The Sunfire House Gang

A young girl's search for her missing cat takes her on an epic quest into the dark and hidden secrets of the world...And beyond that, to the unimaginable.
Here are five sample chapters from my book, The Sunfire House Gang:

Let's begin.

The Sunfire House Gang

“Continuity is one of the rights of man; it is a homage of everything that distinguishes him from the beast.” --Charles Dupont-White, 1860 “I was alone. I was alone with my dog and the ship was drowning.” -Anonymous.

Chapter 1

THE MISSING KITTY

My cat went missing on an early December morning in the year 2022. I’m only telling you this now because it will become very important later.

The last night I saw him the three of us were watching television shows on an old VHS in my bedroom. I’d say four of us if I included my grandmother but she is usually asleep on the other side of the house. My two cats, Shadow and Bitsy are seated quietly in front of me, watching the television.Their eyes light up as the colored flashing of Big Trouble in Little China fills the room.

“The girl with green eyes…” the cats listen intently as we hear the words come out of the speaker, “The girl who can tame the burning blade…”

Bitsy is my female cat, the one on the left. She’s about three years older than Shadow. She’s black and white with a patch on her face that looks kind of like the Canadian flag if you dipped it in chocolate. I got her when I was twelve years old and she’s been with me for a few years now. We’ve already had several adventures.

When Bitsy was only one, she slipped out of the house behind me. I was on my way to 7-11 for Grandma. I looked up and down the street and noticed there were no cars driving anywhere. It was almost midnight on a Sunday night and no one was around. I decided to see if she would follow me. The first time, she only went halfway and waited for me in a tree, the second time, she followed me all the way there and waited by the ice machine. My Grandma doesn’t know I’m doing this. I don’t want to worry her.

Shadow was a farm-rescue my sister gave me before she moved away to college. I could tell she didn’t really care about the cat when she gave him to me. She saw him as more of a nuisance that her new boyfriend might be allergic to.

He was just a tiny little thing in my hands when I first held him, no bigger than a baseball. Now he’s a big, fluffy guy with long black fur and thick paws.

Once Shadow was big enough, he quickly followed step. He absolutely refused to stay in the house while Bitsy and I went on our midnight walks. Now both of them are trained to follow me. Sometimes we go to the park when it’s empty, sometimes we just explore the empty alleyways of our neighborhood. A couple of times we were all brave enough to risk a trip to the convenience store. They sat outside by the dumpster and waited patiently while I got corndogs.

It was scary being in the store the first few times without being able to see them, but everytime I came out there they were, waiting in the dark, their little eyes aglow.

I’ll always remember walking back from the store together at night, our loot in my bags and a hop in my step as we trudged through the snow together. Later at home, there would be cat food and snacks and old tv shows. The whole world had forgotten about us and we had gotten away with something truly special.

It was like that for a long time, I ended up losing interest in a lot of other stuff like boys and drinking and cars.

One night, on another secret walk with me and Bits, Shadow ended up tearing into the field to chase after a bunny. I was scared because not even Bitsy was that brave or had ever gone that far from me. I had to wait until he came running back from the treeline, having given up on the rabbit. I stood still and told myself not to worry. He came pattering up through the snow with his bell jingling and a proud look on his face.

The field is part of the park we live on the outskirts of. It’s a vast centrality that links most of the city together. We don’t usually go there because the news keeps reporting coyote sightings. Some areas are covered in trash and needles from homeless camps that move through it according to my local church.

I can’t bear the thought of one of those coyotes bearing down on my kitties, or one of those homeless people snatching one and stealing them away in their filthy backpacks.

I still take risks with them. I don’t know why. It feels good sometimes when I do. I feel like deep down inside we are all meant to be free. And also, if it came down to it, my cats are quite fast, agile, and wary of strangers. They can sense dogs from a block away, and if they can make it to the fence and up through my slightly open bedroom window, they’ll totally be able to escape. I would give them high odds. Cats are survivors.

I feel myself starting to drift off to sleep with a comforting feeling in my chest. I feel gratitude for these two cats, my best friends and I, mellowing out under the colored flicker of the tv while the smell of cheese and coffee embrace my nostrils.

My grandmother sleeps often, as I’ve said before, and she often gets up around five in the morning to vacuum the rug. I’ve been pretty much alone with her and the cats since my parents went away. She even lets me duck of school a bit as long as I keep my job at the grocery store.

“Grandma?”

“Yes?”
“Have you seen Shadow?”
“Is that the black and white one? Yeah she was by the door awhi--”

“No, the other one, the fluffy one.”

“OH, that one. No,” she informs me, “I haven’t seen him since last night.”

Shadow has a little thing I call a ‘hovel’ near the edge of my bed, where I kept my feet. It’s a little carpeted cat-cave and he drifts into sleep in there while Bitsy curls up nearby. Sometimes I would wake up around three in the morning just to put my head close to his hovel and listen to him snore.

Then one morning, I got up to look in his hovel and and he was gone.

No fluffy little guy in his little house. No soft purr from beyond the blankets. He was gone. Something in me knew he was not just outside or down the hall this time…

He was always there when I woke up for school, always. Bitsy was down on the rug next to my bed, looking pleasant, as if nothing had happened. She got up and stretched and went to look for food in the kitchen. I got up and searched the house.

Nothing. Looked in the yard. Climbed over neighbor’s fences and knocked on doors that didn’t answer. I thoroughly questioned my grandmother and anyone that passed nearby our home. No one had seen him. I got desperate and took his favorite toy and walked around other people’s sheds and gardens and garages, jingling it and calling him as loud as I could. Maybe he had gotten trapped somewhere?

I even knocked on the guy’s house down the street that was under house-arrest for assaulting a prostitute. He was actually home. I could tell by his reactions to my questions that he had absolutely no ill-will or concern for kitties at all, which was comforting.

Did someone take him? Did he wander outside and get scared by something? Maybe someone saw him wandering too far from the house and though he was a stray? I haven’t gotten him tags yet.

He loves being at home with me I know he wouldn’t just run away. I felt elated. Just like the time Bitsy went missing, he’ll probably turn up in the next day or so or two. Hell, if he’s nearby anywhere he’ll know exactly where to go. He loves our yard and our neighborhood. He knows the smells. Our house is older and has character and he’ll recognize it right away.

This feeling gave me comfort to sleep that night, confident that he would probably be back in the morning.

I woke up in the morning when it was still dark out and the sun was just beginning to rise. He’s still gone. I Go back to sleep. It’s a bad dream. The kitties always come back.

I drift off. I feel good, like I’m floating in an ocean. I have a dream that he’s hiding under the deck. I reach out for him in the dream and say, “Where are you?” He looks up at me as if he’s been caught in something, as if I wasn’t supposed to see him there. He gets up and runs!

I wake up. I look happily over at his hovel again. If he’s in there, the nightmare ends, just like when Bitsy went missing. He’s not there again. My heart sinks like it’s been dropped off a cliff and all the horrible things that might have happened to him start swirling through my mind. All of it, horrible. His hovel is empty. I weep uncontrollably.

After I’m done, I get up and search the animal control website, confident someone picked him up the same day, just like with my other cat. I keep scrolling through kitties…

Life went on like this for a while. Bits and I kept walking around at night and putting posters up everywhere

“MISSING KITTY: REWARD IF FOUND”.

The posters are nice and big and have my best picture of him. It’s the one I took when he was about a year old, when he propped himself up on a fence post and posed like he was ready for his first day of school. I could almost imagine a little lunch kit in his hands. This image now adorns entire streets. Someone has to see him sooner or later.

My greatest fear is that all of it didn’t matter. My love for him didn’t matter to the motorcycle barrelling down the street too fast...My love didn’t -- no, NO. I have to avoid thinking like that...But, I can’t, rationally I can’t. He’s dead or worse. Or he’s alive and well. Not knowing which one of these states he might be in tears me apart.

One time I found a cat that looked like him, about six months after he went missing. It was dark but it looked like it might be him if he was bigger? I called him by name in my cutesy voice he was used to, the way I always imagined finding him. He looked back at me, surprised and confused before he tore off into the alley and under the deck of a big house. It wasn’t him. There was no white patch on his belly. But it made me worry, would he even remember me after all this time? I only had him for one year. Is it possible he would become grizzled fearful and angry? Is he mad at me for letting him down? Would he even remember me?

I weep on the way home. That’s what I do now. I hope Kitty is coming home soon...

My grandmother died late that winter.

Chapter 2

SPACE GRRL 2089

Our car ascends up the side of one of the biggest skyscrapers in the city. Bitsy is sitting beside me on the hood while I eat a sandwich and watch the city spread out below us like a pool of lights. Once we get near the top, I can see the peak of his gabled roof poking out above all the glass and steel.

I’ve come to the man. The man who saved my skin worth a thousand times. Is it sad that after almost a hundred years I really only come here to ask him one question?

Steam rises from a lawn auto-sprinkled by hidden hoses. I can see carnations, daisies and long rows of haphazard sunflowers. There’s very little light pollution nowadays so behind all the green and color you can always see a myriad of stars. A nest of herbs reaches my nose from nearby, he must be growing at least twelve different things in there. I can guess he still loves to cook.

For the most part, it looks like the old house from the first time I met him. That, with accompanying electronics rigs and a strange device at the back of the house, it’s all older than retro. The device itself looks like a wooden box with multi-colored lights and tubes pouring out the back. There are christmas lights on the top of the house as well, adorning the old wooden shingles like a web.

I always get a sense of deja-vu when I come here. Everything from the framed windows that look like eyes, to the worn out paint on the wooden porch that leads to the front door. It reminds me of something in a way I cannot describe. It looks almost exactly the same as it did all those years ago. I wonder if he replicated it or if he literally moved it up here? I wonder if I’ve asked him before? I probably did.

Our car comes to a slow over a stone walkway leading to the house and sets down. Bitsy and I get off the hood and walk through the garden toward the home. Every ten years I come here, and every ten years he tells me something new. I wonder what it’ll be this time? Which parts will I forget? Will he still look the same?

The world came up with boosters a long time ago. It’s basically an injection that extends the mitochondrial limit by seven to ten years. Short of getting hit by a bus or giving in to some virus or disease, you can live for a long time now. Nobody knows for sure how long. It even makes you immune to most stuff. Some people, me included, were curious to see if they might work on cats. Turns out...they do. Bitsy is 73 years old now. I can’t remember how old I am, but I look the same as I was when I was sixteen. Taking the boosters too early does that to you. The reason I bring this up is because this guy has supposedly never taken one but he always looks the same.

“Hello,” I hear the soft words from behind me just as I reach the porch and the car powers down.

Bicycle Boy is what I call him because of the first time that I saw him, riding a bike. He’s tall and handsome and of course he’s standing in front of the moon. He’s still wearing the same blue and white ball cap from when I was a kid. The one that seems to glow sometimes. Is it the same one from when I was a kid? Or was it red and white? I can’t remember. I remember the arcade. I remember the neighborhood. I remember the Sunfire House gang. But most of all these days...I remember him.

“Nice to see you again,” I say.

He steps forward and offers me a bowl of fresh cereal. He has his own. We sit in the garden and eat in crunchy silence.

I know what I want to ask him about but I’m always careful what I ask him. If I don’t follow my heart I’ll come away with the wrong info again.

“Where’s Loreal?”

He lifts his spoon and points. Loreal is sitting right next to me, quietly licking her fur. Bitsy didn’t seem to notice her either, though it’s hard to miss that tuxedo cat once you see her. She’s beautiful, even more beautiful than mine.

Bitsy prances up to Loreal and they touch noses. Another soft little moment in a long, long line of them.

“But, there’s been darkness, too,” he says.

I should be used to him reading my mind by now, or whatever it is he does.

“Yuup.” I say, and trail off. My words disappear like a shadow over the moon.

“Still no sign of him, ey?”

“There are some...I just found some more leads but they’re old. Gonna follow up on them tonight.”

“Good idea,” he says as he gets up from the bench. “I’m going to go in now.”

I instinctively follow him inside. Our cats wait on the lawn. It’ll be a few hours before we’re done talking and it’ll be important. I know I won’t remember it all. I never do.

As I raise the car back up into the sky Bitsy sits next to me on the book I’m reading. The Science of Limitation. It’s the book everyone’s been reading. Limitation is huge right now. I’ve got 20 minutes before my shift at Psych ICU where I’ll probably spend some time reading it.

I descend the side of the building and head toward the flashing arrows that mark the auto-fare that will drive me to work. I tap on my favorite song and listen to the trumpets and drums blare as I try to remember the pertinent details of my conversation with Him.

“They’re close now.” is all that I can remember him saying...

In the future, most jobs have become automated. Not all of them though. Some still require human error and others were reclaimed or kept by people that simply loved doing whatever it was they were doing. Some jobs, like the one I’m going to now, have become largely crowd-sourced. There are still nurses there, and they have the MHACbots, but patients in crisis can be spoken to for an allotted hour after a small introductory course and certification. Research has shown these sessions are highly beneficial to the community. Patients list their needs on a website and people can sign up for them. The more resilient mental illnesses take a lot more support and sometimes go years without being cured. These people provide seven or more working hours to the public per day. Come in, sit down on the other side of the plexiglass, and talk to someone for an hour.

The woman I’m going to see tonight doesn’t require the barrier as she has been deemed non-aggressive. You can sit with her in a makeshift living room drinking tea while you help to cure her of her depression. Some patients are more popular than others and she’s one of them. I’m glad to get this spot after several weeks of trying.

The front doors of the concrete building flood the street with purple. The upper floors seem to have sort of an orange glow. This area of the city is full of regular cars and lots of walkers. The buildings are tight-packed together and allow no room for parks. A remnant of the old days. My lambo lands down in it’s predestined parking slot. The black designer substrate lights up with my symbol in an array of embedded LED’s. Most of the parking lot is already filled, a few remaining slots flash names and symbols for other cars. Mine is a girl riding a comet with two cats.

As the driver-side door lifts itself I slide smoothly out of the car. Bitsy is curled up in her seat and I leave her there to nap. I’ve got four minutes before getting demerits so I rush to the front of the hospital. If I can make the elevator in two I can arrive for my shift on time.

Chapter 3

INTO THE FOREST

A few months after Shadow's disappearance I decided to finally do the unthinkable. If Shadow was lost somewhere in the big forest park then I had to look for him. Maybe find some clues he had left behind. It’s the only place that makes sense. All of my posters had been up in the neighborhood and there was not one reply. No one has seen him.

I’m pretty much free to do whatever I want at night now anyway. The social workers check on me from time to time but as long as I make it to school I get to stay in the house my parents left to me. That means I have no official bedtime anymore. If my kitty is out there in a place of miscreants and coyotes, I have to retrieve him, no matter how scared I am. The forest park it is.

It bugs me that I didn’t search the forest earlier, but I’ve only been into the city core once and the park sort of scares me.

I wasn’t sure if Bitsy was going to come with me, but I packed her a lunch just in case. I also brought my own food, a pair of binoculars, a flashlight, and grandpa’s old crowbar. It all fit nicely into my brown and yellow backpack.

To hell with going to school tomorrow, I thought. I was too sad to focus on anything else right now. It was pretty much the last place I hadn't looked. I had to bring kitty home.

I stood and looked up at the white fence before me. The only light was from the kitchen windowsill in the house. Through the cracks of the fence I could see only darkness.

“Mrww.” Bitsy came up behind me and brushed my leg.

I look down at her and ask, “You want to come? You want to come search for Kitty?”

Bitsy simply glared up at the night sky and then hopped, her claws catching the top of the fence. I jumped up and climbed after her. We paused at the top of the fence and looked at each other.

We dropped down on the other side at the same time. Her paws and my sneakers meeting the damp grass in the dark. Beyond, far beyond the fence was the forest and the park, across the field...waiting.

“This is it,” I whispered and we sprinted off together.

I didn’t realize how big the park was until we got close to it. There were little lamp posts dotted all over amongst the trees, lining long winding paths. I could see a statue or two highlighted by yellow lights deeper inside. Beyond that, between all the tree trunks, I could make out a long line of lights that looked to be a road.  I tip my baseball cap down and peer upward. Rising up over the leaves and lampposts I can see the dotted fresh lights of the city. All of the little skyscrapers are only a lighter shade of black against the night sky.

Bitsy and I walk onward. We reach the edge of the treeline and soon we are in a labyrinth of running paths and park benches. I wondered what Shadow must have thought of a place like this. Did he see the giant jungle gym of a park and run toward it excitedly? Did he get lost inside and not know the way out?

Bitsy suddenly ran out ahead, prancing excitedly. She spots a nearby tree and scales it halfway up.

“Wait for me!”

I reach the tree and watch her for awhile. She seems more alive out here, the wildness coming back into her heart. She hops down from the tree and we begin our search. I look for any shape that might resemble a cat, using my flashlight to look under park benches and up into trees. I kept imagining him, staring down at us. A few squirrels run by and a small flock of birds scatters at our approach but I see nothing, no sign of Shadow.

I forgot to bring my posters to put up, but I don’t mind. I keep having this persistent feeling that the posters will not be the way that I find him.

Bitsy hisses at something far away. I watch her eyes glare beyond the trees ahead. There is a public washroom or something next to a large, gnarly tree.

“HELP.”

A woman is shouting. Oh my god a woman is shouting.

“HELP...please!”

I hear a grunt, sounds like, ‘shut up’. I instinctively walk closer to see. Bitsy stays back, resting on her haunches. I go out ahead carefully and quietly as she watches me.

When I get closer to the building I can hear the sounds of a scuffle, and then a scream. It pierces the night and then echoes. There doesn’t seem to be anyone else in the park that I can see. I hold the flashlight out ahead of me and slowly turn the corner of the building to see a man in his forties holding a woman down by her throat. It looks like she was jogging. He’s bludgeoned her on the head with something and he’s untying his pants. She tries to swipe and claw at him but her arms are all wrapped up in her coat and he’s leaning on her heavily.

I walk forward.

I feel brave until the man looks up at me.

A weak little, “Hey!” escapes my lips and lingers in the air.

He’s not that big but he’s bigger than me. I’m just a fourteen-year-old girl what am I doing out here? I should have brought a cellphone. As he starts to get up off the woman I’m not sure whether to run or to hold my ground. The woman whimpers underneath him, he’s ripped her shirt open and he’s keeping his knee on her torso.

I feel a swell rise up in my chest. I find myself whistling loud for Bitsy, “TrEEEEEEEP!” The whistle tears at the air enough to wake the dead.  I pull the crowbar from my backpack and hold it in the air.

“HEY WHY DON’T YOU PICK ON SOMEONE YOUR OWN SIZE?” I’m not sure why I yell this, but I feel a buzz running through my whole body.

Bitsy comes galloping down the grass towards them, her eyes lit up all green. She looks like a wily demon riding the black winds of night. Her sudden appearance scares me a little, but not as much as him.

He shouts something in a language I can’t understand and recoils at the site of the demonic cat bearing down on him. He shouts again and turns, tripping over himself, falling, and hitting his head on a post nearby.

He’s out cold.

Bitsy stops beside me and rests on her haunches again. She raises a white paw to her face and licks it lazily, almost as if nothing had happened.

“Th...thank you,” the woman squelps. She stands up slowly and moves away from her attacker. She looks back at him like he’s suddenly a piece of trash. She hugs me by both shoulders and squeezes a little too tightly, “Thank you,” she whispers. Her voice sounds like the wind. She fiddles in her pocket for her cell phone.

It takes a while before the police come but the man doesn’t get up. Even if he did, we tied his feet with my jump rope and wrapped her coat around him so he couldn’t see. Whimpers are all we hear from him as the two large policemen come walking up the path from the road. As they both see us they start to sprint, flashlights bobbing in the dark.

“I’ll always remember this,” the woman says, “thank you…” she looks down at my feline friend, curled up like a ball on the bench next to us, eyeing the man on the ground. “And thanks to your obedient little cat.”

I look down at Bitsy and she looks up at me, as if we both aren’t sure about what the woman said.

When more police arrive they begin to haul the rapist off. He curses and swears as if he has been wronged in some way. The irritation of listening to him ruins my elated mood. All the good feelings of adrenaline wash away, the dreamy excitement of it all starts to fade because I suddenly remember why I was here in this park in the first place.

I just stopped a major crime at the age of fourteen and all I care about is this one thing...this one little thing...

“Shadow,” I whisper low enough so that no one can hear me. I survey the treeline quickly, my eyes darting everywhere, but once again I don’t see him, my eyes don’t find him there.

“You’re a hero now, miss,” one of the male police officers tells me. “You and your little kitty.” His words raise my spirits a bit. I guess I should feel proud, instead I feel despair.

Chapter 5

THE FIRST UNOFFICIAL MEETING OF THE SUNFIRE HOUSE GANG

It was night. Bitsy and I crossed the long soccer field that led to the elementary school. I had a bundle of missing kitty posters tucked under my arm. I could hear Bitsy’s bell go ‘ching-ching-ching’ as she followed close behind me. It’s been a year and seven days since Shadow went missing.

I hoped maybe he would come back on the anniversary of his disappearance. End all this pain. I have several time-marks like that. Christmas, his birthday. I suppose it will continue on and on if I don’t find him soon.

My television and newspaper appearances did not bear fruit. I remember standing on a box behind the podium at City Hall while they showered confetti. I was holding up a picture of Shadow for all the cameras as they took pictures of Bitsy and I. There were others there too, receiving awards for various things. The PR people that talked to me beforehand told me not to show the picture of Shadow because it would distract from the media story about me. I didn’t listen to them. I frantically checked the next day and made sure that he was clearly visible on all the evening news stories when they showed the awards ceremony. It filled me with a sort of certainty. Even the newspaper articles about me showed me holding the picture. Someone has to see him now. Someone has to know where he is.

Nine months later and he’s still lost. No one called my house to inform me that they’d found him or that they had seen him somewhere. Only one crank caller. Some creep said he ran over Shadow with his motorcycle and threw his body in the trash. I deleted all of the messages he left.

Christmas is coming again soon. I know they are going to be doing their annual light-up of the elementary school manger scene tomorrow. That’s why I’m out tonight. I’m going to place a missing kitty poster right in the middle of baby Jesus’ manger. When they light it up tomorrow for the official ceremony everyone gathered there will see it.

While I pull the fake baby out of the manger I hear a dog barking somewhere behind us. The night is getting darker and all the manger characters look like menacing black ghosts but I try not to be scared. I pull a poster out from under my arm and gingerly place it in the bed of straw and swaddling clothes. This is it. I hope this works.

“I miss you, Shadow.” I whisper, kneeling in front of the manger. Bitsy hangs her head solemnly. “It’s been a long time, I know. I hope somehow you can feel my words...wherever you are...I miss you.”

I start to cry and whimper. Bitsy watches me silently. Before I know it, my cheeks are running red with tributaries of bitter tears. I heave and heave. It gives me anxiety to think about how far away he could be, how long it has been...what might have happened to him.

“Three-hundred and seventy-two days...three-hundred and seventy-two days...since you went gone…”

Woof.

The hairs on the back of my neck stand up. So do Bitsy’s. She turns and hisses. I get up and try to spin around, but my body is too slow from crying. There are three children standing behind us, all about my age. Two boys and a girl...and...cats? One of them is holding a cat and there is a fluffy white cat near the girl. The boy on the right is standing next to a huge, brown-and-white dog. No leashes.

“Three-hundred and seventy-two days since what?” The blonde kid with the dog asks, rather loudly.

I stare at them wordlessly, my breath letting out little puffs of cold air. I’m embarrassed to be caught but I’m also surprised at what’s happening.

“Who...are you?”

“We’re the Sunfire House Gang,” the girl explains, stepping forward with her white cat. “I’m Yeo-Sung.” She has a slender, somewhat stern, asian face. “And we know who you are.”

The boy in the middle follows beside her, he is holding a large tabby cat in his arms. It’s almost too big for him to hold. “You are a hero and we come requesting your aid.”

The fluffy white cat next to the asian girl hops forward and starts to hiss at Bitsy. She hisses back and readies a defensive leap.

“Shhh! Mao-Tse Tung-Kitty, Shhh!”

The fluffy white cat lets out an irritable sneeze and then turns around, stand back beside its owner. “I’m truly sorry, He is a little bit temperamental with new friends.”

“Friends?” I let the word swim around in my mind a little. I didn’t have any of those.

The big dog lumbers forward to Bitsy. I gasp with terror for a moment as Bitsy moves toward the dog. They sniff at the air between each other and then touch noses as everyone watches. I’ve only ever seen her run or hide from dogs.

“Did...they just make friends?”

The dog lets out a muffled grunt and then sits on its haunches. He almost seems to smile. Bitsy returns to my side.

“Boomer only hates evil,” the blonde kid says, stepping forward. “They call me the Kurt Russell Kid and that’s my pal Boomer, but you can call me Shane.”

“My, my name is…”

“We know,” says the middle kid, who I now realize has an East-Indian accent, possibly Punjabi. “We know who you are. We saw you on the news a long time ago. We’ve been looking for you for a while now...but, you were not easy to find.”

“Looking...for me? Why? Who are you?”

“My apologies,” the Indian kid says, “My name is Ashan.”

“We are looking for someone to be our leader,” Yeo-Sung says. Her voice is harsh but pretty. “I wanted to be the leader but Ashan says that you are special. He had a feeling to look for you.”

“Why? Why me? That thing in the park was only one time, nothing’s happened since then. I’m not a leader of any kind. I can’t even find my missing cat.”

Ashan walks forward with his huge feline in his arms. “We come from the suburbs beyond the firestation, where someone has been killing our neighborhood kitties and we need you to help us find the culprit.”

“What? Someone’s been...How did you find me? How did you know I would be here?”

Shane and Yeo-sung exchange glances.

“Let him explain,” Shane says, “Show her.”

Ashan steps very close to me, his cat turns in his arms and looks at me and I realize there are only slits where his eyes should be. This is a blind cat.

“His name is Astral. He will help you understand.”

“What? I don’t--”

The cat reaches out with one paw and touches my forehead.
I collapse.

Chapter 6

THE 4,177th MEETING OF THE  PARLIAMENT OF CATS

The night sky opened up above us. The snow turned into white rain and a light pulled our spirits out. Up there, up there in the sky is where we went…Even beyond the night sky. What happened after I would only ever be able describe in teary clumps, like heavy, half-forgotten dreams. This is the best I can remember of it:

Beasts of Burden, Beasts of Domestication, Wild beasts! Almost any kind of cat you could imagine--many that existed and many that didn’t--all circled around and around forever, seated on the night sky, staring up at something...enormous.

There were thousands of them up there, tens of thousands. They barely noticed Bitsy and I as we took our seats in the outer circle of the Parliament of Cats. The many hosts of cats and related cat-type beasts formed a spiral going upward like constellations, seated on stairs made of night. I could feel them all until their personalities congealed, became one and somehow we became a part of them too. It felt like...it felt like home.

A great bell rang out. It’s reverberations were like tiny earthquakes across the sky, stirring up hidden places in the night. Suddenly, the sky shone all around us. It was brighter than the stars but it did not hurt our eyes. My cat sat on my lap and became very still, quietly observing. Like constellations in the sky they formed around the center, around their sun, their god, The Great King Kitty Himself. The Beast.

“BE SEATED” a voice bellowed and everything grew dim.

Eyes approached from the darkness. Everywhere, a cacophony of growls and purrs and strange sounds seeped into this place from the darkness beyond it.

“THE MATTER BEFORE US.”

“Kings, Queens, Gods, Kitties and Men,” muttered the half-squirrel, the mediator. A beast that does not exist in any other realm. “The losses of several great children is the matter before us today...seven kitties died this day, at the hands of the Great Enshroudment. This matter has been repeating for several rounds and we fear it will only grow worse.”

“A hushed awe came from the crowd.

“This is our day,” they whispered, while birds chirped restlessly at the back.

“WHAT OF OUR ACCOUNTING, HOW MUCH HAS THIS COST EVERYONE.”

“Summon the Accountant!” Shouted the Half-squirrel.

The beam of light dimmed, then brightened in an area near the top of all the souls where the stars were the brightest. An elderly grey cat, appearing from atop an embroidered chair, its paw resting on a Great Book, lifted its head and spoke, “Behold, the current state of affairs…”

Swirls of light came down from above, changing into scenery, changing into information, changing into cats. There were cats running through fields, cats eating squealing birds and mice, cats getting run over by cars. The images increased and flourished and grew until they were all around you could not only see them but feel them. The same scenes and dramas, repeating again and again while a multitude of different cats ran through them. Cats drinking from water bowls, cats atop fences, cats tearing at each other with claws, people loving them, people petting them, people hating them. Birds, dying by the thousands for the cats, cats, dying by the thousands, for us. Some grand, cosmic play of pain and happiness and misery and loss, growing and expanding again and again.

Somewhere, a little girl cried out and I could feel the numbers, the literal tens of thousands of little girls weeping for their missing cats; their murdered pets. PLEASE COME HOME FOR CHRISTMAS, they all cried out in unison, and I felt myself amongst them. PLEASE BRING MY KITTY COME HOME FOR CHRISTMAS!

The cat closed the Great Book with a THUMP and the scenery vanished, along with all of the screaming, crying, purring, eating, clawing and running. “The Book is closed,” he declared, fading from view.

“THE STATE OF AFFAIRS IS OVERWHELMING. SUMMON FORTH THE BEST BEAST WE HAVE ON THE MATTER.”

A narrow beam of light fixated itself on the starry night floor, making a circle of white. Into it stepped a small cat, fluffy and black with white on its chest. A little green bell hung from his collar. Oh, god, It’s him.

“THE PARLIAMENT RECOGNIZES THE SOUL OF SHADOW-KITTY THE ONE-HUNDRED-AND-SEVENTEENTH!”

(I wanted to speak, to cry out for him but in this hallowed place my words found no strength.)

The Great Hall was silent as the kitty spoke.

“Meow meow...Meow, Meow Meow, MEOWTH.”

The entire crowd burst forth in raucous laughter, for Shadow Kitty the Hundred and Seventeenth was known throughout history for his broad range of humor and excellent speaking skills. (I’m not sure how I knew this.)

“HUMOROUS THOUGH YOU MAY BE, WHAT SAY YOU ON THE MATTER AT HAND. YOU ARE ONE OF OUR AGENTS ON THE CASE. WHAT IS THE DARKNESS THAT HIDES?”

“Mew meeoww…” he paused and the entire cat-host purred and growled anxiously.

“...Meow meow meow...MEOWTH.”

The entire assembly gasped in horror and rage.

“HAAAAUH?” even King Kitty was shocked by what the Parliament had just heard. Every cat present muttering and despairing. There was anxious clutching of paws and licking of fur.

“Then it’s true, then?” remarked the half-squirrel, “This is the Times of the End? This is Catbarach? The Great Catbarach??”

The Giant Kitty in the sky closed his eyes then with sadness and despair. He gathered himself before speaking again.

“TRULY THIS MUST BE SO. THE DARK ONES SEEK US EVER NEARER. EVEN NOW I FEEL THEIR ENGINES ROAR AND THE WOLVES HOWL FROM THEIR CHASM. THE DARK FORCES THAT FUEL THE CAT MURDERS ARE TO BLAME.”

“Summon the Ghost of John Candy!” shouted a distant voice in human.

The crowd rippled with pleasure. The beam of light faded and Shadow-kitty’s form with it, then burst anew onto an orange cat lit by a fireplace.

“Ahheeem,” said the cat, clearing its throat. It perched itself up straight in front of the flickering firewood and then puffed out its chest. “This is grave and very serious, too serious, even for me.” This got a small chuckle from the crowd.

“But, today must be like any other, our efforts must not be thwarted. If the churning chaos were to increase there will be many more kitty-related deaths to come, not to even speak of the other animal-based kingdoms. The heart of humankind continues to let wickedness come in, and as such, all hearts are in jeopardy.”

“But, what must we do?” someone shouted from the back.

“We must utilize our newfound gifts. The blessing of higher consciousness. As it affects Mankind, it is also affects our troops on the ground. We are now allowed to be more in sync with our human friends. If our alignments are closer together, there is no telling what might be done.”

“THIS KITTY SPEAKS THE TRUTH OF US,” said the Great King Cat in the night-time sky. “WE ARE NOW PERMITTED, MORE THAN EVER TO DO THINGS WE COULD NOT BEFORE.”

The Ghost of John Candy bowed his furry head and the light dimmed from him.

“WE WAIT NOW FOR THE SPECIAL BLESSINGS.” King Kitty roared.

The whole audience was hushed, and grew completely silent. Everyone closed their eyes. From above, several blessings, like little colored lights came down from nowhere and sparkled in our midst.

The elderly grey cat was highlighted again, he held his paws on the Great Book as the blessing poured into it. On the blank page words appeared that I could not understand. The cat peered back and forth, feeling them with his paws and deciphering them with his eyes.

He stood on the book then, and spoke:

“The blessings are this: For the Next Several Rounds we have been granted Higher Intelligence, We Shall Appear more Resplendit in the Moonlight, and the Coyote will be Kind for several Full Moons...That, and the Secret Blessing of the Sunfire Light shall come to the humans. These are the blessings.”

The Great King Kitty above looked down on all assembled below him and spoke one last time.

“WHAT WE HAVE BEEN GRANTED WE MUST USE TO OUR BEST EFFORTS.”

The Great Bell rang out again with the power of a shattering star.

BOOM BOOM BOOM

“NOW RETURN TO YOUR PLACES,” The Great King-Kitty declared, his voice booming across worlds, “RETURN TO YOUR QUESTS...RETURN TO YOUR PEOPLE, RETURN TO YOUR ULTIMATE DESIGN…YOUR PURPOSE...THE GREAT OPENING OF THE HUMAN HEART! BE AGILE AND WARY, LEST ALL BE LOST!”

I felt myself falling down, down, down, Bitsy swirling around me. The splendour of it all being torn and folded away. The stars and the cats and the Gods of Cats and the steps made of night sky flew away into the air. Down, down, down we went until all was darkness and then...dim yellow lights and snow. I saw my body then, lying in a field next to my cat, the other children and their pets circled around. We were on the ground, breathing heavily, our eyes staring into nothing.

“God, oh god,” I said, barely feeling the return of my own voice, “I....I...oh my--”

“It’s okay,” I could hear the others whispering to me, “Now you understand.”