“That’s right,” said a new voice, low and husky. He whirled about, came face to face with a pug-faced orange and white animal. One eye was a ruined mass of scar, and his ears were notched and cut. “That’s right,” said One-Eye, “and that king is me.”
He didn’t hesitate, but hissed and leaped. Flinch’s voice came from somewhere far away, “No, no!” One-Eye didn’t leap, merely stood up on his rear legs and met his charge with a solid chest. He felt as if he’d hit a wall and fell back, rear legs scrabbling to claw, but One-Eye bore him down to the ground, the strongest thing he’d ever gripped. Shameful panic overwhelmed him, and he mewled for escape. This was worse than the shrieking bird: He was beaten by his own kind, with tooth and claw.
“Only one,” One-Eye said, and bit his ear. His mewl changed to a yowl of outrage, but there was nothing he could do as One-Eye tore his flesh. The pain was lightning. He had no more strength in him to fight. The shrieking bird’s attack, the great fall had left him with nothing but limp panting breaths.
“Only one, right?” One-Eye said again, and he measured his words carefully in reply.
“So you say,” he said, sick inside with defeat. One-Eye got up and walked away, tail erect and swaying.
“I told you,” Flinch said just as a growling, clanking sound entered the alley. “Quick, to the side, the apes have come for their things.”
And so it went for him as he healed. The black slick bags were slung on the pile one by one. The bags contained things that were good to eat, but the hunters had to contend with the rats, rats that carried a dank, lip-curling stench. What the rats left they hurried to eat, and he ate with distaste the food from the bags, some bland, some sharp on his tongue, but enough to quiet his flat belly, and more.
One good thing was the shrieking stinking bird never appeared here; one bad thing was the prey birds, the stinking birds he’d eaten most of his life, never came near enough to catch, but perched instead on metal stairs above the alley. He was sure there was a way to catch them, but One-Eye forbade hunting them, saying “Enough to eat in the bags. Don’t leave the alley, the apes will get you.”
They called him Bit-Ear, but each morning he reminded himself: “I am king.”
The light-furred other named Hurry grew fatter and fatter until one day he asked Flinch why; she laughed and said, “She will have kittens soon.” As quickly as she’d laughed, she grew somber, tail low. “And then she will lament.”
“Lament? Why?” As he asked he remembered the echoes, but she would say no more.
It happened one day when the air grew crisp in the early morning. Hurry had disappeared beneath a metal box that grew from one alley wall, and just as he reminded himself that he was king, he heard tiny mews that quickly grew silent. He crept forward and peered at Hurry, who hissed at him in a friendly way.
“Away with you, Bit-Ear. Let me enjoy them while I can.”
“While you can?” he asked, backing away. The kittens were tiny and squirmed. It seemed impossible he had once been so small. A dim memory of huddling in the palm of an ape’s hand came to him, along with the sweet taste of milk. Hurry did not answer, but a rustle behind him did. His lip curled with disgust as the smell of rats wafted over him. In the dim morning light he watched them come, quiet and purposeful.
They scurried forward, edged their noses beneath the metal box. Hurry hissed and spat, and he shouted “No!” in unison with her, but they were already snarling and biting. He leaped for the nearest without knowing why; they stank and did not seem like good prey. The rat shuddered as he struck its back, then squealed as his teeth bit home in the nape of its neck. He turned his head a fraction to the side and bit again; the rat squealed anew, and the others pulled their heads out from under the box, dead and dying kittens in their mouths.
His long teeth slid on bone at the base of the rat’s skull, he felt a final crunch, and the thing went limp.
The biggest of the rats dropped the kitten so it could speak. “What do you do?”
He was keenly aware that there were five rats facing him. More of them dropped what they held and bared teeth that disturbed him-they were sharp and narrow and looked formidable. Though he was larger than each of the rats arrayed before him, they were five and he was one. He thought about the question. What was he doing?
“Kittens… not prey,” he finally said.
“New here?” asked the big rat, his brown fur becoming clearer as the dawn progressed. The big one didn’t let him answer. “You are. If you weren’t new, you’d know. These are ours. Live in the alley? Our alley. Our babies, very tasty. Best warm. Going now.” He picked up the kitten he’d dropped, as did the others.
He hissed and urrred with displeasure, but there was nothing to do. The rats returned down their hole. It led into shadow. One after another, the five rats began to disappear into the black until only one remained. Then a kitten mewed from under the metal box, and the last rat froze, turned to face him. “One more for us,” it said.
“No,” he hissed, and arched his back.
The rat paused. “What do you do?”
“This one stays,” he said, and charged.
This rat turned and fled. He chased it down the hole. The path plunged down at first, turned right, left. It was nearly pitch black, but his eyes adjusted and he found he could see. “I am king!” he yowled into the tunnel, scrambled on. He heard the scratching of rat claws ahead of him.
The path opened, and he was assailed with the smell of rat. Around him he could see rats standing up and sniffing the air in a rough burrow with a low ceiling. Other exits led from the horror he’d stumbled into, a lair of rats, more than he could easily count.
“Fat one, I have a gift for you,” squealed a rat triumphantly, surely the rat he’d chased. At one end of the burrow a knot of rats raised their snouts and sniffed. “We have the babies,” a huge mass of a rat said. “What else?”
“Smell him,” the one he’d chased said, and he realized the rats could not see well in the dark burrow, but relied more on their noses.
The huge rat sniffed. “What do you do?” it said.
“Kittens… are not prey,” he said, unsure what to say.
“You are prey,” the huge one said, and as one the rats in the burrow surged toward him, a dark shadowy wave. He turned and raced through the first open tunnel behind him.
He ran around a tight corner and flailed the open air before him, sensing something just above his head. This was not the path to the alley. Once again he fell, feet first. In the dim light there was not much to see. By the time he hit the water, it was dark, dense darkness he had never seen above ground. It took all his strength to struggle to the air. Even in rain he’d never been so wet. Ground, he needed ground, but in the racing water and the darkness there was no ground. As his strength ebbed, his head slipped beneath the water once, twice. He thrashed, dreading the end, wishing for sky, for air. In the distance, he heard a splash through the sound of the water. Then it was over.
He coughed and spat water, felt his fur heavy and flat over his entire body. He was filled with the urge to twitch violently, scatter this water off his limbs and body, but caution made him freeze. Something large was nearby. He heard it breathe, slowly hissing in, out, in again. A sharp smell came to his nose, and it itched him in a way he didn’t recognize.
“You are awake,” said a voice, a rumbling giant voice, bigger than the shrieking voice of the clawed bird, bigger than the yawps of apes.
He could not help it any longer. He stood and twitched, spraying water everywhere. Though he was cold, he was a bit dryer and would soon be warmed through by the moist, hot air around him.
“I pulled you from the water, tiny panther,” said the voice. “Speak to me, tell me of yourself, of your journey here.”
“Rats. I ran from rats and fell,” he said, afraid to remain so near to the giant beast but unsure where to go. The darkness was absolute, not even a pinpoint of light to be seen. He sat down.