London Wild (71 page)

‘So what’s the master plan?’ Charles came straight out and asked
, too tired to even consider a more tactful approach.

‘I can’t tell you exactly what we’re planning. The
fewer people who know it, the less chance there is that the cats will get to hear about it. At least, that’s the way it’s always been explained to me,’ Aloysius told him.

‘So you’re not in on the main part of the plan yourself?’ Charles suggested.

‘I’m not,’ Aloysius agreed somewhat reluctantly.

‘Sou’nd was Stage One. Attacking their regional headquarters is next
; that’s Stage Two. Stage Three is when we go to their actual houses and mop up those that survived the first two stages,’ The Colonel said. ‘That’s all we know.’

‘We know where many of the cats live?’ Charles commented uncertainly.

‘We do now,’ the Colonel responded. ‘There was a reason we let everyone know of the attack thirty hours beforehand.’

‘I’m not sure I understand,’ Charles stated.

‘Getting back to the point,’ Aloysius interrupted. ‘We know that some cats did find a way out of Sou’nd. We also know that they are threatening to head to the North of the country, where the population isn’t used to the threat they pose. However, despite their threats, we expect them to stay more towards the South. Most of the bigger military targets are to be found in the South of the country, and we find it hard to believe they’ll resist trying to attack at least some of them.’

‘We think that there are maybe forty thousand cats total still alive, including those in the Cattery and France and America
,’ the Colonel offered.

‘Of course it’s not just the cats anymore,’ Aloysius commented
. ‘There are thought to be three distinct terrorist groups also operating in the Capital. One of these,
the Children of the Goddess,
is thought to be an offshoot of the
Church of the Goddess
and is fighting on behalf of the cats, even if the cats themselves don’t appreciate it.’

‘That church need to be closed down,’ Charles hissed.

‘We’d love to,’ Aloysius replied, ‘but three of the current cabinet ministers are also members of the church. So it’s not going to be easy to get the motion through parliament.’

The Colonel walked over to the large computer monitor on the wall and pressed a button. The computer came out of its ‘sleep mode’ and entered one of ‘standby.’ The Colonel could simply have given the order verbally from his desk but for some reason hadn’t.

‘There are also many small groups active in and around the city. Perhaps they feel sympathetic towards the cats in some way, or perhaps they have their own reasons for wanting to help them. Not all the smaller groups are working on the cats’ behalf, though. There are currently many gangs of children, orphans who have lost both parents to cat attacks. They are combing the area, searching for cat trouble. We don’t think these children are trained enough to handle any such trouble they find, but that doesn’t seem to deter them,’ the Colonel said as he stood by the computer.

Charles remembered his encounter with the teenagers in the early hours of the morning
. They had two laser rifles between six of them; what chance would they really have had if they actually met any cats?

‘In a moment we are going to show you a short film of one of these small groups in action
,’ the Colonel continued unabatedly, pausing only to draw breath before continuing, ‘It seems that Lieutenant Colonel Norton, who, as you may or may not know, is in charge at the Cattery,
wanted to transport a group of cats to what he felt was a more secure holding pen.  Somewhere they could be better interrogated. I’m not sure of the details of why he wanted these particular cats moved or specially questioned. Anyway, Colonel Norton got suspicious when one of his men seemed only too anxious to volunteer for the delivery. He felt that something was up, and he wanted to know what. The film you are about to see was taken by a hidden camera positioned in the back of the truck used to transport the cats. It was fitted because of Norton’s suspicions. What you are about to see happened just yesterday.’

The Colonel pressed a virtual button on the computer screen
, and the ‘standby’ message was replaced with a slightly grainy image of the back of a truck. It was a two-dimensional image, similar to those used on the newspaper, if not of such a clear quality. It had obviously been taken at a wide angle from the center of the roof in the back of the truck, as the image showed everything from the front end wall of the truck to the rear doors. There were a dozen cats sitting in two rows of six and a guard at either end, each wearing the standard uniform an Elite guardsman.

‘You notice that there are twelve cats,’ the Colonel explained
. ‘There were only supposed to be eleven in the back of the truck. So already we know that something is wrong. If Colonel Norton had had the foresight to get a live feed, then he could have stopped the truck before it left the compound, and what follows wouldn’t have happened.’

Actually
, not a lot seemed to be happening. The picture had become a lot clearer as the camera had automatically found the right focus and light settings, but because the camera was directly above the passengers it was hard to recognize any individual features. 

The Colonel, who had obviously seen the tape before on his own, sped the tape on to a preset time stamp and slowed it to normal.

Those in the truck were no longer swaying gently with the motion of the vehicle. The truck must have stopped. ‘The truck was not scheduled to stop anywhere until it reached its destination. We believe that whatever the guards had planned, it was supposed to happen here. However, I don’t think they could have bargained for what they actually got.’

One of the feline figures not too far from the rearmost doors of the truck seemed to suddenly be free of her bonds. Not only that, but she was moving so quickly that before any of those watching
the film had really come to terms with the idea that anyone could actually free themselves from such bonds, the two guards were both either dead or unconscious and the rear doors had been smashed open. The only way they were sure that she hadn’t gone alone was that one of the other chairs, one that had been occupied, was now empty.

‘Play back the last five seconds,’
the Colonel told the computer. ‘Slow the play speed to one tenth.’

The computer complied. This time it was a lot easier to see what had happened
, if still hard to believe it possible. As the doors were again kicked open, the figure clearly had another cat draped over her arm. She was still moving faster than a normal person even at one tenth normal viewing speed. The Colonel ordered the tape to pause. 

‘Just what are the cats capable of?’ Charles asked.

‘We have no idea who she was, nor why she didn’t free the others at the scene. It seems clear that she killed the third guard shortly after opening the rear door, so she would have had plenty of time. Yet she left most of the cats behind for us to recollect,’ the Colonel told him. He then gave the computer an order to rewind the last few seconds of the film and to play it at a twentieth of its normal speed. ‘Indeed,’ he said as the film was played forward again, ‘at this point she actually aims a kick at one of her fellow prisoners. We believe she may actually have killed the target of her kick.’

‘Believe?’ Charles asked
, surprised. ‘Surely you know?’

‘The rest of the film will explain it better than I can,’
the Colonel told them.

‘Why did she leave them all behind?’ Charles pressed
. ‘Why not rescue her people?’

‘We aren’t sure,’ Aloysius replied
. ‘There have been any number of conjectures, but no actual answers.’

‘It’s all under investigation,’
the Colonel insisted. ‘Now, let’s get on with the film.’ He then gave the computer the order to continue playing the film. The picture was fairly dull for several minutes, the remaining cats sitting in their various chairs, some moving restlessly, others moving just occasionally. One in particular was slumped in the chair where she had been since the escaping cat had kicked her. The one sitting next to her seemed to be talking gently to her, but there was no sound to hear what she might be saying or whether or not there was any reply. It seemed that Colonel Norton had only considered it important to see what was going on, not to hear it.

Charles sat up suddenly
and said, ‘I think that that’s Starlight. I can’t see properly from this angle, but she’s very like her.’

‘Who?’
the Colonel asked; he let the film play on, as nothing was really happening on the screen of any real importance.

‘Starlight was one of my three pet cats
,’ Charles told him anxiously, excited to see her again, if only on film. ‘I wonder where the others are. What’s she doing on that truck?’

‘She’s a fugitive now,’
the Colonel replied coldly. ‘Keep watching the film.’

Charles obeyed as the film continued to play through. Nothing much was happening, but then the figure of a man climbed into the back of the truck. He seemed to hesitate at the rear doors for a few seconds
, and then he returned to the rear and disappeared from the view of the camera.

He reappeared shortly after and went straight to the injured cat
, crouching down before her to help as best he could. He exchanged a few words with the cat Charles had identified as Starlight, but made no attempt to free either from their shackles.

Then two more figures appeared in the back of the truck, a man and a woman
. They exchanged words with each other, and then the man started to carry the bodies of the guards off the truck.

‘We found the three guards lying together just outside the truck. It looked as if whoever put them there had actually cared about them in some
way. We also think that whatever the guards had been up to, it was these three that they had been expecting to deal with. It’s hard to believe that they might just have been passing that area at that time by coincidence and just happened to stop to help.’

‘In could happen,’ Charles commented.

‘Possible but unlikely. It doesn’t matter, as what happens in this film clinches it,’ the Colonel explained. ‘What we need to know is who these three are.’

On the film, the first of the three to have climbed on board the back of the truck was leaving again
. This time he was carrying the injured cat in his arms, and he was accompanied by the woman, who seemed to be helping him get off the rear of the truck without jarring the injured one more than they had to. The man left behind seemed to be talking to the one Charles had identified as Starlight. Then after only a minute or two he released her from her bonds, and together they freed the other cats from their bonds too.

Then the man and Starlight left the truck
, while the freshly freed cats seemed too shocked for a moment to even move from where they had been sitting imprisoned for the last thirty minutes. Eventually a couple of them climbed carefully out of their chairs and moved slowly to the end of the truck, hovering near the doors before evidently deciding it was all right to leave and jumping down.

‘Stop the film,’
the Colonel told the computer. The playback ceased and the screen went back into ‘standby’ mode. ‘We don’t need to hunt down those last eight you saw leaving the truck at the end there. Their bodies, or what was left of them, were found not too far from the truck. It looked as if someone had been using them for target practice. Our obvious suspects for that are those who rescued the other two. Not that it really matters; there is no law against the killing of cats, not anymore.’

Charles actually felt a little elated
; Starlight had escaped. At least she was safe. At least one of his three pets had managed to get away from the Cattery. Then his fears for the other two greatly increased. Sunshine at least would most likely have been kept in the same cell as Starlight, since they had been handed in together. The fact that she hadn’t been on the truck with her almost shouted to him that she was now dead.

‘We fear there may be many such small groups operating in the area of London. Groups sympathetic to the cats, quite possibly people who in the past would have done nothing to assist a cat but who now feel it’s their responsibility to do what they can because of the Government’s policy of extermination
,’ the Colonel explained. ‘The higher-ups felt you should see this film so you know what sort of people you might have to deal with. It was also thought that you should see that speed effect in action, just in case.’

‘Anyway,’
the Colonel continued in his ever-present monotone voice, but somehow seeming angry, ‘we will find out who the three are who released the cats, and then we’ll plant their faces—better pictures than those we just saw—all over the newspaper networks. Someone will see them; someone will hand them in.’ He finished the sentence with a small nod, more to himself than to the others in the room with him.

Charles felt the need to scratch his chin. There was two days
’ beard growth there. He had intended to shave that morning, but the meeting had been called at such short notice that he hadn’t really had the time. He was a little surprised at just how much hair could grow in such a short time.