“Berries for Cheetara”
By RD Rivero
**final
version**
It wasn’t
supposed to be this way.
With a
sigh, deep and heartsick, she clutched the blanket and tossed to her
right. To her left, behind her, snored the slumbering figure of the lord of the Thundercats,
sleeping fitfully, naked and unprotected.
The room itself was dark pitch, lightless but for the glow of moonlight
-- muffled and obscured by clouds -- seeping through the open windows and the
tint of plasmatic blue shinning from the hallway and bathroom fixtures across
thin lines of crevices to her eyes.
She sighed
again for it dawned on her that she was alone.
It came to her suddenly or maybe not so suddenly. Truth was she had been aware of it, knew it
all along, but in fragments only. And
that night, those gloomy, fractured ideas and vague notions culminated in a
sort of whimpering anticlimax revealing at last the totality of her
situation. She was alone despite the
intimacy of the moment -- the kiss and warmth of flesh -- it was as if she had
made love to a corpse. A soulless body unable to fully and completely be one with her
heart and mind.
She was
alone.
Cheetara
sobbed.
“What’s
the matter?” Liono
asked, whispering inaudibly into her ear, lips whisking just over her
flesh. “I didn’t hurt you?”
She gave
him a half smile and pet his cheek gently. “No, that’s not it.” Not that she could have told him, quite
literally, she had no words for it.
Cuddling,
he draped an arm around her chest.
Chocking, she brought his hand up under her chin.
No -- she
echoed -- it wasn’t supposed to be that way.
It was too
much, the smothering, the pampering and she had to get away. Not that she detested the lion,
to the contrary, she worshipped the red-maned
cat. She loved him too much. She loved him enough to know she was not the
one for him. She loved him enough to
yield to the pressure of her duties but she could never love him that
way. He was and would always be that
unassuming little cub she tucked into that suspension capsule all those years
ago.
She gazed
down upon him as slants of moonlight bathed his body in an eerie glow. By whatever fate, accidental or designed, he
had grown into the glorious body of a full-grown Thundercat and yet beneath the
almost exaggerated exterior the eyes, the lips, the very texture of his face
retained the character of his former self.
She rubbed his chaffed shoulders and wrapped the blanket around him,
tucking him in like a den mother one last time.
But it was
her duty to love him?
It was not
her duty to be happy. It was not her
duty to feel joy. It had not been a year
since their victory over the Mutants, only months after their final battle with
MummRa and the Lunatics. The relics of their fortresses still
smoldered and filled the air of that somber, silhouetted half-world with the
aroma of its languishing flames, its scent of burning embers. Never once were
their fortunate turn of events celebrated and as the time passed day-by-day she
wondered if there would ever be a true kind of peace. As though, indeed, only through strife could
they be at ease.
In her
room, Cheetara explored the open displays of art that she had created over the
years on Third Earth. She had always
been interested in pretty things, things devoid of any real value. It formed her gold fixation. It was the basis of her interest in
jewelry. She had tried her hand at
various forms of artistry, from simple mosaics to sculptures.
But it was
not enough, she needed something to hold, to
protect. And ever since she had seen
those relics of ancient
Cheetara
held it over her bosom, petting its rough edges, purring in a state of blissful
euphoria. She rubbed it across her fur, her fundamental need satisfied and kissed its worn lips
lovingly. She returned it to its stand,
passing her fingers sensually over its passive, delicate, fragile features.
Early
spring and the skies had accrued a bright blue.
The clouds amassed dense, white isles that floated from horizon to
horizon. The air was cool but warming
day-by-day. Nature had awoken from her
wintry hibernation to feast upon the bounty of emergent life, gorge the lustful
appetites of that seasonal dance of fur and teeth that thus assured the coming
of the next generation. It was as if the
unholy alliances had never been or that if the universe of Third Earth’s lesser
creatures had known that they were unaware of their passing off. The world was pure again, set free from the
vile corruption of the dead and the damned that had dared express dominion over
her.
“It’s over
here,” he said, dredging up the bare and rocky slopes. “It’s here, I just know it.”
“Slow
down, Kat, be careful.” Cheetara
struggled behind the youth, not that she could not run fast, but because the
ground was loose and unstable. The soil
around the smoky crater had the consistency of loose sand. “Do you see it?”
The hybrid
cat stood at the edge of the shaky rise, looking into the center of the
unnatural terrain. “Ash everywhere,” he
gasped.
Up next to
him, she gazed across at the penultimate scene.
The bulk of Sky Tomb and the Pyramid were intact insofar as their
individual shapes were still discernable amidst the rubble. Yet, the totality of the panorama was incomprehensible
devastation. Great fireballs had melted
rock and steel together, giving the impression that the whitened and brittle
form of the movable outpost was literally growing out of the onyx masonry of
the Egyptian construction like a blister bubbling out of a scar. Buried beneath layers of dirt were various
implements of war, poking out from its sterile cover by the constant action of
the wind.
“Tygra
said there were still fires raging there,” Cheetara said as she clutched WileyKat’s shoulder.
“Then
we’ll be careful.” He smiled and led her
down along the other side of the steep ‘lip’ that surrounded the crater.
Upon
closer inspection, it was obvious that the fires had done more than melt the
fortresses together, the flames had shaped the geography
of the battle zone’s terrain. Its
unquenchable thirst for air had carved ventilating caves into the ground of the
base of the amalgamated superstructures.
He
scratched his nose. “What could that
be?”
She
coughed at the acrid, upset air. “Put
your mask on,” she ordered.
“It’s not
that bad, whatever it is.”
She patted
his mane and with the same hand dropped the dust mask over his mouth.
The crater
was too large to survey all at once by the entire group of Thundercats. For that reason, at the start of the
expedition, the land was divided into equal-sized, radial sections and they
agreed among themselves to rotate among groups of two or three to explore and
gauge the areas for contamination. The
whole acreage had been promised to the Warrior Maidens for their indispensable
aid during the Final Battle and Liono wanted to make
sure that the annexed portions would cause as little damage as possible to them
and the environment.
The last
showdown was brought about by the combined genius of Tygra’s imagination and
Panthro’s unparallel engineering. They
had invented special explosive charges and a launching rail-gun that rivaled
the Thunder Tank in both size and complexity.
The explosions that ensued were strengthened by the blanket of methane
that naturally enveloped the pyramid.
The fires evolved into such an out-of-control state that it was secretly
feared to be able to consume the entire atmosphere itself. However, that occult fate was not to be and
at the end, because their enemies had not survived or returned, victory was
just assumed.
“Strange,”
he said, tapping the dials on his instrument.
“What is
it? What did you find?”
He pointed
to a v-shaped opening. “That vent. A moment ago there was radiation coming out
of it, now this says it’s all clear.” He shook his equipment. “Must be malfunctioning.”
“I’ll
check it out.” She sprinted
form the rocky base to the alcove across a mound of ash and rock.
The
youngster watched the cheetah vanish into a blur of yellow.
Having
nothing to do he adjusted his gear’s readout until he
was confident that he had fixed the apparent problem of its sensitivity. Finished with that chore, he started a quick
stroll around the perimeter of the allotted sector. Done with that, he began a hike along a
makeshift trail that the Thunder Tank had formed that morning. All the while, he had clear and unblocked
views of the unusual cavern opening for though the area was vast the terrain
was featureless. He stopped frequently
to see if she had re-emerged but always he was disturbed to realize that she
had not come out.
Nervous,
he called to her. Wrapping his hands
around his mouth, he shouted ‘Cheetara’ so loud that he was sure his voice
echoed around the crater itself but there was no reply, no response. He returned to the foot of the mound, intent
on going into the alcove to rescue her, if she needed rescuing.
“WileyKat?
What’s wrong?”
He was
surprised by a female voice that was not the cheetah’s. “WileyKit?” He held his sister’s arm. “It’s Cheetara. She went into that cave and hasn’t come out.”
“So?” She was more than a bit confused at whatever
her brother was saying.
“What if
there’s something still alive in there?
We can’t just leaver her there.”
“Oh, Kat,
everything’s dead --”
“That’s
alright.”
The twins
lent their eyes to the site of the v-shaped alcove.
“I’m
alright, Kat.” Cheetara coughed. “It was just a long passage with not much to
see.”
Her
clothes were unusually disheveled but she hoped they would dismiss it to the
effects of her running. She noticed
their somewhat morbid interest in her and tried to change t subject, pushing
her hair back, artfully removing from her mane a singular and dusty strand of
gray hair that had suddenly felt very heavy on her. She let the clump fall to the ground but it
was not entirely out of sight for a gentle breeze rolled it about the dirt that
separated her from the hybrid pair. She
stepped forward and casually hid it under her foot.
WileyKat,
distracted by the pubescent workings of his mind, was oblivious to Cheetara’s
motions but WileyKit had noticed and stared at the
cheetah’s boot utterly suspicious.
“It’s all clear hear,” she said. “Why don’t we go to Panthro’s sector? I’m sure he’d welcome our help.”
“He’s
already got Liono helping him,” WileyKit
said.
“Oh.” She paused.
“Is
anything wrong?” WileyKat
asked.
“Wrong? No -- did you find anything while you were
out here?” The youth shook a wordless
‘no.’ “Then why don’t we get back to the
tent, there’s nothing more to see here. Nothing more. Let’s
not bother the others.”
WileyKit
sighed. Lately the cheetah had been
acting strange to say the least and her brother was following her into the
depths like a willing lemming. Well,
it’s just a phase with him, it won’t be forever, she thought to herself, it
wouldn’t always be like that, but as for Cheetara --
Over the
following weeks, Cheetara vacillated between moods of extreme happiness and
gloom. Liono
was the first to notice and suffer from her distance and mental imbalance but
in time, the understanding that he and the cheetah shared a common sentiment --
the relief that their informal ‘marriage,’ the worst mistake they had ever
made, had ended, consoled him. It was
not that he found her repulsive, certainly, the lion like the rest of the
man-cats at the lair, had a definite attraction to her. She was like a mother and not the kind that
bred warriors, feline gods built for battle, which was why he was grateful that
they were no longer mating. He was
disturbed only by the manner of the death of their relationship. It was something that happened as casually,
indeed as coldly as the coupling had begun.
He
remained nervous around her for sometime.
A sense of embarrassment lingered for the way the act broke off
suggested to his inexperienced mind a sort of subtle but profound
rejection. He was a child who had gone
too far with his new-found prowess, ultimately repudiated by the purported
object of his imposed but adopted desires who had been leading him along the
way all the while. He had shared with
her his most intimate moment and now the way things had developed, the
resulting, red-faced chagrin he felt being in the same room with her was too
much to bear. He, too, assumed a
distance but grew to live with the discomfort and, with the help of WileyKit, even learned to forget it.
Panthro
and Tygra, who had known her long enough to call her friend, knew, too, that
the swift one had had problems for the longest time. To be kind they considered them
‘difficulties’ and left it at that. They
had observed that she tended to be compatible with young and inexperienced
men. They thought, then, that her
relationship with Liono would be a natural fit but
its failure made evident the possibility that her ‘difficulties’ were far, far
more serious. For it
seemed then that it was not just emotional but physical immaturity that
interested her. It seemed that
she needed total domination to be ‘happy’ or at least satisfied.
It was the
panther who first suspected and then witnessed the bond that had developed
between her and WileyKat. It was not a physical union, or if it was, it
was neither overt nor meaningful. It was
not so much emotional either, but a mutual needy clinginess.
“It’s like
they share a secret,” he told Tygra one day.
“But what
sort of secret?” he muttered -- he had also noticed the pair’s mutual
dependence.
“I don’t
know --”
“The way I
see it, they need each other. They have
something in common.”
“Might be
wise to follow them ode day.” Panthro
intimated a glance toward the tiger’s whip.
“Oh, no, no! No, Panthro, that
would be wrong.”
“Well, how
else are we supposed to know?”
“Ask
them.”
The
mechanic grumbled and returned to his absent-minded work.
Yet it was
WileyKit who was pained the worst. Her brother had changed radically and
whatever it was the impelled the metamorphoses caused him to accelerate the
growth of an adult’s sense of maturity that surpassed hers. Quiet but not moody. Studious and obedient. His unusual caution that emergent hormones
had abated returned with full-force. Had
that been all it would have been a welcome transposition, but it had come at
the insisting that they separate. The
cord of familiarity that had connected their very souls he amputated moving
into a different bedchamber -- one conspicuously close to Cheetara’s -- and
cooling his enjoyment for the activities that they were so fond of sharing.
She blamed
herself and through it was a reaction to her own blossoming attachment to Liono. Thinking
deeper into the matter, she realized that no such jealousy existed between WileyKat and her. It
struck her that her brother’s distance was brought about and aggravated by a
secret. It made sense, then, everything
from his somber mood to his caution to his detachment. Alone he was doing something that together
they were incapable of: the hiding of a
secret.
Immediately
the worst came to mind.
“What has
she done to you?” she asked, stopping him flat in the hallway. It was the middle of the night and he had
just returned to Cat’s Lair.
“Done? What are you taking about?”
“If she’s
touched you -- ”
“Touched
me? Who?
What are you talking about, WileyKit?”
“Cheetara!” She wiped a tear from her eye. “It’s not supposed to be this way.”
He shook
his head. “No. You’re mistaken.” He reached for his door. “Cheetara’s done nothing to me.”
“She’s
done something.”
“She needs
me.” He paused and whispered, his face
contorting into a kind of twisted grimace.
“I’m the only one she trusts.
Please, leave it at that.” He
kissed her and told her to get back to bed.
WileyKit was
unconvinced. She watched him enter his
room and stood out in the passage for about half a minute, wondering,
listening. She hid back in an open
closet and waited until she was sure he was asleep. However, he was not preparing for rest -- he
opened his door, refreshed and redressed for another hiking trip. He wore a raincoat and held a lantern. Over his back was a large black bag.
She did
not follow him out of the fortress.
Rather, she used the opportunity to do some exploring of her own. WileyKat’s door was
locked shut, much to her frustration.
She was about to pounce on its frame but restrained herself because she
did not want to alarm the rest. So, she
tried Cheetara’s room instead.
It was not
a place she ever remembered entering so determining what to look for was a bit
of a problem. First, she inspected the
various desks and tables but the furnishings held nothing unusual. The drawers tended to be empty --
Thundercats, even vain ones, were not known to have many possessions. She did find a short pile of papers but they
were only poems.
Then she
inspected the bathroom but again she found nothing out of the ordinary. Nothing except for the
brush. The bristles were
entangled with strands, thick clumps, of gray hair. Long gray hair. Peculiar but it did not belong to
anyone. A small, red spider crawled
about the dusty fibers and she let the brush fall with a shriek. Disturbed, she left it on the floor and
returned to the main chamber.
Lastly and
out of desperation, she spied the cheetah’s collection of art. Various masks were kept neatly behind
glass. The animal masks had the outward
appearance of bears, deer and horses and yet left the impression that they were
actually Thunderian in nature. They
looked like distorted felines. Cheetahs by their spots.
The male faces were the most detailed and expressive. The females were the ones that seemed to be
undone, malformed and forgotten.
She found
an empty space where a mask had been recently removed.
Unfazed,
she hid back in the hall closet. Sitting
vigil, she watched and waited in and out of consciousness until she lost the
struggled with sleep. She slept up to
the hour before sunset when the alarming din of scuffling awoke her. She blinked her eyes, rubbing them open and
saw for herself the events as they transpired.
Cheetara
and WileyKat had returned from their night’s
outing. Dripping wet, their boots were
covered with mud. He held two lanterns, the bag had disappeared. She helped him take off his raincoat and
draped it along with hers on her arm.
They
hugged for the space of a minute and slowly broke away from each other.
“I don’t
want to do. There’s no reason why --”
“No, Kat,
it must. I can’t bear to live without --
we must go together, there is not other way.”
“But --”
She
stopped his lips with a gentle finger.
“You have the recipe?”
He nodded.
“And the
ingredients? WileyKat?”
“Most. I don’t have the berries yet.”
“I have
very little time.”
“Is it
supposed to be this way?”
She smiled
and kissed his cheek, vanishing into her room.
WileyKat
languished out in the passage for a moment and sighed. She thought he was crying. He retired to bed and the rest was silence.
WileyKit overslept
but she meant no harm. She was not
negligent in her duties as a Thundercat for it was one thing to forget
responsibilities. It was another thing
to purposefully disobey. One was born of
ignorance, the other an allowance of intelligence. Not superiority, as intelligence might
connote, but awareness. Intelligence in the sense that she chose to oversleep. She chose not to wakeup. And why would she want to wakeup?
To face
yet another day without the company of her brother. Liono, even he had
succumbed to a dementia of express sadness.
He, who should have stood triumphant, a demigod, a new Caesar for a new
age, sword swinging in the air proclaiming the dawn of peace, had been reduced
to a shell of a man-cat. Not even much
of a man. And for
what? Because
Cheetara, who had been steadily improving through the past months, had again
become distant and aloof.
It seemed
to WileyKit that even the lion had a secret, so no,
she did not want to wakeup.
A warm
hand clasped her shoulder -- the pressure ceased and the touch vanished. The disjointed effect disturbed her and she fluttered
her lids open in response. Half in and
out of a lucid dream, she was not fully aware that someone else was in the room
with her until a shadow swept across her face and moved closer and closer.
“Liono,” she said, sitting.
“You
didn’t come to breakfast.” His voice was
soft, fragile.
“I’m
sorry.”
He took
her hand and held it in his -- although she was technically older, his paw was
almost twice the size of hers.
“I missed
you.”
She rubbed
his thigh, stroking his short fur, but it failed to take its affect.
He smiled
and turned to face the window, revealing his eyes, red and dry.
“Why are
you so sad?” She brought herself up next
to him. Despite his more developed
build, she, too, had grown through the years and was nearly as tall as he.
“It wasn’t
supposed to be this way, WileyKit.”
“I know
that. We’re supposed to be happy, but
that’s become of us? Why
can’t we be happy, Liono?”
He
sighed. “I guess some people are only
happy when others are as miserable as they.
I knew our enemies were like that, never one of our own.”
“We can’t
always judge how some people will turn out.
Just look at my brother.”
He turned
to her and cradled the back of her hand in his palm.
“I don’t
know what to do.”
Act like a
man,
she thought as she hugged him, resting her head on his chest.
“Put her
out of your mind. She’s been away for so
long, you’d think she’s forgotten what it means to be a Thundercat. What does she do when she’s gone? Where does she go?”
He did not
answer but she believed -- or hoped -- that knew the very thing.
“It
doesn’t matter,” she continued, “maybe we should, do other things.” She let go and brushed back his red strands
of mane.
“What do
you mean?”
“To busy
ourselves with work to take our minds of it. We’ve always had ideas about how to improve
Third Earth. Repair the damage the
Mutants have done. I’m sure that there’s
plenty more.”
Liono smiled --
it was brilliant. “I’ll have Panthro and
Tygra make lists.” He kissed her
cheek. “We’ll get started at once.”
The spark
of hope flickered in his mind. Was it
possible -- he wondered -- to breathe new life into the Thundercats? Perhaps. He felt he was so lucky to have WileyKit and for the first time he saw in her that
masculine quality that the cheetah lacked.
He patted
her stomach lovingly.
Again, as
always, she stood before her brother’s door.
He did not own many things. He
had only taken a small sack of clothes with him when he had moved out of their
old room. What did he have to hide in
there? What was it? What?
She
reached for the knob.
“It’s
locked.” Panthro’s voice boomed from
across the hall where he and Tygra were approaching.
“Where’d
he go this time?”
“Said he
was picking berries.”
Her eyes
started and for the briefest of instants, she was taken back to a time in her cubhood years ago when they had runaway from the lair.
“Berries?”
she asked.
“Yeah. He’s been doing that for the past few days --
don’t know what he’s picking, though, he comes back empty handed very time.”
Tygra
nodded -- he had remained silent throughout.
“I don’t
like the sounds of it, Panthro, this is really worrying me.” She paused for a retrained moment of drama,
pinching her brow to fain the holding back of tears.
“Now,
now,” the tiger consoled. “I’m sure
whatever he’s doing that it’s --”
“You’ve
got to find out.” She grabbed his arms
frantically -- he had been drawn to her by the torment he had seen in her
shaking frame. “You’ve just got to. Please.
Follow him today. I’d ask Liono but I’m afraid he already knows what Kat’s been up to
and is too afraid to tell me. You’re the
only one --”
“But that -- ” he hesitated.
“Cheetara,
now WileyKat.”
Panthro grumbled.
Tygra
sighed. “I’ll do it.” He sulked down the passage and reached the
stairs. “I’ll report what I find. I’ll go on foot.” With those last words, he vanished.
“We’ve got
to get to the bottom of this, Kit. It’s
driving me insane. I’ve known her longer
than you’ve known your brother and I could’ve never seen this coming.”
He stared
at the cheetah’s door.
WileyKit wrapped
an arm about him in a semi-embrace. She
massaged the tense muscles of his back and stared on along. “Maybe the answer’s in there. Just like I think sometimes
the answer’s are in his room.”
Without
wasting a second thought, he grabbed the knob and forced it open, shattering
the mechanics of its internal gears in his hands. The door swung open as though acting on its
own accord to reveal a crypt of a chamber as black as death. The lights struggled to turn on --
characteristic of the fluorescent fixtures when unused for prolonged
periods. Illuminated, she saw that every
exposed surface was dusted with a covering of thick dust -- further testament
that the room had been unoccupied for days.
They
entered and the ransacking commenced.
They approached the unoccupied bed that had been neatly made and paused
-- he was uncertain, almost hesitant, regretting having gone so far, she was
confused for so little had changed.
Content to let the search continue, she snuck into the bathroom. Its lights took their time to come to life,
meanwhile the air, that was stale and humid, was
vibrant with the activity of her eyes adjusting to the dimness, spotting odd
specks of shadows that her mind mistook for colors and shapes.
She caught
her breath and almost shrieked when she saw it.
The brush she had dropped remained on the floor, on the tile work,
undisturbed. The long,
gray hair. She eyed the sink --
it was clogged with those singular clumps.
The tub -- it was dingy with dry soil, brittle leaves and more hair.
She
shivered and left, closing the bathroom door behind her.
Back in
the main body of the bedroom, she found Panthro huddled over a desk. A shelf of smashed masks adorned the walls
above him. He was reading that pile of
papers -- now unusually yellowed and aged -- the very clues she had earlier
dismissed.
“What is
it?” she asked, oblivious for she had not divulged that she had previously been
in the chamber.
“Insanity,”
the panther handed her a few sheets to read.
“A mind at the end of its tether.”
“’My
joy at having found you, clutched in my grasp,’” Panthro scanned a few
lines. “’You are the missing piece in
my life. Grow. Grow.
Grow to fill me, consume me. I
can feel your ravenous heat, the breath of your lips quivering soft whispered
passions.’”
“Love
poems? For who?”
“Or by
whom,” he interjected. “Some of it’s in
her hand, the rest --”
She
examined the pages closely. What she had
earlier mistaken for a stranger’s handwriting the expanse of time and a new
light revealed that it was Cheetara’s.
“It’s her
hand, disguised to make it seem that someone else wrote it.” She perused aloud one of the doctored
examples. “’Many flowers have
blossomed in my hands, bursting through throbbing buds silky petals, to the
gentlest lulling of my soft touch. And though each and every parted floral treasure overjoyed my
carnal senses, ‘twas the bloss’m of your seed that
warmed my heart!’”
“This one
I know she wrote. ‘Leaving me
everyday, another part, another piece vanishes o
dust. Limber, fleshy
warmth to foul, leathery cold.
Why must you leave me? Take me in
your arms and we’ll fly away together to the bounds of the universe. Take from me the wants and needs of my life,
but do not take from me your love.’”
“’A
world of sand, an empire of dust and everything is death and dying and death
and dying and death and dying. You but
your spirit roams abroad. Wherever you
are, wherever you go, I shall find you.
I shall find you in the shadows by the light of our souls. What is dying but the smallest price to pay
for eternity?’”
“This is
wrong,” Panthro said, aghast, “Liono must be told of
this.”
It was so
clear to her, so obvious. Her brother, the berries.
The pieces were falling together -- and it terrified her for it all lead
to one unstoppable and inescapable conclusion.
“Panthro!” Clamorous footsteps echoed through the hall.
“I’m here,
Liono,” he shouted.
“Panthro!” He staggered into the room, Sword of Omens in
hand, extended like a fully engorged beast.
“Something’s happened! Tygra saw
Cheetara and WileyKat enter a cave with poisoned
berries and the sword growled.”
“Then we
mustn’t waste time! Lets
go, lets go!” She stormed out, spilling
the yellowed pages on the floor and dragging the men along with her.
The place
Tygra had indicated was not a wasteland or a dreary stretch of country but at
the same time it had little that distinguished it from any other place on Third
Earth. The area around the slopes of a
tall mountain, a short walk from the smoldering crater in the distance, the land
was a mixture of green shrubs and yellow, orange sand. Weather and fire had long ago consumed the
trees and denser vegetation of the vicinity and though the terrible act was
lost to the oblivion of past centuries, the arbors were slow to grow in that
climate and had failed to reclaim the land.
The
remains of a small cottage house were all that lent the area a distinct but
subtle otherworldly character. But if it
infused the panorama with a quality of dreamlike fantasy, it also added a
melancholic sadness. With its crumbled
walls, it was barely a skeletal framework.
Masonry scattered from its base to the riverside suggested the outline
of inner and outer structures. Cobwebs
adorned the gaps where once there had been mortar. Scavengers resided within.
Tygra sat
on an embankment of fallen stone and cement.
His face was colored by death.
His mind was so tormented by what he had seen that he did not notice the
Thundercat’s arrival until the glimmer of Liono’s
weapon roused him from his trance. Still
he was lost in faculty and motivation.
“WileyKat!”
She screamed and lunged toward the cavern entrance on the hillside
behind the ruins.
The youth
emerged from the shadow and, finding his sister, he smiled. For the first time in weeks, he smiled.
She clasped
him in her arms, almost knocking them both down.
“I’m free,
I’m free now.” He laughed softly,
exhausted and out of breath. “Let’s get
out of here, Kit.”
“What is
it, Tygra? What did you find?”
The
striped cat looked up at his lord and stared for a moment. His lips moved but uttered nothing, his
speech too soft and incoherent to be understood. He grabbed Liono’s
hand as if to warn him, non-verbally, to stay away from the truth that lurked
in the unseen. Panthro tapped his
shoulder and he relaxed his hold.
“Her
clothes, Liono,” he pointed to the torn shards of
Cheetara’s uniform that littered the already cluttered floorings of the
cave. “She must’ve been living here all
this time.”
A light
ahead directed their attention to an antechamber buried deep within the
mountain. It was a vault, lit by a
series of torches on black marble urns.
An altar of rock and straw lay at the center of the pentacle. Acrid dust and the smell of burn candles
lingered in the air like an afterthought.
On the
altar were two figures under a red blanket.
Exactly two figures -- distinct and well formed -- they saw it for
themselves, they could not deny the evidence of their senses. One, with the bud of breasts and slender
form, was clearly Cheetara. The other
was taller, bulkier and exuded maleness, raw and naked masculinity. Yet when the covers were drawn back they
found only one thing immediately identifiable as a body -- the cheetah herself,
her lifeless form still supple and limber.
She looked as tough she were not dead, not dead at all, despite the
smell of the berries and her lack of breath.
It was as if with the gentlest nudge she could awaken.
Next to
her -- no, cradled about her -- was a pile of bones and dusk kept together by
leather rags, Lunatic by fashion. It did
not look like a corpse at first, but something awkwardly put together to look
like one. A cheetah mask covered its
face but the swift action of unveiling the blanket had tipped it aside to
reveal its features -- features that had not been originally in proportional to
the sculpture but that through the pressure of its application and the
liquefaction of its flesh reshaped it to conform to its contours. Gradually it slid to the ground and
shattered. Foul some and detestable
though the skin had become, the mask had preserved the character of the body’s
identity as if the gray hairs tat still clung to its head were not enough.
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