Something’s coming. It’s big, very big... and it isn’t friendly.
Harry Goldman is back once more, and this time he’s living the domestic life up in the Catskill Mountains with Anastasia, his transgenic girlfriend. At the end of Catnip 2: Rise of the Transgenics, he went through the same process as Anastasia did. Now he’s the same as she is, and their only wish is to be left alone and to live their lives in peace.
Their peace is shattered by the arrival of a pig-man named Istvan. It seems that Istvan escaped from a laboratory in Hungary where yet another scientist was conducting transgenic experiments. In short order, the young couple is confronted by Szabo, a giant of a man who is more shark than man. He has plans not only for himself but also for others who wish to become as he is.
This is something that Harry cannot allow. Soon he, Anastasia and Istvan are circling the globe and making stops in Hungary and Serbia. Their journey ends in Russia where it all began. There, Harry meets the real brains behind the transgenics program and is once more involved with his girlfriend in a battle against those who’d destroy society, a battle that could very well cost them their lives.
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Revolution
Copyright © 2015 J.S. Frankel
ISBN: 978-1-4874-0400-0
Cover art by Carmen Waters
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Smashwords Edition
Revolution
Catnip Three
By
J.S. Frankel
Chapter One: Field of dreams
Harry Goldman smelled grass, dirt and flowers. It was night and he was running through a field, seeing nature up close, not as person looking down from the vantage point of five feet or more, but from the viewpoint of an animal slipping and sliding through the foliage at ground level on all fours, legs moving in a ceaseless, effortless rhythm. It was a distinct joy to be outdoors, in his element, alive and free.
He remembered emerging from his cabin at dusk, seeing the world unfold before him. It’s a big change from being cooped up here, he thought as he examined the greenery, nosing around a clump of clover just outside the cabin porch. It was tiring being kept inside all the time, a stultifying existence. Four walls, wood, stale air... this was better. A person was not supposed to live indoors all the time. It wasn’t healthy and it wasn’t natural, not in the least.
Here, he could be as one with the natural order of things. He looked behind him at the open door, expecting his girlfriend, Anastasia, to be there. “Anastasia,” he called out. “Are you coming?”
No answer came from her, and that perturbed him. In the past, she had always waited for him, had matched him step for step. Now, though, she wasn’t around, and he felt a sudden sense of loss. A second later, the bad feeling vanished and he looked at the greenery in front of him. She would catch up to him soon.
This being summertime, he sniffed and tested the air around him. Cottony warmth enveloped his body, caressed his fur and comforted his soul. When he inhaled the clean, sweet air, a sense of happiness filled him. The world lay swathed in darkness. Only the stars, pinpricks of light, sparkled and illuminated the landscape along with a full moon. The forest beckoned.
Running on all fours was an odd, although welcome sensation, unlike any he’d ever had. It was a liberating feeling, something he couldn’t easily define, yet exhilarating in its own right. Freedom—yes, that was the word—it was freedom to go and do what he pleased. This is how it has to be, he thought as he nosed through a thicket of grass, easily brushing aside the blades of greenery.
His body, small, sleek and powerful, moved with speed and economy. It was a revelation, movement being so easy, and he felt his muscles, compact, tightly coiled and yet flexible, work under his fur and propel him along. His legs ate up the dirt at a speed unknown to man. Another revelation occurred, and it had to do with his senses. Sharp beyond compare, they picked up the minutest sounds of the night.
There the call of a whippoorwill, the squeak of a field mouse searching for a tasty morsel, the mole digging and grinding in the dirt as it sensed him—all those sounds came at once. For anyone or anything else, it might have caused confusion. Not for him, though, as he differentiated them in his mind and marveled at how wonderful his new form was.
Harry had become a cat. Cats were small creatures, but fast and clever and agile, and they were natural hunters. Even though he was an animal, he did not let nature rule him. Instinct was not his master. Intelligence was. A real cat had few wishes in life other than food, warmth and exercise when it felt like it and not much else. Domesticated cats sometimes gave their owners purrs and rubs of affection, but that was in exchange for the creature comforts they could obtain.
Harry, though, was different, as he possessed a human’s intelligence. It would have been easy to catch one of the smaller animals out there. They could not match his speed or agility, but he did not wish to kill them. He was searching for something else, something larger, but did not know what it was. No matter, as he sensed that it would reveal itself in due time.
Up ahead, he smelled a rabbit’s warren. His eyesight, sharp and able to discern the faintest of movements, detected three brown rabbits foraging for food. They nibbled on the stems of some flowers, and as he slunk toward them, his feet padding quietly and purposefully over the soft ground, he wondered if they knew of his presence.
They did not, as they continued feeding on the juicy morsels in front of them. He approached them without fear. The largest of the rabbits, a male, twitched his nose up and down in a rapid motion and turned in his direction, yet did not run. In fact, he and the others regarded him with an air of calm. The smallest of the lot, a young doe, hopped over and sniffed his fur.
In turn, he gave her coat a quick examination with his nose. How unlike them, he thought, as he nosed around their space yet shied back appropriately, for he did not wish to frighten them.
Ordinarily they would have fled at the sight of a predator, but he was not interested in them. This was also a dream, and in dreams one could do as they wished, go anywhere they wanted and were not bound by the rules of time and space. As for Harry, he’d already gotten the scent of the rabbits and had no further interest in them. With a quick spring, he moved on, tested the environment with his nose and left his scent upon the grass.
A sound of scampering feet made him turn around. The rabbits had gone and they’d left in a hurry, not bothering to hide their trail and not taking care to keep silent. What could have spooked them? He arched his neck and put out his tongue as if to taste-test the air. The night air carried the smell of animal droppings. It came from up ahead. Venturing further on, he found that they’d been made by a stray dog. However, they we
re dry, which meant that the dog had long vanished from this area and he did not feel as if it would return.
Since nothing of note was behind him, he continued on, his feet picking up speed and moving tirelessly. He bounded over a small bush and found himself in a clearing, just open space and nothing else. The sounds of the night abruptly halted and then vanished. A void of silence filled his ears. He stood in the empty patch of grass and wondered what had happened. This was not how a forest should be.
He began to run again toward a thicket, but a second later, he stopped once more and his ears twitched. His nostrils dilated, he inhaled, and now the smell of danger permeated the atmosphere. Nothing that he could pinpoint right away, no, but there was definitely something out there.
After backing away and reassessing the danger by nosing around, he found nothing and set off again. He reached the thicket and entered a forest. Trees were everywhere and blocked off his path. His heart began to speed up as the sense of uneasiness within him mounted. He sniffed at a patch of moss near the base of a tree, smelling ammonia, droppings and something else.
It was the pungent smell of blood. Heavy and thick, its redolence painted the air. Harry stopped once more, confused, for who was doing this and why would there be blood now? No one answered his mental question. He tried to speak, but found that he could not. He’d always been able to speak, but now his vocal chords refused to work. Disconcerted, he continued on his way, searching and wondering and internally questioning what had gone wrong.
A feeling of impending doom settled over him, oozing through his fur into the very essence of his being. Afraid now, he backed off, the hair rising all over his body, and he gave a low moan of anger mixed with fear.
“You,” a voice said from up ahead.
Harry stopped in his tracks, his eyes growing wide. The trees abruptly split apart, rent by a giant hand that uprooted and then tossed them aside as a child would discard an unwanted toy. The person he’d been searching for had found him, but the individual who’d uttered the command was not a person. It was a thing well over six feet in height, towering over the plants and bushes and it blotted out the night. “You are dead!”
The hand—not a hand, but a giant claw—reached for him and only one thought ran through Harry’s mind. Escape! Wheeling around, he made a mad dash for the cabin. Four walls and artificial space or not, it offered safety and security. That was what he needed most.
The bushes and plants sped by in a blur and his breath came fast and hard. His heart thumped painfully in his chest, but he paid it no attention. In a blind rush for safety, he didn’t bother trying to plot a zigzag course. A feeling inside him spoke of a predator, something that could not and would not stop until it had found its prey.
And he was the prey.
The sound of heavy, menacing footsteps from behind him grew louder and shook the earth. The vibration, heavy and hurtful, spurred him on, but no matter how fast he ran it seemed as though the footsteps got ever closer...
Yes! The cabin loomed up ahead, the door open. With a leap, he ran inside. Desperate now, he threw his weight behind the door, legs scrabbling for purchase on the slick wood. With an effort, he shut the door, backed off and looked around.
It was a sparsely furnished place, just a table in the center of the room, a couple of chairs and a sofa. Harry first hid behind the table, but realized that it would offer no shelter. He then changed his mind and headed for the sofa. It was big, it was solid and it would hide him. He’d be safe now, wouldn’t he?
Or would he? The door began to shake and shiver under a series of smashes from the creature. Its roar made the windows tremble. Harry began to back up, the hair on his body rising in rage and terror, and the latter was winning. Any thoughts of running away stopped as with a sudden blast of sound, the door exploded off its hinges and flew across the room to smash into the opposite wall.
“You,” the monster bellowed in a voice that bespoke of a demon from the depths of hell. “I have come for you!”
At first, Harry thought of leaping to his left, but decided to stay where he was. The monster snuffled around. As if by magic, its snout seemed to increase in length. “I can smell your fur,” it said and a second later, the sofa flew into the air and landed with a crash at the other side of the cabin. “There you are,” said the creature with a sense of satisfaction.
His cover blown, escape plan number one lay in the windows, but they were too high up. Having no choice, he retreated to the far wall. Harry thought of jumping to his right, but when he tried, an invisible barrier stopped his advance. Growling in frustration, he tried the same tactic, this time to the left side, and came up against the same kind of barrier. He could not go backward. He was trapped. With a hiss of pure rage, he attempted to flee between the monster’s legs.
It didn’t work, as with a motion too fast for his eyes to follow, the creature reached down and snagged him by the throat. In a casual display of strength, it reached over with its free hand and crushed a corner of the table as if it were tissue paper. “You see, you see what I can do?” it asked.
“How about you see what I can do,” a voice called out.
Harry twisted his head and saw Anastasia, also in cat form, approach on the run. She leaped up and slashed at the monster’s head, drawing blood, thick, heavy and red, from its neck. The monster roared, but not in pain. It seemed that it liked being cut. With another casual move, it caught her around her waist and crushed her. It then tossed the limp corpse aside.
“No!” Harry screamed, his voice suddenly manifesting itself. This couldn’t be happening. His girlfriend, his love, his life—she was dead. “I’ll kill you for this!”
A laugh came from the monster. “Will you now?” it asked with the confidence of someone who had all the power in the world at his—or its—disposal.
With another effortless motion, it lifted him off the ground as easily as a child would lift a toy from the play chest. Harry struggled, clawed at the massive hand that had a hold of his throat and squirmed in a desperate effort to escape. His consciousness began to blur out and with it, his life. With his last breath, he croaked out, “Who are you?”
“I am your end,” the giant said. Grinning now, he began to squeeze...
Chapter Two: Cabin in the Woods
“No!”
Harry awoke with a shout, the sweat bursting from every pore. His heart hammered against his chest wall like a trip hammer on amphetamines. He wiped away the sweat on his forehead and looked around, his eyes darting left and right, taking in every detail. After taking in a deep breath, he found that all was normal.
Normal meant living in a log cabin, the cabin that he and Anastasia shared. Normal meant that their surroundings—the Catskill Mountains in upstate New York—were quiet and undisturbed. Normal meant that they were alone, untouched and safe. So if all was normal, then why was he feeling so uneasy, and why had he dreamed that dream?
“Hey, are you okay?”
Anastasia, his girlfriend of almost nine months, stirred beside him. She sat up to put her arm around his shoulder and repeated the question. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine,” he responded, trying to sound nonchalant when he’d just had the nightmare of all nightmares. Who cared if having a dream was supposed to be a cliché? It had been so real, the voice, the clutching hand... everything.
Worst of all was the idea that Anastasia had died in the dream and no, he was not about to tell her. This happened to be the first time she’d ever appeared in the dream. Without her... he shut that part of his mind down. To be without her would be the same as not breathing.
Still, the traces of the dream remained and the memory made him shiver, the warmth of the summer notwithstanding. The Catskills were cool at this time of year and most people used blankets. Harry had no need of pajamas. He wore only boxer shorts and slept with a t-shirt and nothing more.
After taking in another deep breath, he felt his heart resume its normal beat and nodded. Pitch blac
k though the room was, he saw just as well as in the light. Everything was as it should be. The place was spacious, replete with all the modernity one would expect in this day and age—fully equipped kitchen, internet connection, television, couches, telephone and more. He swung his gaze back to his girlfriend’s face. Her eyes held a look of deep concern.
“Nothing’s here,” she said. “I saw you checking things out. Night vision’s a real bonus, isn’t it?”
He nodded. One of the perks of being enhanced, he thought. His life of being enhanced had been short, only three months, but in that time he’d discovered strengths and abilities far beyond what anyone could have predicted.
It had all been due to Anastasia. He’d met her nine months earlier. She was a Russian girl and the product of transgenic engineering. Her genes had been mixed with those of a cat and while she retained her figure and her femininity, she had abilities far beyond those of someone who just had fur on her body. Faster, stronger and more agile than three gymnasts, power-lifters and mixed martial artists combined, she had claws, fighting skills and enhanced senses far above the norm.
She’d also suffered from amnesia. Over time, she remembered her name, the name of the scientist—now dead—who’d experimented on her, and what she’d been in her past life. It hadn’t been a happy one. She’d contracted AIDS, and the scientist had given her a new life at the expense of her humanity.
Harry had helped her as much as he could and had fallen in love with her along the way. Anastasia had felt the same way about him and they’d been inseparable ever since. They’d had many adventures, the latest being a duel to the death in Chernobyl, where she’d faced off against another cat-girl and defeated her.
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