Catalyst

by Anne McCaffrey

  “You mean anyone who eats the shiny bugs, directly or indirectly—like by eating something else that ate them—becomes a part of your scheme?”

  “If you must oversimplify, yes.”

  “And this person us bug-eaters or sons of bug-eaters are supposed to enthrall, how does it happen for them?”

  “That human will come to understand your heart and mind, and you will understand his in a profound bond between the two of you. In most cases the bond will be love. Its intensity will range from affection to adoration but will, for the most part, allow the clever cat to bend the human to his or her will.”

  “Well, then, you can let me out at the next ship. I’ve eaten the bug, as has my mother before me. I don’t know if the boy has or not, but he loves me. I need to find him if I’m going to get back to dominating him or whatever, because your scheme does not work beyond a certain distance.”

  “Ah, but you have other uses. Since the time when most of our attendants were taken to other planets, our feline civilization, once flourishing, is now diminishing. The purity of our bloodlines may prove our undoing. We require an infusion of genetic material from an unaffiliated breed whose superb qualities may be enhanced by our own.”

  Breeding and mousing, mousing and breeding. Was that all life was about? It seemed everyone who claimed to want me, with the exception of the boy, only did so because of the vermin I could catch or the kittens I could produce. What about this kitten? I wanted to ask them. Aren’t you missing a step here? Shouldn’t you be paying proper attention to how amazing I am, to what I am doing and what I want right now, before you skip straight to the next generation? I didn’t even feel any particular urge to breed yet. Hsst!

  “We are all mere links in the great chain of feline divinity,” Pshaw-Ra said, then licked his shoulder. “Except me, of course. I’m actually rather special.”

  “So are we headed back there, to your planet, so you can introduce me to the ladies?” I asked.

  “All in good time, my son, all in good time. You are my first acolyte, the first worthy of being recruited, as you alone of all of the ships’ cats I’ve encountered have benefited from the gifts of the kefer-ka. On our great journey we shall encounter other ships with other cats, and these we will draw unto us, recruiting the best, brightest, and most beautiful to join our ranks.”

  “Like you recruited me?”

  “Preferably with less mewling and yowling,” Pshaw-Ra said. “But for now, we sleep, we dream, and in our dreams we travel, seeking the minds of others of our kind and drawing them to us.”

  We would draw them to us as he had drawn me—and Kibble—to him, trying to save him. I just felt so betrayed, so violated, so used. So sleepy, suddenly. Nestling my head into the cradle of my own paws, I fell into a deep sleep.

  I don’t know how long I slept before I dreamed of the ship. I became aware of it as a distant dot. As it grew larger, Pshaw-Ra entered my dream. “Do you sense a cat? I don’t sense a cat. What kind of ship is that with no cat? I thought all of your ships had cats now, but this one has no cat.”

  He was right. There was something empty and sterile about the ship and the funny thing was, although I did not find a cat in my dream, I suddenly saw a young human sitting on her bunk weeping, hugging a pillow to her and stroking it with her hand. The ship had no cat, but it had a Cat Person.

  The dream Pshaw-Ra spat in disgust. “Useless!” he said, sitting down to wash beneath his dream tail.

  “Not really,” I told him. “That girl needs a cat. Your ship says that we—or at least you—are here. If the ship sees us, and she comes to rescue us, she will probably bring more fishie treats, just as Janina did. That would be good, wouldn’t it?”

  “You do not fool me, catling. You wish her to come so you may escape on her vessel. I was not born yesterday, you know. I am ancient and wise to all manner of subterfuge.”

  I thought the ship would probably stop anyway, and intended to do exactly as he suspected and hitch a ride back to it with the girl. But the dream ended with the ship gliding past our pointy pyramid vessel.

  “Hey! That’s not the custom!” I said. “They’re supposed to stop when they see the Cat on Board sign, whether they have a cat or not.”

  It became evident to us both over the course of our naps, our waking moments, our meals, our snoozes, our snacks, our rest periods, our games (he wasn’t as intriguing to chase as my own tail but his moves were somewhat less predictable), and our sleeps, that the custom had changed. More of the sterile, cheerless, catless ships passed us and none slowed, engaged us in their tractor beams, or made any attempt to see if we were indeed aboard and adrift as advertised.

  Pshaw-Ra was perplexed. “Are you somehow warning them away?” he demanded. “Because this has never happened to me before. The ships always stop and try to save me, but I hide while they try to find me. They sometimes leave behind offerings of food, and the kefer-ka return with them to their ships.”

  “So that’s how you spread the bugs,” I said. “But I haven’t warned anybody. How could I when there’s no other cat on board?”

  But then the day came when another ship approached. Its course seemed in opposition to the ones we’d been encountering. It had a cat on board. This time when Pshaw-Ra entered into his dream state to board the ship, I easily entered into it with him. I could not understand how I was able to do this, until we entered into the dream mind of the other cat and saw his world. Then I understood that I had an inherent connection that must have given me an advantage. Across his dish was inscribed his name: SPACE JOCKEY. My sire.

  The dish looked as if it had just been filled, crunchy nuggets of the Barque Cat fleet’s favorite mealtime treat mounding gently in the middle. In another corner of the room a sparkly pond of clear, fresh (for a spaceship) water shimmered with the very slight vibration of the ship’s propulsion system, beckoning, beckoning. A comfy, fluffy bed lay empty. In the dream, I looked out from the shadows. Above me was the rectangular berth of the CP, in front of me a barricade of cat toys.

  I won’t let them take me, my sire was thinking. I was unsure whether he was dreaming that he was hiding or whether he actually was and I was picking up his thoughts rather than his dreams. But I could feel his fury and his fear. After all I’ve done for them, how can they treat me like this? They think I don’t know, but I overheard them on the com to Galipolis. Impound, they said. My orderly argued against it, but he is of very low rank, despite the fact that he is my only human voice among the crew. No more valuable kittens, he said, and then the captain told him that my offspring were being impounded too, and my entire harem of cosmic queens. They think we’re infected with something. They want to “test” us. But my orderly asked if they would then return us, and the captain shook his head. “Not likely, Freeman,” he said. “If he’s not infected when they take him to the lab, after the contact with the contaminated beasts, he will be.”

  Nobody knows this ship like I do. As soon as someone opens this door, I will hide where they’ll never find me. I’ll miss my regular feedings but I can live on those delicious shiny bugs. There seem to be more since the last station. Besides, if I eat them all up, then my ship will be clean of them and the impound people won’t bother us. Yes, that’s what I’ll do. As soon as someone opens this door. Then I’ll hide and they’ll never find me until I’m ready.

  Then Space Jockey and his ship faded into my old nightmare of the field behind the barn on Sherwood and the wild canine carrying Git in his mouth.

  “Another one passed us by without attempting to board,” Pshaw-Ra observed aloud, interrupting my sleep.

  “Just as well since they’d have to turn us over for impound with the rest of the ships’ cats,” I told him, surprised to find that he had not picked this up for himself. “You mean you didn’t get that? I thought you read everyone and knew everything.”

  “Of course I did,” he said, stretching. “I was testing you.”

  “Sure you were,” I replied. “We’re g
oing to be out here for an eternity all by ourselves if this keeps up. I think universal domination may take a bit longer than you planned.”

  “You’ve fraternized with humans far more than I have. What is this impound like?”

  “I think it’s fatal,” I said. “At least, my sire seems to think so. My mother has always said he is a very brash and bold cat, a fighter, but he was frightened. Was going into hiding. Impound must be a very bad thing. I think it’s got to do with what I overheard the vet and Kibble talking about—a disease. I showed them that what worried them came just from eating the shiny bugs—the kefer-ka, as you call them. But someone seems to have decided those are dangerous too and is trying to impound them as well.”

  “Hmmm,” Pshaw-Ra said, finishing his stretch. “What a nuisance. I had forgotten how troublesome humans can be.”

  “Don’t you have any humans where you come from?”

  “Only a few, the ones who were too devoted to us to leave when the rest of their people were resettled on other worlds. Ours recognized that they would be unable to lead full and satisfying lives without us and stayed put. Many of us were worried when the majority of the people and a lot of the cats were taken away, but in truth it served as a selection process. Only the most intelligent, discerning, sensitive, and loyal humans remained with us, and those served us well. We for our part dealt with them generously, allowing them to stroke our fur, granting them purrs on occasion, and permitting audiences at the ends of our naps.”

  “It doesn’t sound much different from what we do,” I said.

  “Ah, but our attendants never dreamt of trying to impound us. They submitted to us in all things. Eventually.”

  I yawned. Submission took all the fun out of things, in my experience. When things submitted, it usually meant they were dead. Gone was the chase, the bounce and the pounce, the leap, the catch, the wrestling it to the floor. Submissive things didn’t initiate games, bring unexpected treats, or open new doors. I was surprised that Pshaw-Ra set so much store by it.

  “You are very very young,” he told me, answering the thought I had not shared with him. “One day you will learn that you can enjoy nothing if you do not control it enough to guarantee that it does not betray you.”

  Being in that ship with that old cat and his warnings was so boring that I slept a great deal, feeling my tail and fur grow longer and my life shrink to the size of that small cabin and corridor. Ships came with anxious cats who knew something bad was about to happen to them. Ships went, empty, sterile, sad, and catless.

  I suggested we enter no more dreams. The men who impounded other cats might come for us too if we brought ourselves to their attention. Pshaw-Ra reset our course for his own world. We might as well enjoy shore leave while the rest of the universe went mad. Dispirited by the increasingly catless void of space, I slept.

  And unbidden, when I had all but given up hope, my boy came to me at last.

  CHAPTER 19

  Jubal spent the first day out of Galipolis fuming and frustrated. Sosi burst into tears in the middle of chores and would not be distracted. Her grief for Hadley was noisy and angry, and it made him feel worse than ever about Chester, not to mention Chessie, the kittens, and the rest of the poor impounded animals.

  He was also bitterly disappointed that Pop had not chosen to honor his contract with the Ranzo, but had gone off doing whatever it was that Pop did when he thought no one was looking. At least now he’d have Doc riding herd on him, if he didn’t find the kitten inconvenient and abandon him somewhere or give him up to the GG goons. Jubal didn’t see how he could, but then, you never knew with the old man. Meanwhile, Pop had what Jubal wished he still had: someone to keep him company, to do stuff with him, read with him, help him figure things out, as well as all the regular cat things like sleeping beside him and purring, licking his face and hands sometimes.

  When Jubal had finished his chores, he threw himself onto his bunk and fell asleep.

  He awoke—or thought he did—when he felt paws land on the end of his bunk and walk across his legs. Hadley used to do that sometimes, but Hadley was gone. And then, as he came more fully awake, he knew that these were not Hadley paws marching across his calves. The cat that belonged to those paws was lighter and stepped more quickly than Hadley. The feel of this cat, although he weighed a ton compared to what he had before, was much more, wonderfully more, familiar.

  “Chester?” Jubal said, rolling carefully onto his back and opening his eyes. There was no cat there, not physically. But he felt Chester’s presence more strongly than he ever had since they’d been forced apart.

  “Prrt,” Chester’s voice said clearly, and the invisible paws leaped from his legs and onto the cabin floor, trotting to the door.

  Jubal followed and opened the door. Trying to understand what was happening, why he was suddenly aware of the cat as he had not been for so many weeks, he had a terrible thought. Had Chester been impounded and killed? Was this a cat ghost returning to say good-bye?

  A claw through the lower leg of his shipsuit trousers goaded him forward. He had the sense that there wasn’t much time. The paws padded up the carpeted corridor, and periodic nudges—mental ones and seemingly physical ones—led him to the Ranzo’s bridge. The crew was tired after the exhausting inspection and enforced shore leave, reloading the ship and threading it back through the heavy traffic orbiting the planet and circling the city. Once the course was set and the Ranzo was back in space, the bridge crew could doze at their duty stations. The first officer and navigator sat with their heads thrown back against the backs of their chairs, snoring. Beulah cradled her head in her arms and leaned across her console, her back rising and falling slightly with her breathing.

  The invisible cat feet hopped across the console, and a cat shadow was outlined against the forward viewscreen. Jubal saw it then. It was very small, in the distance, another ship.

  He touched the zoom control and the ship shot forward, into his face. A derelict, drifting and dark, but the COB sign, along with the outline of a sitting cat, was outlined against it.

  You want me to save that cat, Chester? Is that why you’re here?

  It was. Emphatically. And in a rush, Janina’s story of losing Chester on a strange derelict came back to Jubal. Before he could reach up to touch the silky cool fur that brushed his cheek, the cat shadow leaped through the viewport, into the derelict, and shrank as the zoom reversed.

  Beulah had awakened and was staring at him.

  “What is it, Jubal?”

  “Chester. He’s on that derelict out there, Beulah. He wants me to come and get him.”

  “Jubal, you can’t—”

  “No, really. He is. Janina lost him there. There’s another cat.”

  “We’d just have to give him up again, Jubal. He’s better off out there.”

  “No. No, he’s not. He wants us to come and get him.”

  “You can’t know that, honey.”

  “But I do. I do. Please, Beulah. Please help us. There’s got to be a way for us to do it. Please. We have to try. He’ll starve to death if we just leave him.”

  “The GG goons will take him off to that lab if you don’t leave him,” Beulah said with a sleepy sigh that actually reminded him a little of a cat waking up.

  “I’ve gotta go, Beulah. He knows I’m here. He came to get me.”

  “Where is he?” Sosi asked.

  “Not you too!” Beulah said.

  “Hadley came. I felt him jump up on my bed,” Sosi said.

  “It was Chester,” Jubal told her. “He came looking for me.”

  “I don’t think so. Where is he? I’m sure it was Hadley.”

  “He went back to his spaceship.” Jubal pointed. The ship was nearer their position now.

  “How?”

  Jubal shrugged. “I was telling Beulah I need to go get him or at least take him more food.”

  “I’m going too.”

  By now Captain Loloma had awakened too, and he waved his hands for
them to calm down.“Whoa. I’ll have no mutiny aboard this vessel. Understood?”

  “Daddy, look. There’s a Cat on Board sign.”

  “Honey, we’d just have to give that cat up too if we rescued it.”

  “But we can’t just let it starve, Daddy. It’s already isolated on its ship. Can’t we just take it some food and water?”

  “It may have run out of oxygen,” her father said, not unkindly. “It would just upset you again. No more cats.”

  “Captain, the cat came to the kids in a dream,” Beulah said. “Jubal thinks the cat he lost is on board. There is some corroborative evidence from the Molly Daise’s CP, Janina.”

  “A dream?” To Jubal’s surprise, the captain did not dismiss this as nonsense. He rubbed his chin with one hand, considering, and gave his daughter a look Jubal didn’t understand but that seemed to indicate that the two of them placed more than the ordinary emphasis on dreams.

  Sosi nodded gravely and put her hand on his sleeve.

  “Yes, sir,” Jubal said, backing her up. “We both felt paws land on our bed. And in the dream Chester had me follow him to the bridge to show me the ship, then he jumped through the viewscreen and back aboard the derelict.”

  “Well, you could just go see if the cats are all right, I guess,” the captain said. “Beulah, you go.”

  “Begging your pardon, sir, but he’s my cat,” Jubal said. “I need to go too.”

  “Me too,” Sosi said. “I’m the Cat Person. It’s my job.”

  “I cannot ask my com officer to babysit you two on an away mission.”

  “It’s okay, sir. They’ll be a lot more trouble if we don’t let them go,” Beulah said. “I’ll take responsibility. Besides, Jubal will come in handy if I have any difficulty. He’s very good with repair and maintenance.”