But I was already starting to run.
“I have to take a rain check on that,” I called back to her. “There’s someplace I’ve really got to be!”
CHAPTER 48
Everything between the announcement of my victory to the coronation ceremony was a whirlwind. First, Q’bip and his fellow beavers festooned the Infinitude in celebratory banners; then ten thousand species of birds sang “Ode to the Emperor”; and finally the sky was lit horizon-to-horizon by a meteor shower spelling out my name.
That was a nice touch.
After these amusements, the crowd again converged upon the Eternal Steps. The braagnox came forward to read the Universal Code of Good Conduct, which apparently explained the rules that the Emperor was supposed to follow. Naturally, I paid no attention. Rules were for lackeys, not lords of all living matter.
This done, it was at last time for me to ascend the steps to claim the Imperial Scepter. Oh joy of joys!
My figure was dashing, my countenance majestic. Admittedly, I would have looked better without the sweater, but soon I would outlaw all knitted items, if not clothing in general. But even so, had any lord of the universe ever been so handsome, so regal, so imperial as I?
Obviously not.
And I knew this to be true. Because I was watching myself.
Or rather—to be precise—I was watching the X2. For, moments ago, we had swapped places, and now it was he who wore the sweater, while I stood next to Flooffee and the other members of AWESOME, playing the part of the mute but handsome Wyss-Zukk! Little did my enemies know that they were mere inches away from their new lord and emperor.
Admittedly, it was disappointing not to personally stand upon the Eternal Steps, basking in the glorious adoration of the animal multitudes. But I knew Ffangg and the other warlords would never simply sit around and watch me become emperor.
Indeed, as the ceremony progressed, Akorn, Ffangg, and Zok were in constant whispering consultation.
I approached them. I had always enjoyed the art of disguise, and my time masquerading as an Earth cat had only honed my already considerable skills.
“So, cooking up a sinister plot?” I asked casually. “Don’t keep it to yourselves. Let others in on the fun.”
“Go start your own conspiracy,” Ffangg hissed. “This one has quite enough members.”
He barely glanced in my direction. Akorn, on the other paw, gave me a cold and beady-eyed stare.
“Flooffee told us you couldn’t talk,” the squirrel commander said.
“I am breaking my silence because I cannot bear to see that Wyss-Kuzz be crowned!” I said. “Of course, he is magnificent, brilliant, and the best leader Lyttyrboks ever had. But why should he get to become emperor, too?”
“It doesn’t sound like you hate him as much as we heard,” Ffangg said, now also eyeing me suspiciously. “We were told that you considered him a disgrace to your entire line. And to all of catdom, for that matter, for his disgusting apology to the canines of the Dog Star Cluster.”
“Why . . . yes, that would be appalling, if it were actually true,” I said. “But don’t you think that Wyss-Kuzz was just pretending to apologize to gain the upper paw? He always was so good at lying.”
Ffangg, Akorn, and Zok looked at one another.
“Do you know what Wyss-Kuzz was never good at, my fellow warlords?” Ffangg said, unsheathing his claws.
“What that, Ffangg?” Zok said.
“Spying.”
Akorn’s eyes went wide in realization as his tiny paws scrabbled for a weapon. An instant later, he was aiming a pneumatic nut rocket right at my nose.
“This is the part where you beg for your miserable life, Klawde,” Ffangg said.
“Yeah, beg, little kitty!” Zok said. “Zok like begging.”
The fiends of AWESOME encircled me. I was trapped. So I did the single most defiant thing I could think of.
I purred.
“I will never beg!” I said. “Do your worst, Akorn!”
“With pleasure,” he chittered. “Say goodbye, Klawde!”
He sure was cute—even when he was about to disintegrate me.
CHAPTER 49
I got home just in time for the coronation ceremony. It was so insane! And nerve-racking. Me, being crowned Emperor of the Universe! I mean, I was actually just standing in our basement wearing the VQ helmet and controlling a catdroid, but it was still the best Thursday ever.
The braagnox gave a long speech about how great the responsibility of the Imperial Scepter was, and how the most important duty the new emperor had was to listen to his or her constituents. I wondered if Klawde was paying attention, because it didn’t sound like emperors had quite as much power as he thought they did.
It did make me feel better that Klawde wasn’t going to be able to enslave the entire universe or anything. But seeing all these species from millions of light-years away made me understand just how real this was. And I got super sad. Because as cool as this was for me—I mean, for Klawde—it also meant that my cat was never coming home.
“Code red, Little Ogre! Code red! Can you hear me?”
It was Flooffee, his voice coming directly into the VQ’s headphones.
“Mighty Lion has been compromised. The Evil Warlords have made their move. Engage X2 weapons system. I repeat, engage X2 weapons system!”
Mighty Lion was Klawde’s code name. But the warlords were supposed to be coming after me, not him!
I scanned the crowd and spotted Zok immediately. Using the X2’s advanced optics, I zoomed in, and I gasped when I saw Klawde. He was surrounded by all three of them—Zok, Ffangg, and Akorn. Gosh, Akorn really was adorable. But wait—was he holding some kind of gun? And pointing it right at Klawde?
ZAP!
I fired the X2’s laser eyes, and Akorn’s weapon evaporated.
Cool!
But what was Zok doing? She was opening her jaws and—oh no, how many teeth did she have?
And then I realized what the ground shark was going to do.
She was going to eat my cat!
CHAPTER 50
“Little toy guns big waste of time,” Zok said. “Zok hungry. Zok want feline for dinner!”
Staring into the mouth of Zok and all 794 of her razor teeth sent a shiver up my tail. But I was not destined to die as shark food. At least, not without a fight!
As the monstrous Zok lunged at me, I jumped skyward. SNAP! went her mighty jaws, but they bit only air as I landed atop her snout.
“Bad kitty!” the beast said, her eyes crossing as she focused on me. “Zok see you!”
“Not for long!” I said, and with a mighty Scissor Cut, I slashed at both of her eyes.
The shark roared and thrashed her head, trying to crush me with her teeth. SNAP SNAP SNAP! But I held on to her snout for dear life. Then, with a mighty buck, she shook my claws loose, flipped me into the air, and
CRUNCH!
Zok’s jaws slammed down upon a feline form.
Thankfully, it was not mine. The ogre had saved me again—this time by shoving me out of the way and flying the catdroid directly into the maw of the great beast!
With one mighty chomp, Zok bit my doppelgänger in half. It looked painful. For Zok, that is. She was spitting out bits of android parts and choking.
“That serves you right, you traitorous monstrosity!” I said. “Now bow down before your—”
“Not so fast, Klawdie,” Ffangg said as he and the rest of AWESOME closed in on me. “You don’t have your doppelgänger to protect you anymore.”
But Ffangg’s words were drowned out by the sound of growling. A lot of growling.
Barx! And the other space ranger dogs. They had formed a snarling ring around us. (A few bunnies and mice had stepped up, too, but they were decidedly less intimidating.)
“Ffangg—Zok�
��Akorn! You are under arrest,” Barx said. “For so many reasons.”
CHAPTER 51
The last thing I saw through the eyes of the catdroid was the inside of Zok’s mouth. That was a sight I’d never forget. Then the VQ screen went blank.
I kept rebooting, trying to get the transmission back, but the X2 was probably deep in the shark’s stomach. But what about Klawde? What had happened to him?
Thankfully, the VQ still had a direct link to Flooffee. “Little Ogre to Best Pal!” I repeated over and over. “Come in! Come in!” Finally, he answered.
“What happened?” I asked. “Is Klawde okay?”
“All good here, Little Ogre,” Flooffee said. “Mighty Lion is safe and sound.”
“Can I talk to him?” I said. “I want to say congratulations—and goodbye.”
“Well, he’s a little busy right now, what with getting the keys to the universe and all. But Barx wants to talk to you!”
“Hey, Raj, that sure was some AWESOME work you did back there,” Barx said. “Get it, AWESOME? Because that’s the name of the evil warlords group.”
“Yeah, Barx, I get it.” The lump in my throat made it hard to say anything else.
All the next day, I was totally bummed. I mean, Klawde didn’t die, and now he ruled all matter and stuff, so that was great. But I missed him already, and I wasn’t sure I was ever going to see him again. That night I couldn’t even eat my dinner. I just kept picking at it with a fork.
“What’s wrong, son?” Dad said. “I thought you’d be on top of the world with that big history project finally out of the way.”
I shrugged, pushing my rice to the other side of the plate.
“Are you worried about Klawde being sick?” Mom said. “If he’s not feeling better tomorrow morning, we’ll take him to the vet.”
What was I supposed to tell them? I’d said that Klawde had been hiding in a box in the basement for days, but now I had to admit the truth. Well, not the truth, because they’d never believe that. But I had to figure out some way to tell them that Klawde was gone, and that he was never coming home again.
Then my phone rang.
SUPREMEST ALL-POWERFUL WARLORD
“Mom! Dad! I gotta take this!” I said, running down into the basement.
“Klawde!” I said. “You called to say goodbye!”
“Please refer to me as Lord of All Living Matter,” Klawde said. “And no, you are wrong. I called to tell you I am on my way home. To your home.”
“My home?” I said. “You mean you’re coming here? To Earth?”
“Yes, ogre,” he said. “To Earth.”
“But why? Don’t you have to rule the universe from the Infinitude or whatever?” I said. “And don’t you hate Earth?”
“I don’t hate Earth, Raj,” Klawde said. “Stupid and ugly though you ogres are, I have come to value your, uh . . . kindness . . . and . . . hospitality. And I like the, um, lovely one moon your planet has. Yes, that’s why.”
For a moment, I couldn’t hear anything except static. Or was that choking? “Are you still there, Klawde?”
“Yes, just some stellar interference with the signal. Where was I? Ah yes. You, Raj, fought so bravely this day that I have decided to reward you by making Earth—or to be more precise, your fortress—the capital of the universe.”
This was so crazy! “Wait, so—”
“Do not ruin this moment by speaking!” he said. “I will return shortly. Be sure to have many cheese products prepared for my homecoming.”
And with that, the call was over. I was shocked. My cat was going to rule the universe—from my house! I really did have the best pet ever.
CHAPTER 52
As I could not bear whatever insipidness the boy-ogre was about to relate, I hung up on him. There was more than enough insipidness to be had aboard Barx’s ship.
“Wait, you can tell I got an A-plus in thermonuclear physics in kittygarten just by sniffing my butt?” Flooffee said. “That’s amazing!”
“It’s not amazing,” Barx said. “That’s just the wonder of the canine nose!”
Why this ship did not come equipped with an eject button, I did not know.
While I valued the boy-ogre’s efforts in saving me, this fact—and every other reason I’d given him—had nothing to do with my decision to return to his planet. I had decided to establish the imperial throne there not because I didn’t still loathe Earth—I did, intensely—but because it was the only place I was sure to be safe from AWESOME’s revenge.
Barx and his fellow space rangers had sent them to the prison planet of Ham-Sturr. But I knew that hellish place of work wheels and spherical plastic jails could not hold them for long.
And so, for my first imperial act, I had declared the Milky Way an Intergalactic Wilderness Preserve. I charged Barx with re-erecting his force field around the galaxy, and giving me the one and only code to unlock it. This would keep my enemies at bay, and Barx from coming to Earth to bother me.
All in all, it had been the greatest day any feline had ever had. And now came the best part: saying goodbye to that miserable canine.
“We’re just clear of the Infinitude now, Chief,” the mutt said. “You can catch the wormhole back to Earth, and it’ll close the minute you’re through it!”
“Well, Barx, I would like to say that it has been nice knowing you, but it has not,” I said. “Goodbye. Forever!”
“Forever is an awfully long time,” Barx said with a wag. “I have a feeling we’ll be seeing each other a little sooner than you think!”
Before I could wonder what he meant by that, Flooffee rubbed against me in a disgusting display of affection, getting his appallingly long fur up my nose.
“Masterfullest, it was so great to be back together again!”
“Yes, so great,” I said. “Now where are the controls for the teleporter?”
“The button’s right here, O Splendidest,” my minion said, pointing. “But first I just want to say that I—”
I pressed the button and was gone!
Mere milliseconds later, I was back on hideous, glorious Earth.
Let my evil reign begin!
TO BE CONTINUED
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Although a worthless Human, Johnny Marciano has redeemed himself somewhat by chronicling the glorious adventures of Klawde, Evil Alien Warlord Cat. His lesser work concerns the pointless doings of other worthless Humans, in books such as The Witches of Benevento, The No-Good Nine, and Madeline at the White House. He currently resides on the planet New Jersey.
Emily Chenoweth is a despicable Human living in Portland, Oregon, where the foul liquid known as rain falls approximately 140 days a year. Under the top secret alias Emily Raymond, she has collaborated with James Patterson on numerous best-selling books. There are three other useless Humans in her family, and two extremely ignorant Earth cats.
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Emperor of the Universe Page 9