The Last Free Cat (20 page)

Viafara turned to look at me. He seemed unnaturally clean, almost like a waxwork, in an impeccable silver jacket over a black polo-neck. He was, of course, a celebrity, a professional, who'd been in these kinds of situations a thousand times and knew exactly how to milk a crowd. They trusted him, just as I'd trusted him once. Now, however, I saw with crystal clearness that this man was my enemy. This man wanted to have my cat's womb removed and her kittens terminated. He wanted this so his firm could go on making profits and he could keep his private islands and jets and customized wardrobe.

“That's for you,” urged Livvy, indicating the empty chair.

By now every eye was upon me. Flashguns popped and a hubbub of murmur filled the room. James Viafara's expression was becoming mildly exasperated.

“Will you please take your seat!” pressed Livvy.

It was an impossible situation. Now I was here, now it was really happening, I knew I could not go through with it. But neither could I sentence Feela to death.

“I need to go to the toilet,” I said.

Livvy slapped her hand dramatically against her forehead, then marched into the arena and whispered in Viafara's ear. As she returned he shared a joke with the crowd which I missed but which they obviously found amusing.

“Please,” she said. “Two minutes at the most.”

Sewell immediately clamped himself to my side. Feela was left in Livvy's care as I was escorted like a death-row prisoner out of the room—leaving the door open—back down the corridor to the ladies' toilet. Sewell knocked on the toilet door, gave the place a quick once-over, then ushered me in—thankfully taking himself outside. I went straight to one of the cubicles, sat down, and fought to compose myself.

This was like no toilet I'd ever been in before. It even had a TV screen set in the door. Ha! I thought. Sewell missed that. For no reason other than bloody-minded disobedience, I pressed the on-pad.

At first I couldn't take in the newsreader's words. All I saw was Kris's face, a recent picture of Kris's face, with the words DELANEY ESCAPES CUSTODY—DELANEY ESCAPES CUSTODY running across the screen below it. When the shock of this had faded, fragments of the story began filtering through to me: Kris Delaney, arrested under Terrorism and Aliens Act, also charged with theft, assualt, abduction of Jade Jones, assaulting a community protection officer … being transferred from Comprot station to maximum security detention center … escape may have involved others … details unclear … public warned not to approach under any circumstances …

That was enough. Enough to know I'd been conned, enough to make up my mind, enough to send me charging from the toilet, past a startled Sewell, back through the open door into the Ambassador Suite. High on emotion, unafraid of anything, I marched center stage. The room fell utterly silent, and next moment I heard my own voice, loud and strong and inevitable, as if it was pre-recorded:

“I am not a criminal!” I cried. “I have stolen nothing!”

I turned to Viafara and pointed an accusatory finger. “This is the criminal!” I cried. “This is the thief!”

My eyes fell on the table prepared for my sacrifice. I seized the ornate ink bottle and with one decisive sweep of the arm sent the contents cascading over James Viafara.

“Victory to the Free Cats League!” I cried.

There was a moment's utter shock—not least from Viafara—then pandemonium. A surge of people came forward, cameras flashing, voices yelling and, in the midst of them, to my amazement, a Free Cats League banner. Punches were thrown between the people holding this and the security guards, and the next second Comprot had opened fire with electric stunners.

I had not lost my new talent for clear thinking in the most desperate situations. In the center of all this chaos I saw both Feela's box and my escape route. Sewell was fully occupied with a demonstrator and only Livvy barred the way. In seconds I had the box in one arm while the other dealt with Livvy—not a hard strike but perfectly timed, enough to dump her on her perfectly toned backside. As I escaped through the exit door I slammed it shut, knowing the keypad would delay my pursuers for the vital seconds I needed.

Luck was with me. As I reached the back entrance a man was coming in. I placed Feela's box beside the turnstiles, vaulted them all at once, grabbed the box again, and charged past the baffled incomer and out of the hotel.

Was I fated to escape? It was beginning to feel like that. Making that speech, standing up to one of the most powerful men in the world, had made me feel invincible. Even though the rear of the hotel was guarded by a wall at least four meters high, I was convinced an escape route would open up for me. Sure enough I found the pedestrian entrance to the hotel's underground car park which I took without a second thought, hammering down a set of steps into an alien world of concrete and luxury limos, their gleaming hoods as unnaturally clean as Viafara. Somewhere there was an exit for those cars—surely that would provide an escape for me.

Footsteps clattered down the steps behind me. No need to look behind: They couldn't catch me. My laser sharp eyes had already spotted the golden arrows marked EXIT painted on the floor of the car park. Despite the weight of Feela I ran like lightning around the corners, up the ramps, between the cars, until it appeared before me: a mesh gate and gatekeeper's booth, on which the word FREEDOM was burning in letters of fire, if only in my mind.

The fact that this gate was closed did not bother me in the slightest. I went straight into the same routine we'd used to get out of the car graveyard—except instead of using a stone I simply kicked the nearest car, setting off an ear-splitting siren and bringing the security guard hurrying towards where I'd been standing. I was already gone of course, taking a zigzag route to the exit gate, all concentration focused on the controls to that gate, wherever they were.

As it was, I didn't even need to find them. As I raced up the final ramp, I must have crossed an electric eye, because miraculously the gate began to lift of its own accord. Truly, truly, we were fated to escape!

It was only when I ducked under the gate, however, that I realized where I was. My sublime confidence vanished like smoke as I found myself penned like an animal behind the high metal fence they'd erected at the front of the hotel, security lights blazing in my eyes. Almost at once the crowd recognized me and let out a deafening caterwaul. Whether they were baying for my blood or howling encouragement I couldn't tell, but it little mattered, because I was trapped like a rat without hope of escape. Compers surged towards me on all sides. Fate had betrayed me.

In that strange timeless moment many things went through my head. My first glimpse of Feela. Mum's face, gray with death. Holding Kris. The needle in Stott's hand.

No! I could not let it be!

In that fractional moment before they seized me, I played the very last card available to me. In all probability it would bring a quick end to Feela's life—but it gave her a chance, however minuscule, of survival.

I flicked open the lid of Feela's box, dropped it to the ground, and screamed at her to run. My scream was instantly silenced by a gloved hand over my mouth. Seized and helpless, I watched Feela's terror at the mayhem all around her. A terrified animal will either run like fury or turn to stone, and Feela, to my horror, was cowering and motionless.

The compers, of course, were also afraid. Being people who obeyed orders and shared the world-view of their masters, they bought into the myths about free cats more than most people. Nor were they trained in how to arrest an animal. For a few moments, then, there was stalemate.

Then they released the dogs.

Never in all my worst nightmares had I imagined it could end like this. I had seen these dogs in action at the cemetery, seen the savage way their jaws could seize a protester's arm. If Feela did not move fast she would be torn to pieces.

Thank God, however, Feela did move, and like lightning. The barking of the dogs was like a trigger, setting off her deepest instinct to survive. She tore away along the front of the hotel, the dogs in frantic pursuit then, just as they seemed about to catch her, turned on a sixpence and set off back towards us. The cumbersome dogs skidded to a halt, turned, and took up the chase with even greater vigor. Feela desperately tried one escape route after another, all dead ends. Her speed was fantastic, the speed of a sudden, natural huntress, but I knew the dogs had greater stamina, and the longer the chase went on, the more likely they were to prevail. As she ran hopelessly to the closed glass door of the hotel, Feela was cornered. For half a second, one of the dogs got half a hold on her, then she was away again, slaloming brilliantly between them, racing towards the crowd, which by now was screaming for the dogs to be called off.

Now she really was trapped. No way forward but the fence. Dogs to the left, to the right, and behind.

So Feela went up.

Even with all my knowledge of Feela's genius, all my awareness of her strong, supple body, I could not believe the miracle I was witnessing. Feela had shot up a vertical wall of wire mesh at least three meters high. As she perched precariously on its summit, the dogs leaped impotently at the fence, their furious barks only completing their humiliation. Meanwhile the compers desperately checked down their line of command for instructions on what to do next.

The drama wasn't over. Feela had gotten up, but she didn't have the ability to get down. Comprot were armed with a whole array of lethal and disabling weapons which they could use on her. Their frantic discussions would soon result in a decision on whether to stun her or kill her, though if she dropped from that height, unconscious, it would surely come to the same thing.

It was at this moment that a new hero—or heroine, I should say—came on the scene. A girl with flowing blond hair and tartan trousers was climbing lithely up the other side of the fence. If it were possible for a person to be part human, part cat, this girl was it. Amid howls of encouragement from the other protesters, her strong fingers grabbed and hauled, grabbed and hauled, till she was within reach of Feela. Only firm, decisive action would work at this point, and the girl provided it impeccably. Feela was swept off her perch and stuffed securely into the girl's zip-up jacket. Down she went, not quite as surely as she climbed, dropping the last meter or so into the now exultant crowd. Finally, as I gazed in wonderment at this angel of deliverance, she looked directly at me, gave me a thumbs-up of fantastic certainty, then melted into the crowd.

By now, I suppose, I was suffering some kind of hysteria. Even so, as the furious compers dragged me away to custody, I had an uncanny conviction that the mysterious girl with the blond hair and feline grace was wearing Kris Delaney's face.

Chapter Thirty

When the judge handed me a ten-year sentence, my first emotion was one of relief. Under the new Terrorism and Aliens Act, I could have gotten twenty-five. I'd refused to plea-bargain by giving any information about the Free Cats League or how Feela got pregnant, so many people expected me to get the maximum. That I didn't was maybe down to my age, or possibly the public outcry over the new no-jury courts.

They then told me I was going to Cold Knap Juvenile Security Unit, and my relief turned to dread. Cold Knap was one of the prisons run by Globex Security, and its reputation was appalling. Seven inmates had committed suicide there in the past year alone, and there were rumors of punishment beatings, filthy conditions, and corruption from top to toe. Even though I was hardened by my experience awaiting trial in custody, and the idea of prison itself no longer scared me, Cold Knap was a bleak prospect.

When it came down to it, however, I was amazed how well I coped—at first. It really was a vile place, but life on the road had hardened me more than I realized. Not only that, but I got respect from the other inmates for what I'd done, and incredible support from people on the outside, people I'd never met who sent me letters of thanks and encouragement—all of them vetted by the guards, of course.

Once I'd survived the initial week or two, however, I sank into a depression deeper than I'd ever known. The full reality of Mum's death finally hit me, and I cried nonstop for days, my loneliness no longer buffered by the presence of Kris or my beloved cat. To make matters worse, I had heard nothing of either of them. With the guards reading every letter and listening in on every conversation with a visitor, that wasn't surprising. In my saner moments I was glad Kris wasn't risking either himself or Feela—if he had Feela—by trying to make contact with me. But in the small hours of the night, in my bare and homeless room, I cursed Kris for abandoning me, imagined all kinds of awful ends for Feela, and began to plot ways in which I could painlessly end my misery. If only, I thought, Mum and I had been out that night Feela strayed into our garden. If only I'd never met her or taken her in, and carried on with my normal life—gone to college, had a career, accepted the world I lived in without complaint—and been content within those limits.

Even as I thought these things, however, they frightened me, even more than the prospect of Cold Knap had frightened me. To have lived without Feela was not to have lived at all. And to live in ignorance, the way I'd lived before I met Kris and we'd begun our desperate adventure—that was to be a human pet in the hands of the Viafara Corporation.

Even now they were determined to train me to their ways. Twice a week we had citizenship classes to teach us how to be responsible and obedient members of society. Funnily enough, it was these classes which began to pull me out of the hopeless dark pit I had fallen into. I hated them of course, but so did most of the other inmates, and together we formed a kind of rebellious bond, a fellowship, a family even. Some of those inmates, frankly, were badly messed-up and unpleasant people. But there were others, as I discovered, who were just as aware as me of the twisted nature of the world we lived in, who hated not only the citizenship classes but the crooks who had stolen our cats and everything else they could lay their thieving hands on.