by Adam Kline
Komatsuna bowed his hoary head and stroked his ashen mustache. He had learned many things, both in our world and in Hat, and foremost among them was the fact that he had never won an argument with Morel, who was unusually brave and equally stubborn and typically heavily armed. Crossing Morel was risky business. So Komatsuna sighed and acquiesced.
“If such is your decision,” he said at length, “you had better take a good supply of neeps.”
After a long and successful day of crossing Cecil’s path and causing all manner of calamities, Millikin returned to Hat. It had been a most refreshing feeling to note that whatever wrong he caused, Leek never once appeared to set things right. Millikin wished he had crossed Leek’s path sooner, in which case he would probably already be happy. But at least now he was finally well on his way. In fact, thanks to Millikin, Cecil had caught a bad cold and been sent promptly to bed, only to find it infested with bedbugs, which were most certainly biting. Success.
Deep within the fortress of the black cats, Millikin was bragging to his friends over a bit of catnip, which for once he’d decisively earned. And oh, how his wicked brethren purred with approval! But just when he was getting to the best part, a feline scout strode into the room and posted a picture on the bulletin board.
“New rabbit,” he said. “I spotted him in Sector Thirteen.”
Millikin couldn’t believe his eyes. For there, staring back at him from the bulletin board, was Leek.
Now, some black cats would have been quite content to know that their archnemeses had been banished to a dark and shadowy realm from which no hapless rabbit had ever returned. But Millikin was, as you know, an especially desperate black cat. And what’s more, he knew all too well that Leek was an especially persistent lucky rabbit. This did not bode well.
Of all the places he might have ended up, thought Millikin, it just had to be here. This will not stand!
“Allocate all available resources to the capture of this rabbit,” hissed Millikin aloud. “Dispatch the Dimmer-Dammers immediately, and engage with extreme prejudice. Sharpen your claws, army of darkness. For if I know Leek—and believe me, I do—he’s headed directly for us—and for Cecil Bean.”
Cecil Bean lay bedridden for several days, sniffling and sneezing and coughing and wheezing—and all the while trying desperately to fend off the battalion of bedbugs that had somehow appeared in his bed. At first, Cecil had assumed that a little bird or perhaps some exotic breed of anteater would happen along to dispatch the bedbugs. Perhaps a shriveled old woman would appear at his cottage door, bearing some fragrant poultice that would instantly cure his cold. But no such luck. It was the strangest thing. Cecil had experienced all sorts of bad luck over the years, but in the past, good luck had always made things better. Now, all of a sudden, his good luck seemed to have just . . . disappeared.
After several miserable days and nights, Cecil felt just well enough to get up, much to the disappointment of the bedbugs. And though the boy felt grave uncertainty about stepping out of doors, where all manner of ill luck undoubtedly awaited, he did have a hankering for a hot scone bathed in butter and apricot preserves. It didn’t seem like much to ask.
So Cecil walked the little gravel path to the village, all the while watching very carefully for dark clouds, mud puddles, rabid dogs, and plagues of locusts—anything that might ruin his day. And soon enough, without noteworthy mishap, he came to his favorite café, widely renowned for its scones, which were baked fresh very early every morning of the week.
“I would like one hot scone, please,” said Cecil to the restaurateur, “with butter and apricot preserves.”
“We’re out of scones,” replied the restaurateur, “as well as butter and preserves. All we have left is liver. And I’m afraid it isn’t overly fresh.”
Cecil paused a moment before walking right back out to sit on the curb and cry. Cecil didn’t care for liver of even the freshest variety. He didn’t much like to cry, either, but it did happen on rare occasions when it seemed that all was surely lost and that he’d never be happy again. This was one of those times—and perhaps the worst time that Cecil could ever remember.
“It seems that someone,” said a voice from behind him, “is down on his luck.”
Cecil turned to spy a mysterious gentleman sitting at a small table, aglow in a narrow but brilliant swath of sunshine. The gentleman was having breakfast, and he had been watching Cecil for some time. As he looked upon the boy seated sadly on the curb, a passing motorcar whizzed through a deep puddle, soaking Cecil right down to his tighty-whities.
“Join me for breakfast?” offered the mysterious gentleman. “I happen to have an extra scone.”
Cecil sadly sloshed over and sat down. The proffered scone was, surprisingly, still steaming. What’s more, there was even a bit of butter as well as apricot preserves.
“Thank you very much,” said Cecil.
“You’re quite welcome,” replied the gentleman. “It seems the least one can do for a boy who’s lost his lucky rabbit.”
Cecil didn’t quite know what to make of that.
“Oh yes, it’s all too obvious,” said the gentleman, noting the boy’s confusion. “You are lacking in luck, a circumstance that indicates the absence of your rabbit. And without said rabbit, you haven’t anyone to offset the devious machinations of your personal black cat. Quite the tragic affliction. I’ve seen it before.”
Cecil wondered if the mysterious gentleman was just slightly off his rocker. But the sparkle in his eye seemed more sincere than mad.
“Everyone in the world experiences good luck and bad, courtesy of the rabbits and cats, respectively,” explained the gentleman. “One almost never sees them, of course, but there are many simple truths in the world that one never actually sees. Black cats are terribly clever creatures, with very few natural predators, so one rarely loses one’s cat. But lucky rabbits are a different matter. The rabbits do have predators—and one especially bad one in particular. I wonder if perhaps you’ve heard of a man named Imbrolio.”
“The magician!” cried Cecil.
“Hardly,” huffed the gentleman, rolling his eyes. “The Great Imbrolio is neither great nor is he a true magician. But he does possess one item of true magic, an item I suspect we may blame for the disappearance of your rabbit.”
“The hat!” said Cecil. Suddenly the boy realized why the sad little rabbit from Imbrolio’s trick had seemed so exceedingly familiar: he’d known him, in a way, all his life.
“But how do you know all this?” he asked the mysterious gentleman.
“Because it’s my hat.”
“Oh,” replied Cecil, for lack of a better reply.
“At least it was,” said the gentleman with a sigh. “You see, Imbrolio was once my assistant. Not a very good one, of course. No panache, you see, and no respect for true magic whatsoever. One day, I awoke to find that he’d stolen away and taken my hat with him. But I suppose I might have expected as much from a fellow with no panache.”
“What a terrible stroke of bad luck!” exclaimed Cecil.
“Luck? Not at all, my boy. Really more a matter of poor manners. Good and bad luck hold little sway over me, you see. My own lucky rabbit currently resides in a retirement community, pursuing a long-standing interest in model trains, of all things. We’re still in touch at holidays. And my cat quit ages ago, once he realized that his powers were utterly ineffectual.”
“But how can that be?” wondered Cecil. “Everyone has good and bad luck.”
“Indeed,” replied the gentleman. “But I know something that very few people know.”
“What’s that?”
“A true magician,” said the gentleman, “never reveals his secrets.”
“Oh,” replied Cecil, again for lack of a better reply.
“But I will reveal this.” The gentleman smiled kindly. “A rabbit can, in fact, be extracted from my hat. Imbrolio just doesn’t know how. So should you decide that your rabbit is in need of saving, you need o
nly find the hat and extract him. It’s a surprisingly simple process, should one know the magic word.”
“What’s the magic word?” inquired Cecil, deciding right there and then that extraction of his lucky rabbit was of paramount import.
“As I said, a true magician never reveals his secrets. Against our code, you see. But the answers to even the greatest of secrets are often right before us, if we only choose to look.”
Cecil considered the mysterious gentleman’s cryptic words, which were far too cryptic for his taste. But the man had given him a scone, which was something. And Cecil knew there was little use in asking a true magician to break the magician’s code. So he rose to his feet, and what little chest he had swelled in staunch resolution.
“Then I must find the villain Imbrolio,” said Cecil, “and save my rabbit. Thank you for the scone.”
With that, off dashed Cecil Bean, in search of the magic hat. As he ran, the mysterious gentleman sipped his tea and watched, and whispered a final farewell.
“Good luck.”
Chapter Three
“Neeps,” said Morel.
Leek and Morel had been walking for some time, long enough for Leek to realize that in Hat, the sun never shines. This, of course, means that very little grows in Hat. There are no parsnips, no fresh herbs, and certainly no green beans. What do grow are horrid, nasty things fueled by moonlight: black trees covered in thorns and sticky, creeping vines. Still, the rabbits had found that within their icy refuge it was possible to raise a rather bitter brand of rutabaga, which didn’t taste particularly pleasant but was certainly better than nothing. This rutabaga, once properly cured and dried, made for a passable means of sustenance, quite filling even in small amounts—and perfect for long adventures. Morel carried a small pouch of the stuff, which the pair had stopped to nibble.
“Neeps are what we call it once it’s dried.”
Leek munched sadly on his share, thinking all the while of his garden and his boy.
“We should keep moving,” said Morel. With that, she hoisted her weapons: a sharp sword slung at her back and a long spear, which she held before her in a most intimidating fashion. Leek himself carried no weapons. He had never felt the need for such things back home, and he had absolutely no idea how to use a conventional blade, as Morel clearly did. Leek had always felt that luck was his most potent weapon, though it was somehow reassuring to see Morel so heavily armed. Morel gave Leek a number of pleasant feelings, and reassurance was one of them.
“Stop daydreaming and hop to it,” snapped Morel, “or a Dimmer-Dammer will get you.”
Leek followed obediently, hopping after Morel just as quickly as he could. Leek caught up with his guide at the crest of a low rise, where the pair was met by a frigid gust of wind and a sight that made Leek’s whiskers curl with dread. For there before them, stretching gigantic and abysmal as far as the eye could see, was an ocean of pure and bottomless black.
“Behold the Great Ink,” whispered Morel. “Treacherous, bottomless, and dank. To brave its crossing means certain death for most.”
“But I must cross it,” said Leek, “for my boy.”
Morel did not respond but instead set about constructing a crude raft. She quickly felled a dozen thorny trees and stripped them of their vines, which snarled at the bite of her blade. In such a way, Morel soon lashed together the tiny vessel she hoped would carry them across. Leek, whom Morel regarded as largely useless, attempted to straighten his whiskers. He didn’t want Morel to know he was afraid.
“Help me push it into the surf,” she said.
Together, the rabbits pushed their craft into the blackness and hopped aboard. As it slipped slowly away from shore, Leek glanced back and wondered if it might not be so bad to live in an icy cave for the rest of his life, where he’d be chilly but categorically safe. But not Morel, who didn’t once look back. Morel looked only forward, for she too had a human to consider. Before long, the shoreline behind them faded into the Great Ink forever, and Leek caught himself hoping the same wouldn’t happen to them.
“How long will it take to cross?” asked Leek, rather fearing Morel’s response.
“I cannot say. Few have dared to brave the Ink, and none has ever returned. There are tales of that which lies beyond, but I do not trust my fate to tales. I trust only my spear.”
“Well, it is a very nice spear,” said Leek awkwardly. It was strange that, although covered entirely in a cozy suit of thick brown fur, Leek felt rather exposed around Morel. Which is to say, the she-rabbit made Leek starkly aware of all his flaws and fears, in a way he’d never been before. And yet she also made him feel as if he might prove awfully brave in a pinch. It was very strange indeed, feeling so flawed yet filled with potential. And Leek wasn’t quite certain what such strange feelings might come to mean in the end.
The pair sailed on in silence, a silence so profound that Leek finally decided to whistle a bit, just to be sure his ears were still working.
Then came a very faint sound, a deep drone that gave Leek’s ears very grave misgivings.
“I hear something!” whispered Leek.
Morel had heard it, too. She scanned the horizon, her warrior’s eyes and ears on full alert, trying to pinpoint its source.
“It’s all around us,” she realized, her voice grim with dread. And then she saw them.
“Dimmer-Dammers.”
From every direction came the Dimmer-Dammers: iron ships propelled at great speed by engines of mammoth size and power. Each emblazoned with the telltale logo of doom, the ships exhaled vapors that stank of sheer contempt. “We are lost,” Morel whispered to herself, “before we have scarcely begun.”
Leek could only watch as the ring of Dimmer-Dammers grew tight as a nautical noose. But before it closed upon them, the mighty dreadnoughts slowed and came to a halt. And to Leek’s everlasting surprise, an all-too-familiar black cat strode forward from the maw of his dark vessel and grinned, exposing his hideous fangs.
“Millikin!”
“I’d thought myself rid of you for good,” sneered the cat. “Yet here you are, out for a cruise in my pool. And with a girlfriend no less!”
“I am his guide and no more,” snapped Morel, brandishing her spear. “There are many ways to skin a cat, as I will gladly show you.”
“Alas, I haven’t time.” Millikin yawned. “You see, I’ve a little boy named Cecil Bean to think about, and I’ve been dreaming up all sorts of wicked things to do to him. Action item number one involves a large dog with a very full bladder and the tree where Cecil likes to sit and read.”
“Feckless hooligan!” cried Leek.
“But first,” said the cat with a smile, “I will see you sink to the depths of the darkest void.”
Before she quite knew what was happening, Morel found that she had stepped in front of Leek, as if to shield him from the danger. For a moment, she wondered why. But Morel would do the same for any rabbit, she supposed, even one as useless as Leek. Wouldn’t she?
As the she-rabbit stood before him, Leek also instinctively feared for his companion. But to fight was not his way. Instead, Leek reached gently for Morel and lightly brushed her coat with a paw—just as he would normally brush against the hem of Cecil’s trousers.
“Dimmer-Dammers,” cried Millikin, “ready torpedoes, and fire at will!”
But before the torpedoes could be willfully fired, the black murk beneath the raft grew just slightly blacker, then started to churn and boil. Millikin’s eyes narrowed to mere slits; he wasn’t quite sure what was happening.
That’s when a monster burst from the depths, mouth agape, to swallow the rabbits whole, raft and all.
The leviathan’s great bulk, encrusted with stones and mollusks, soared into the sky, eclipsing—for a moment—the moon. Its jaws snapped shut with a sinister, slimy slap, and with that, it twisted and plunged, back into the icy depths, soaking the cats in the process.
Millikin shivered, shook the water from his back, and thoughtfull
y licked one wet paw with his venomous, sandpaper tongue.
“Bad luck for you, old foe,” he snarled, “and good riddance.”
Leek thought it had been dark before, but the darkness inside the fish was something altogether different. There, deep within the bowels of the monster, even the cold moon of Hat could never reach. Leek couldn’t see the familiar tips of his whiskers, let alone Morel. He wished very hard for a carrot, as carrot consumption helps one to see in the dark. But alas, carrots simply don’t grow deep within the bowels of sea monsters. That’s a fact.
Morel, however, was a resourceful type of she-rabbit, and Leek could hear her rustling and bustling about. Soon enough, she had located the remains of their raft, and hacked a section of thorny wood from a log. She then struck a bit of tinder, still dry in its little waxed pouch, and produced a torch.
“That’s better,” said Morel.
But things weren’t really better, she thought. They had escaped the insidious Dimmer-Dammers only to be swallowed whole by a fish. No, she thought, things weren’t really better at all.
“At least we’re together.” Leek smiled.
Morel could only roll her eyes. She was quite accustomed to fighting and surviving all by herself and even liked it that way. At present, you see, Morel found little value in togetherness.
Then came the faintest sound of music. It was a sad and lonely sound, to be sure, but that didn’t make it any less surprising.
“What’s that?” whispered Leek.
“Only courage can answer such questions,” snapped Morel, clutching her spear before her. And with that, she strode forward, ever deeper into the gullet of the fish. Leek felt rather short on courage at the moment, but of course he quickly followed. To Leek, togetherness seemed increasingly important.
Leek went with Morel through the innards of the fish, and as they crept along, the music grew somewhat louder. When they reached the entrance to the monster’s cavernous stomach, Morel peeked in and beheld an unexpected sight.