently in her captor’s grasp, she heard the bushes rustle again. Though her head was pressed to the path, she was able to turn it just enough to see the large black and white fulfillment of her fears amble up to seat himself a whisker-length away from her nose.

“Poor kit,” he said sweetly. “I’d hoped it wouldn’t come to this. You should have given me what I wanted, but at least you’ve ended by presenting me a revelation worthy of one of your own gut-dabblings. When you and this… snack-” he gave Huey a blood-chilling smile. “-sneaked into my lair and freed that stupid mouse, my first reaction was to ask why I’d tolerated your existence for so long. Then it came to me: I only need you because you are Catopolis’ Seer. But why are you Catopolis’ Seer? Because you said you were! You claimed Bast appeared to you in a dream, and two other cats swore they’d shared it. Only two.” His gaze drifted over the faces of his seven waiting minions. “I think I can swing that.”

“You can’t just proclaim yourself a Seer!” Lulu shouted. “You haven’t got the gift!”

“Sometimes, kit, the gift of prophecy lies in the Seekers, not the Seer. What a difference a title makes! Call yourself a Seer, and they all stand ready to believe you can see! Fill your prophecies with vague, ‘mystic’ words, and your Seekers blame themselves when their foretold futures don’t come to pass as predicted. Such a clever trick.”

“That’s not how I serve Catopolis, and you know it!” Lulu protested.

“But it is how I will do things when I take your place.” Señor Pantalones looked as though he’d fallen heir to a catnip factory.

“Our kin will find out you never had Lady Bast’s blessing,” Lulu said. “You won’t be able to fool them for long.”

“Long enough to remake Catopolis in my own image. As for Bast’s blessing, don’t make me laugh! How can a scrap of some ancient cat’s imagination bless anything? You put all your faith into a pretty fable, staked your life on a myth, and where did it get you? Where’s your so-called goddess now?” He smirked, then told the cat restraining her: “Let her up. I want her to have a clear view of this.”

As Lulu shakily got to her feet, Señor Pantalones made a terse gesture with one paw. The minion holding Huey grabbed the hamster by the back of the neck and dropped him in front of his master. “My first Reading,” Señor Pantalones said, his whole body rumbling with wicked delight. He lifted one paw for the killing blow.

“No!” Lulu exclaimed. She tried to reach Huey, but her feral guard shouldered her back. “

Please. Spare him and I-I’ll read the omens any way you want! And if you want to replace me as Seer, I won’t stand in your way. I’ll confine myself to exile among humans. I’ll never show my face in Catopolis again!”

“All that, for this?” Señor Pantalones sneered at the hamster in his clutches. “Have you a reason, or have you simply lost your mind?”

“This creature is a greater Seer than I could ever hope to be,” Lulu declared. “He can speak to the dead.”

“Any minute now,” said Señor Pantalones.

“He also has the power to read minds.”

The big black and white cat threw back his head and guffawed. “Is that so?” He looked down at Huey. “All right, little snack, prove it. Look into my mind and tell me how I’m going to kill you.”

The hamster regarded Señor Pantalones calmly. “You think you’ll do it by slitting me open throat-to-tail. Of course now that I’ve said that, you’re thinking you’ll make it tail-to-throat, just to be a wiseass. You’re also thinking that as soon as you’re boss of Catopolis, you’ll never have to associate with smelly trash like your feral buddies over there.” Huey waved a paw at the seven street cats.

“Bah! Nonsense!” Señor Pantalones huffed. But a nervous look twitched over his face and he refused to meet his minions’ eyes. “That will be enough out of-”

Undaunted, Huey forged on:

“Plus, you think you’ll be able to fool the other cats with your stupid ‘I had a dream from Lady Bast making me a Seer’ plan, except you’re all ego and no brains. Otherwise you’d to realize Lady Bast can send real dream-visions to every cat in Catopolis, telling them what a big, fat phony you are. Which is something your feral buddies will already know when you kick them to the curb like a bag of empty Tuna NomNom cans. And what’s more-”

“I said enough!” Señor Pantalones’ bared claws slashed down. The force of the big black and white cat’s blow tore Huey open from throat to tail, as the hamster himself had predicted. Lulu yowled.

And then, a miracle: Instead of the expected gush of blood and innards, Huey’s ravaged body erupted with a surge of blinding light. The humble park pathway became a carpet of fragrant lotus blossoms. Silver stars danced in swirling midair streams. As the awestruck cats stood witness, a lithe, graceful feline as tall as a royal palm tree ascended from the fuzzy shell at Señor Pantalones’ feet. Her ears and paws were adorned with rings of pure gold. Her flanks were the color of the immortal desert, and her eyes were green mirrors of the moon.

She showed the big black and white tom teeth like a row of scimitars. “

Surprise, moth-brain.”

Señor Pantalones stared openmouthed, faintly uttering the feline version of homina-homina-homina-homina until he regained control of his tongue. He then flung himself flat and called out, “O great Lady Bast, have pity!”

“Way ahead of you,” the goddess replied. “For your name alone, if nothing else.

Señor Pantalones? What were your humans thinking? Remind me to smite them with a plague of locusts, or at least make them lose their car keys. But aside from that, it’s impossible not to pity someone whose main goal in life was to become the sole ruler of Catopolis. You actually thought you had a future herding cats?”

“My lady, I-”

“Ffffftttt!” She silenced him with one admonitory hiss. “Señor Pantalones, your crimes are many. You doubted my divinity. You attempted to corrupt my chosen Seer. When she refused to serve your purposes, you sought her death. You have brought about the self-serving slaughter of so many of this city’s mice, endangering the food supply for my feral children, that I was compelled to assume rodent’s guise in order to intervene. Do you have any idea of how humiliating that was for a cat goddess? Do you think I enjoy this whole felis ex machina gig?”

Señor Pantalones raised his head. “Sweet Lady Bast, I swear I’ll-”

“Save your breath. I call your own minions to witness that you are banished to the sole company of your human servants from now on. If you ever dare to show so much as a whisker in the streets of Catopolis-” The goddess raised one paw. A gigantic water pistol appeared in midair. An unseen hand pulled the trigger.

Lulu was still laughing long after Señor Pantalones’ drenched and caterwauling flight from the park was a faint memory. His minions too had fled, sharing their erstwhile master’s soggy fate. When she caught her breath again, she asked the goddess, “Once he dries off, do you think he’ll stay in exile?”

“He’d better. His former minions will see to that. Remember what I said about how he was going to dump their butts once he came to rule Catopolis? They’ll remember that, too. He may be a power-mad fool, but he’s not stupid enough to venture onto the streets as long as seven strong ferals are holding a grudge with his name on it.” The divine feline smiled. “But enough of him. My kitten, this night you have shown steadfast reverence, faith, honor and compassion. Tell me, how may I reward you for all this?”

“Wellllll…” Lulu took a deep breath. “Could you please rewrite the rule that says I have to eat the Reading, after? Because like I told you when you were still a hamster, I really, really don’t like to eat-”

“-rodents? Then let me see what you do like to eat, sweet Seer.” Bast placed one forepaw on Lulu’s head and closed her eyes in concentration. “Aha!” she exclaimed at last, looking well pleased. “Hear me, O Lulu, my Oracular One! From this night forth, you are empowered to read the omens of the future in a splash of milk, a scattering of kibble, yea, in anything my beloved children lay before you. And whatever form the Reading may take, through my sacred power it shall become your favorite food once it touches your lips.”

“You mean-?” Lulu scarcely dared believe the blessed fate awaiting her.

“Yes,” said the cat goddess gravely. “ Turkey. And the good kind, from the deli; not the cheap supermarket store brand. So let it be written! So let it be done!”

Lulu bowed low. “Hail, Lady Bast! A fowl future never looked so fair!”

That was when Bast got out the Broom.