by Ged Gillmore
‘Oh boohoo, the indignity!’ she wept. ‘The horrible errors of fate; the wicked way of the world!’
Well, I don’t know about you, but I’ve had it up to here (the rear of my ears) with Minnie’s weir of tears, so I’m going to fast-forward half an hour to when she’s finished crying. Here she is, still on the road, walking much more slowly by now, and this time when she hears a bus, she runs full pelt to the next bus stop—sticking out a paw just to be clear of her intentions.
Fortunately for Minnie, the driver of this bus was different from the one she’d met thirty minutes before, or I imagine he may not have stopped. Unfortunately for Minnie, he had the exact same way of speaking to cats.
‘Oh, look at the puddy-wuddy-cutey cat!’ he said as he pulled up at the stop. ‘Where do you want to go, puddykins?’
‘Miaow,’ said Minnie. ‘And step on it.’
And then, without a further word, she walked to the very back seat and lay across it, spreading out as much as she could (which was less than it had once been) to stop anyone sitting beside her. She was in no mood for talking.
WHAT A DRENCHING!
It might have been the warmest day in weeks, but it was still far too cold to be standing around soaked to the skin. But poor Tuck didn’t have a choice. Nor, I hasten to add, did the five hundred and fifty-five feline employees of CIA HQ. The VIP’s (Very Important Pussies) had been whisked away in a fleet of limousines, but the rest of them were standing woeful and wet in the winter wind, a safe distance away from the disguised entrance to their workplace.
This entrance—which you’ll remember was the boot of an old VW—was, nonetheless, a hive of activity. Firecats in shiny helmets rushed in and out, and all sorts of cats in uniforms were miaowing orders at each other and asking to see ID. Not that many of the cats in the field were watching this activity. Oh unimpressed employees, no! They were all glowering at Tuck, or sometimes outright pointing at him, making no disguise of the fact that he was the subject of their hissing and mewling.
‘I still don’t understand how I made it rain,’ said Tuck sadly.
He and Bunk were standing apart from the others in an overgrown corner of the field which ran towards the first (or last depending on your direction of travel) trees of the Great Dark Forest.
‘You hit the fire alarm,’ Bunk explained for the fifteenth time. ‘That activates the sprinklers and extinguishers. There’s so much wiring and weaponry and whizz-bang machinery down there they get very nervous about fires.’
‘But I hate the wet,’ said Tuck. ‘I thought all cats did.’
‘Better wet than burned. Uh-oh, here’s trouble. Stand to attention.’
The sleek Siamese who had sent them into the dark room was approaching with a fierce look on her face.
‘BunkTech 2000!’
‘Yes, ma’am.’
Bunk sat up straight with his tail in a perfect line behind him.
‘Can you confirm this idiotic individual did not see the faces of any of the Board?’
‘He says not, ma’am.’
The Siamese rolled her eyes in a way which reminded Tuck of Ginger, then addressed her next question to him directly.
‘Your name is Tuck, I believe?’
‘Yes, mammy.’
‘Did you see any of the faces of the people in the room with you?’
Tuck looked around him. ‘We’re not in a room. Are we, mammy?’
‘I mean, downstairs,’ said the Siamese with a sigh which also reminded Tuck of Ginger, so much so that he suddenly missed her terribly. ‘Did you see the faces of the Board?’
‘I didn’t see anyone who looked bored,’ said Tuck. ‘I couldn’t see anyone at all. They might have been bored, but it was ever so dark. That’s why I was trying to turn the light on. Then suddenly it started raining and everyone was running and now we’re outside and it’s ever so cold. I’ve never been an undercover agent before.’
The Siamese gave him an evil stare, then beckoned Bunk away for a few words alone. Tuck could only pick up a few words, or parts of words, but even these he didn’t understand: ‘—iot’ and ‘—upid’ and ‘—nintelligent’. None of it made sense. Finally, the Siamese walked away, no happier than she’d arrived, and Bunk walked slowly back to Tuck.
‘You’re free to go,’ he said. ‘I convinced her you hadn’t breached security. Other than causing a total evacuation, thereby revealing to the feline fire brigade, the purrlice service and any passing birds the exact location of the headquarters of the most secret organisation in all of cattery.’
‘Oh gosh,’ said Tuck, smiling for the first time in at least an hour. ‘I thought I’d done something wrong. So where are we going then?’
Bunk looked away, the wind pushing his damp whiskers back against his face. ‘We are going nowhere. You can go where you want. I have to go back to the farm.’
‘Oh, but you can’t go back there! You heard what they said, they said you could die and it wouldn’t matter. You’re completely expandable.’
Bunk turned back. The wind had made his eyes water.
‘This is goodbye,’ he said.
‘Oh no,’ said Tuck. ‘I hate goodbyes. Will you write? Just a paw print on a postcard? Or send me a tweet via the birds? Oh, oh …’
But he could say no more without crying and he knew how Bunk disliked him crying. He closed his eyes tight to keep the tears inside.
‘Why are you sad?’ he heard Bunk’s soft American voice ask.
‘Because you’re my friend,’ said Tuck. ‘And I don’t want you to get expanded. I want to go on spy adventures with you and talk.’
‘So come with me then.’
Well, that made Tuck open his eyes, forget about crying and stop talking, which is a lot of things for an intellectually-disinclined cat to do at the same time.
‘What?’
‘You heard me, Tuck. Come with me. You’re the only friend I’ve ever had and it would be less lonely if there were two of us.’
‘Back to the farm? But what about the Pong man and the Pong woman and the Pong poison plot and all the poor Pong pussies in prison? It’s so scary!’
‘Your choice,’ said Bunk. ‘I cannot encourage you to endanger your life. It was nice knowing you. Goodbye.’
And with that he turned and walked away towards the first (or last, depending on which way you’re travelling) trees of the Great Dark Forest.
‘Oh,’ said Tuck, watching him go. ‘Goodbye then.’
And not knowing what else to do, he turned and walked in the opposite direction. Then he walked to the left a bit so he didn’t have to get too close to the glowering glares and still stormy stares of undercover cats caught unawares. Then he walked to the left a bit more to avoid a group of muscular white toms dragging a rather long hose pipe. And then he walked to the left even more to avoid a group of tabbies comforting a young ginger who’d nearly been trampled in the evacuation. And then even more to the left … just … because … until soon he found himself facing in his original direction. He could see Bunk making his way through the rough grass at the edge of the car yard, back toward the forest. Even now, in the middle of the day, the shadows between the trees looked ominously dark, and Tuck knew he would lose sight of Bunk as soon as he got close to them. He stood there, watching, hoping Bunk would maybe turn around so he could give him a little wave. Then he stood there a little longer, wondering where he was supposed to go. He knew it wasn’t very far to the city centre, he could probably get there in a night’s travel. He’d certainly be able to find something to eat, and maybe he’d even find somewhere warm and snuggly and safe to sleep. But what was he supposed to do then? He had no idea where Minnie’s audition was, or when, and he’d given up hope of ever seeing Ginger again. He suddenly realised he’d never felt so lonely and unloved in his whole life. He tried to imagine what Ginger would say to him now if she was by his side, but instead he found himself thinking what Bunk would say.
‘There is nothing to fear,’ he whispered. �
��Except fear itself.’
Then, ‘Hang on,’ he said, as if he’d just had an idea.
And then ‘Hang on!’ he shouted, so that those cats who’d forgotten he was still there turned and scowled at him again.
‘Hang on, Bunk, hang on!’ yelled Tuck, and before he knew it he was running as fast as he could across the overgrown field of burnt-out cars, chasing after Bunk, desperate to catch him before he disappeared into the dark shadows of the trees.
WHAT A HOLE!
Ginger too was about to enter the darkness. She was sure that Bumfluff and Fleabomb had disappeared down the tunnel she’d found, but who knew what else was down there? OK, that’s an easy one. Bumfluff and Fleabomb knew, but you get the point.
‘Oh well,’ she thought. ‘Here goes.’
And with that, she put first her head, then her front legs, then her tight and toned torso, and then her back legs and, last of all, her tail, into the black mouth of the tunnel. It took a second or two for her eyes to adjust to the new level of darkness she found there, but (unlike Tuck’s eyes with a light shone at them) soon enough they did. Not that there was much to see, just a long dark hole boring down through the ground. But pooeeey!!! What a smell! It smelled like rats and wee and worms and bin juice, but mostly rats. The tunnel ran steeply downhill, and, as Ginger crept slowly along, it became wider. Soon she heard the sound of trickling water and could make out, a long way ahead, a faint glow of light.
‘Be brave,’ she said to herself. ‘Feel the fear and do it anyway.’
On and on she crept in the darkness, knowing neither what she was treading on, nor where she was going. All she knew was that the noise of running water was growing louder and louder; and there were other noises too: scuffles and scruffles and scraps and scrapes and squeaks and scratches and drips. But above all of those were the smells. Not only the pongy smells like before, but scrummy, scrumptious, delicious smells. Maybe it was that which encouraged her forwards. Certainly, it made her belly ache.
Soon enough—well, soon enough for you and me, but for Ginger it felt like ages—the tunnel ahead of her began to curve and the glow of light grew stronger. Ginger flinched as she suddenly saw the source of the light: a huge chamber with a ventilation shaft dug out of the ceiling, that obviously ran all the way to ground level. Now Ginger was really nervous. What kind of animal could dig tunnels and was also smart enough to think of ventilation shafts? Well, there was only one way to find out, so Ginger continued to crawl slowly forward.
As she did so, she discovered the space ahead of her wasn’t a chamber after all. It was simply another tunnel, but this one was much, much, larger than the one she was in. It had curved concrete walls and was so big a fully-grown human could stand in it. Her small tunnel ran into its side.
‘Oh!’ thought Ginger. ‘It’s a sewer!’
She realised she was approaching one of those huge tunnels which run under all cities to take away all the water humans waste and all of the waste that comes out of humans. The tunnel Ginger had crept down ended as a small hole in the sewer wall and, as she leant in and looked along it, she saw there were other small tunnels opening into it too. But this was nothing compared with what she saw on the sewer floor. It was like looking down from a second-storey window onto a busy street. But, whereas if you or I did that, we would see humans and cars, what Ginger saw was rats. Hundreds and hundreds of rats. And all of them were busy. Some were pushing little trolleys with boxes on them; some of them were pulling little trays with boxes on them; some of them were floating boxes in the deeper water in the middle of the sewer floor. And every single one of the boxes smelled delicious, so delicious they even cancelled out the pooey smell of the sewer. Then Ginger noticed what was written on every single box: Destination: Dingleberry Bottom.
Ginger gasped. What could it all mean? If the Riff Raff rats, with Fleabomb and Bumfluff’s help, had stolen their stores from the farm, why on earth would they be sending them back there?
‘Maybe yer still interested, so?’ said a voice right behind her.
Ginger gave such a jump that she nearly lost her footing and fell into the sewer full of rats below her. She crawled backwards into the dark, then pressed herself against the smaller tunnel wall to let her eyes adjust again.
‘Watch out,’ she said to Bumfluff McGuff once she could make him out. ‘I might eat you.’
‘Yer watch out,’ said Bumfluff. ‘I might squeal and yer’ll have ten thousand rats on yer tail.’
Ginger thought about it. She couldn’t remember how far it was back up the tunnel to the wasteland, but she wasn’t convinced she could outrun rats in such a confined space. And there was no cat in the world who could defend herself against so many of them.
‘What’s happening down there?’ she asked, nodding toward the sewer.
‘See,’ said Bumfluff looking behind him. ‘Didn’t I tell yer she’d be interested?’
‘Ay!’ Fleabomb’s voice came out of the darkness and soon his shiny little eyes appeared, his furry black body still invisible in the darkness. ‘And didn’t I tell ye she might eat ye, like?’
Bumfluff gave a ratty little smile and turned back to Ginger.
‘What yer see down there, big ginger cat, is a major trade agreement. It seems Mr so-called King Rat has done himself a big fat deal. Turns out, some major cat food producer wants all the food what cats find delicious from the entire region. “Get it by hook or crook”, that’s the motto, apparently. Well, King Rat’s a crook all right. Word on the street is there isn’t a food store in the city that hasn’t been pilfered. And, as we both know, he’s also branching out into the countryside.’
‘With your help,’ said Ginger with a frown.
‘Oh, yer can’t blame us,’ said Fleabomb. ‘They made us a lovely offer so they did, and it wasn’t like we had to—’
Ginger heard Fleabomb suddenly scuffle, and then watched as Bumfluff scuffled too, sitting up on his back legs, his nose twitching the air, his shiny little eyes wide and his tiny brown ears alert.
‘Someone’s coming,’ squeaked Fleabomb.
‘What?’ said Ginger. ‘From where?’
But when she cocked an ear she could hear it too. The unmistakeable noise of two or three rats, scampering down the dark tunnel towards them.
‘Negotiate,’ said Fleabomb quickly. ‘King Rat loves to negotiate.’
And with that, he ran past Ginger, Fleabomb close on his heels, towards the lower end of the tunnel. Then, before she could say another word, the two country rats disappeared over the edge and down into the sewer.
WHAT A DIFFERENCE!
‘We are to let ourselves be recaptured,’ Bunk explained to Tuck as they walked back through the Great Dark Forest. ‘I have had a system upgrade with a new tracking device, a new navigation device, and a new communications device. Once we have identified what the Pongs are doing, we will send a message back to CIA HQ for them to determine an appropriate course of action.’
‘Ooh, goody, goody, gumdrops,’ said Tuck, who had no idea what Bunk was talking about. He was so happy to be having an adventure with his friend again that he couldn’t listen properly over all the happy noises in his head. ‘And then will we live happily ever after?’
‘There is a 3.72% chance of that outcome,’ said Bunk.
‘Awesome,’ said Tuck. ‘Shall we sing a song?’
The Great Dark Forest didn’t look at all scary to Tuck today. He was with his best friend in the whole world on a second secret mission, and they were, like, total undercover cats. He was so happy he started to sing:
‘I’m a spy, I’m a spy
No one can deny,
So, don’t you try
Or even ask me why
‘I’m undercover
With my brand new brother
You can’t tell us from each other
As if we had the same mother.’
And Bunk seemed happy too, because he started to harmonise as if Tuck was singing in tune and anything rhymed. Bun
k sang:
‘I have no strings to strum,
So I will simply hum
With my friend who isn’t dumb,
Although he can’t do a sum.
‘I shouldn’t be dishing,
But we’re on a mission.
It isn’t nuclear fission
But Pongs under suspicion!
‘I used to be glum,
But now life’s so plum.
Tuck’s more than a chum,
He’s my bro’ from another mum.
‘Look how the trees glisten,
Like a painting by Titian.*
I’m clearly not wishing
To be away from this mission.’
(*Look it up)
As Tuck and Bunk crossed the forest, on and on through the afternoon, the air around them grew steadily colder. The snow, which over the previous days had softened, began to freeze again into strange jagged shapes, and the puddles of slush beside the path grew crackly and stiff. Tonight, it was clear, more snow would fall. Fortunately, Bunk’s system upgrades meant he could direct them back to Dingleberry Bottom farm in significantly less time than they had needed to travel from the farm to the CIA HQ. In fact, it was no more than a couple of hours walk across a narrow stretch of the Great Dark Forest before Tuck said, ‘Gosh, this looks like the road near our old farm.’ A little while later, he said, ‘Gosh, this looks like the driveway which runs off the road down to our old farm.’ And a little while after that he said, ‘Oh, look at those roofs! They look just like roofs at Dingleberry Bottom.’ Then he and Bunk reached the point of the driveway where it dipped suddenly down to the farm buildings, and Tuck said, ‘It is Dingleberry Bottom, what a coincidence! But, oh! What have they done? It looks so different!’
This was an understatement. In the short time Tuck had been away, the farm had had a complete makeover. The old barn, which used to lean at a forty-five-degree angle towards the ground, had been pushed straight again, held upright by six long beams of wood. The smokehouse had been painted in yellow and black diagonal stripes and now had a sliding window which faced down the driveway. Outside the window was a yellow metal bollard and attached to the bollard was one end of long wooden barrier which stretched across the driveway in a most foreboding way. As for the open-fronted farmhouse, it was barely open-fronted at all. Two humans in yellow helmets were standing on scaffolding building a thick new wall along its front, and were already halfway up the second level.
