by L. Fergus
“As you wish. Let’s start at the beginning.” She threw him down on the conveyor at the killing station and waved Dusk in front of his eyes. “I can’t kill you, but you don’t need your eyes to talk.” With a quick flip of her wrist, she slashed through his eyes. The man’s head thrashed as Kita dragged him down the conveyor.
“We’ve arrived at the paw removal station. You don’t need hands or feet to talk…or do you?” The man spat blood at her. “As you wish.”
In the corner of the room, a steam engine drove the conveyors and hook system. Kita grabbed a large cleaver, thrust it into the tinder box, and returned to her prisoner. With one quick chop, she removed the man’s feet. Two more chops and his hands hit the floor. Kita returned to the tinder box and removed the red-hot knife, pressing it against the stumps, she cauterized his wounds.
“Smell that, my friend? That’s you cooking.” Kita giggled. It must be wrong that I enjoy this so much. “Let’s move on to the next station, or do you have something to tell me?”
He snarled through clenched teeth.
“I guess I’ll have to gut and clean you then.” Kita jumped onto the conveyor, picked him up, and slammed his armpits down on a pair of meat hooks. She sliced open his abdomen, yanked out a length of intestine, and held it up to his nose. Pain lines creased the man’s face as he screamed and thrashed.
Kita clamped her hand over his mouth. “Quiet or you’ll wake the neighbors. I have something for you. Smell that? That’s your rotten gut, which is now spilling out. How does your own waste taste?”
Kita forced his mouth open and shoved a piece of intestine inside. The man fought her and spat it out. “Anything you’d like to say to me?”
“I hope you rot.”
“Tsk-tsk, I wouldn’t wish that on you,” Kita said in a pouting voice. “I guess we’re down to the skinning station.” Kita picked up a skinning knife and cut around the man’s upper thigh and then down the back of his leg. She worked the knife under the skin and yanked. The man screamed in a way Kita had never heard before. She climbed back up to him. “Anything constructive to say? No? I like your spirit. Next station.”
Kita threw him around the meat hook's track. She caught him at the next station, unhooked him, and threw him down on the conveyor.
“This is where the meat is cut up. What are the proper cuts for a human? Don’t know? Me either. Guess we’ll do what you were doing, cutting off the limbs.”
The man was quiet. Kita slapped him on the cheeks. “Hey, wake up. I’m not done yet. No going catatonic on me. I’ve got a cure for that.” She injected him with a powerful stimulant. “Stay with me. I don’t want you to miss the fun.”
Kita found another large cleaver and stuck the first one back in the tinder box. With four mighty chops, she took off his lower legs and arms and cauterized the new wounds. The man’s screams rang off the walls.
“We’re out of conveyor, only the grinder remains. Anything you want to tell me? You’re going to die no matter what, but I can make the end quick.”
The man whimpered but said nothing.
Kita shrugged and carried him up to the grinder. She angled him so he could hear the spiked wheels turning. His pale face went white. Kita held him and lowered him in little by little. “You can end this anytime you like, just tell me what I want to know.”
The man refused to talk, and Kita lowered him in just below his waist. She took out Dusk and threw it in a large arc to cut the belt that drove the grinders.
“Please kill me, I beg you. Have mercy,” he whimpered.
“Last chance to tell me what I want to know,” said Kita. The man shook his head. “Have it your way.” Kita grabbed him by the neck and injected him with a stimulant and a clotting agent.
“Wait, please kill me! Don’t leave me like this,” he cried as Kita walked away.
“I have killed you, but it’ll take a while. I injected you with a stimulant, which will keep you awake while a coagulant causes your blood to clot faster. You’ll eventually bleed out, but it’ll take days.” Kita turned. “Whose hand would you rather die by now?”
“You are not an angel but a demon. No one can be this cruel.”
“Not a demon, a fallen angel.” She giggled and turned invisible. “Enjoy your last days.”
In the barracks, Kita moved the bunk. Rhythmic chanting replaced the whimpering coming from under the desk. Kita stuck her head in. There was a surprised cry and a foot crashed into Kita’s face, knocking her back and her hood off. After everything I’ve killed today, what gets the drop on me? A kid.
The boy looked at Kita, thrust a talisman into her face, and screamed for her to get back. Kita returned to normal.
“Easy, kid. I’m not here to hurt you; I want to help you.”
“Back demon! In the name of the holy goat, I command you to get back.”
Kita sighed. “Look, I’m not a demon. I’m human, just like you.” The kid paused but kept the talisman out. “If I was a demon, I should be fleeing in terror right now, right?”
The boy slowly nodded. “But humans can't turn invisible. What are you?”
“A fallen angel,” said Kita.
“But fallen angels are evil and work with demons.” The boy tried to push past Kita.
“Easy, we never work with demons. Fallen angels are just like regular angels.”
The boy studied her. “Regular angels are beautiful, and you are, but you don’t have any wings.”
“That’s what makes me fallen.”
“But I was told fallen angels are evil.” The boy said it like it was written in stone.
“Even the light needs a little evil. Sometimes you need evil to fight evil. Understand?”
“So, you do evil things to accomplish something good?”
“Yes.”
“Then why are you here? Is there something evil here? What happened to the foreman?”
“This place is evil. It captures and kills innocent war cats. Those of the light do not like seeing their creatures treated this way.”
“But this place belongs to the King of Yorq. How could he do something evil?”
The boy is a sharp one.
“The King of Yorq would never do this. But I’m going to find out who is.”
The boy’s eyes went wide. “You know the King of Yorq?”
Kita nodded.
“Wow, then you really must work for the light. I’m sorry I didn’t believe you.”
“It’s ok. You have the right to be suspicious. I do need your help, though. I need to get what’s behind the big metal door. Afterward, I’ll get you out of here and somewhere safe.”
“You want to see the cat queen? She’s evil! She attacked and killed lots of men.”
Cat queen? “I know, but I need to know why and then defeat her—if necessary. I’m hoping to bring her to the side of the light.” How much longer can I keep this up? As long as it takes to get this kid’s help.
The boy handed the talisman to her. “This is the key. Push it into the groove and turn. The door will open.”
“Thank you. I’ll be back as quickly as I can.” Kita turned to leave as Sarge pushed his way under the desk.
The boy screamed, “It’s a war cat, stop it! Kill it! It will eat me!”
Kita shoved Sarge out from under the desk. “It’s ok. This is my war cat, Sarge.”
The kid’s mouth fell open. “You have a war cat? Wow, where did you get him?”
“He was a gift from the King of Yorq. He gave him to me when I…first arrived here. If you like, I can leave him here with you while I am away. He likes to play, just don’t pull on his tail, ok?”
“I can? Please?”
“Sure. Sarge”—the big cat came over and stuck his head against Kita’s thigh, and she scratched his ears— “I need you to stay and protect the boy until I come back.”
Sarge licked Kita’s hand.
“Good. I’ll be back shortly.”
Standing in front of the massive metal door in the b
arracks, Kita pushed the talisman into the slot. The sound of gears grinding came from inside the door as it swung inward. Kita entered the rocky passage, alert for danger. As she moved down the path, the temperature rose, but her body’s augmentations kept her cool, even as she had trouble breathing from the heat.
The path ended in a circular room with a large pool of lava in the center. Above the pool, an inverse conical platform balanced on a thin cylinder. Three smaller platforms moving at various speeds and directions circled the main platform. On the main platform lay a gray lump.
Kita zoomed in. From the back, the lump had the curves of a woman, but gray fur ran along her back, and finer, shorter fur covered her legs. Black rosettes like Sarge's covered her. An enormous tail sat limp along the woman's cat-like lower legs. The tail must be as long as she is tall.
Something bumped against Kita’s leg. The war cats crowded around her.
“I take it you want me to go get her?” Kita asked the war cat that bumped her. She received a huff.
Kita sighed. It wasn’t going to be an easy jump, even with her new abilities.
Intense heat rose from the lava as she stepped to the edge, but the rising heat did create an updraft. Kita studied the circling platforms. The outer platform moved much slower than the other two. The middle platform moved in the opposite direction. The inner platform moved at twice the speed of the outer platform. Goodie…
Once she was confident she had the pattern, Kita readied herself as the platforms came around again. A nagging suspicion about the stability of the platforms pulled at her, but she ignored it. She took two steps and leaped.
As she landed on the first platform, the force pushed the platform down and it wobbled, confirming her suspicion. The unsteady platform sapped her momentum. Even the slightest shift in weight caused the platform to tilt. She knelt to lower her center of gravity and didn’t move.
If she tried to jump again, the platform might become so unsteady she wouldn’t be able to put any power into the leap. A constant buzzing noise in her ear that had started when she’d reached the platform added to her annoyance and frustration. How does a bug live down here? She couldn’t find any insects, but the buzzing grew stronger the closer she got to the platform. She laid down, spreading herself evenly, and looked over the edge. It was like looking into a hot oven. Unlike the rocky top of the platform, a ring of tiny metal half-spheres encircled a large one in the middle under the platform. A thin wire with a ball on top stuck out of one of the spheres. Antenna popped into her head. Whatever that is. Didn’t Omega say I could connect? ...
With a thought, the buzzing increased and became a steady tone. In her mind, an interface appeared. The menu contained several choices: pad stability, pad controls, and exit. Kita tried controls, but nothing in the menu was accessible. A blinking warning at the bottom flashed OVERRIDE. She tapped pad stability. The screen contained three sliders labeled x-axis, y-axis, and z-axis sensitivity. The sliders had a range from very sensitive to off. The z-axis and the x-axis settings read VERY SENSITIVE. The y-axis was in the middle. Kita pushed it toward off. The pad climbed a few inches. Curiously, she pushed it to off, and the pad fell. She pushed the slider back, and the pad returned to its previous height.
Kita set the other sliders to the OFF settings. She stood up and shifted her weight about to test the pad. She found it steady, like being on solid ground. Now, how do I get rid of the display in my head? Disconnect? The tone vanished, and the buzzing returned to Kita’s ears. She shook her head. Everything comes at a cost.
Kita jumped between the smaller pads, resetting the stability controls as she went. Landing on the edge of the big pad, it pitched backward. Kita threw herself down next to the woman. She hadn’t seen the woman’s face earlier and was expecting something odd. Instead, it felt like the air had been sucked out of the room.
The woman’s face looked like a war cat’s, but it was finer, softer, and more delicate, made to fit a human body. She had small triangular ears. A fringe of fur framed her face. Long fur, like on her back, covered the outsides of her arms. A short, fine thick fur covered everything else, including the backs of her human-like hands. “Beautiful—”
The pad shifted under them.
Kita connected to the pad. It had a different interface with a warning that read, “Mass parameter exceeded. Intruder detected. Shutdown procedures for parent and child pads will start in six seconds. Please save all work.”
Kita couldn’t find a way to override it. She disconnected, picked up the woman, and watched the pads. To her horror, they wobbled uncontrollably. The large pad tilted, and the edge dipped into the lava.
If there was ever a time I wish I could control my berserking, it would be now. Come on. I’m plenty scared! Come on. Come on…Dammit! I just found her. I don’t want to lose her! Not this way…Maybe not ever…
A red halo closed around Kita’s vision, and the world slowed to a crawl. The pads came into line, and she jumped between them. Even with her extra strength, Kita struggled to make the jumps with twice her weight. They landed in a heap at the edge of the lava pool. Kita crawled over to the woman and checked for signs of life. Her heartbeat faintly and breathing was shallow, but her stomach growled. I know the feeling…
The war cats nudged and licked the woman. After one overly enthusiastic licker, the woman pushed him away with a weak set of growls and chuffs.
Kita blew out her bated breath and knelt beside the woman. She tried to focus on Kita but was unable. Kita pulled out her water bag, poured some water into her hand, and offered it. The woman’s tongue scratched like Sarge's, but, to Kita’s relief, it wasn’t as rough.
She drank three handfuls before she spoke, “Food…”
The raspy and weak voice sounded wonderful to Kita's ears. How long has it been since the last time she made a human sound?
Kita pulled out some ration bars. She opened one, tore off a small piece, and offered it to the woman. Kita fed her the entire bar and gave her part of another when a wave of emotional energy crashed in on her. She pulled out all the bars she carried and gave them to the woman. “Here take these. I’ll be right back, ok?” Kita hoped the tears in her eyes hadn’t reached her voice. The woman didn’t say anything but kept eating. A girl after my own heart.
Kita waded through the war cats and found an empty place to sit and let nature run its course. At least this time I'm not the center of attention, and no one is trying to rush me.
Kita cried, until something soft brushed her ear. She lifted her head to find the woman standing over her. Her large tail lay draped over an arm, twitching away. She looked elegant. Can any cat keep their tail still, ever?
“Are you ok?” said the woman.
Kita wiped at her tears. “It’s stupid, but I can't help it,” she said and stood up.
“The cats tell me you are to thank for my rescue.”
Kita blushed. “It’s no problem. I believe your cats came and found me.”
The woman’s whiskers drooped, and her ears lowered. “I hope they didn’t drag you here.”
“No, I chased them.” The woman’s blue eyes went wide. “I believe they convinced my cat that I was what they needed.”
“You have a war cat?” she said in a disapproving tone.
“Yes. He was a gift from the King of Yorq. I pulled Sarge out of a litter to play with him when I was a little girl, and he imprinted on me. The litter master was furious because Sarge was now useless. He tried to kill Sarge, but I screamed until someone came. It happened to be the king. Since then, he’s always at my side.”
“I see. Well, thank you very much for your rescue. I need to tend to the cats.”
Kita knew a dismissal when she heard one. Saddened and frustrated, she went back toward the barracks to find Sarge and the boy. In a sudden fit of uncontrollable rage, she struck a rock outcropping. The rock exploded into chunks, flying down the passage. She’d taken all the skin off her knuckles and could see the dull shine of her metal bones beneath.
It should at least hurt more…
Kita found the boy and Sarge playing. They'd turned the room upside down in their adventures. Kita stood in the doorway, amused.
The boy stopped running when Sarge saw her. The cat slinked over to her.
“Having fun?” Kita directed it more at Sarge than the boy.
“Fallen Angel, you’re back! We were playing Fall of the Castle of Leedenshire. Sarge played the dragon, and I played the mighty Sir George the Dragonslayer.”
“You weren’t hitting him with anything, were you?” Kita said in a disapproving tone.
“No! I spent most of my time being eaten,” the boy said embarrassed.
“That’s good. I’m finished, and I’m going to take you home.”
“I don’t have a home,” the boy said glumly.
“Don’t worry. I know a place that will take care of you.” Kita took him by the hand and led him toward the door. She jerked to a stop, surprised to find the cat-woman standing in the doorway.
“Fallen Angel, it’s the cat queen! Run! She’ll eat us both!”
Kita watched with amusement as he ran and hid behind the desk. She wasn’t so amused when she turned back to the cat queen. “Did you want something, or did you just do that to frighten him?”
“I’m sorry, I mean no harm. My cats also tell me you are the one who freed them?” the woman said with an uncomfortable look in her eyes.
“Yes. I guessed they wouldn’t leave until they knew you were safe. I hope now they have left and gotten out of this charnel house.”
Sarge chuffed. The woman knelt down before him.
“You are a great-grandcub of…” The woman spoke no words but a mix of growls and hisses. The pair talked back and forth. Is she going to try and take Sarge from me? Fear electrified Kita’s nailbeds. When the woman stood up, Sarge sat on Kita’s foot and wrapped his long tail around her.
“I have misjudged you," said the woman. She bowed her head. "When you said you had a war cat, I thought you meant like most people have war cats—chained to something. He tells me you are his friend and companion. You treat him better than you treat yourself. He also does not wish to return to the mountains. Given a choice, he would rather stay with you.”