Puss in Stiletto Boots Part I

Puss in Stiletto Boots: Part I

"I've seen terrible things."

Jessica's body was splayed out on the hard surface of a dark, oily street, three floors below the rooftop she had tragically miscalculated the distance of when she jumped from an opposing rooftop. Visions of her plight and mission going up in flames floated through her consciousness as she swam through the sticky evening air on her way down from the roof ledge to the narrow street below. She landed hard with a wretched snapping sound: her left hand hit the street hard, balled up, her fingers smashed against the ground, cracking and breaking. Next to hit was the pad of her other hand, smacking the surface awkwardly, jolting and twisting harshly at the wrist. Last to come down was her left foot bearing most of her weight. The side of her foot rolled and twisted, snapping loudly and sickeningly as the tendons yanked and bones popped. It all happened in a matter of seconds, but it played out in her mind for hours. She fanned her thick, furry tail over her bruised and bleeding limbs; her dirty, blonde hair falling across her face. High above her, cat women were hissing and badgering one another. The consensus was that Jessica had made it to the other roof and was working her way furiously down the building stairwell.

"What will I do now?" she thought. "It's only a matter of time before they figure out I didn't make it to the other rooftop and they come down here looking for me."

She needed to treat her own injuries. As if the screaming pain in her limbs wasn't enough, she would need to bandage and splint her broken bones with what little material she could find. But what was there? Nothing but trash and soot. Hold on. There, next to the dumpster, was an old pallet. That would work for the splint, but what about the wrapping? A few dirty and slightly used old garbage bags and some greasy rags. It wasn't pretty, or even sanitary, but it would have to do. If she could just crawl over there with her two broken arms and one broken leg. She leaned over and tried to drag herself across the pavement. Her lithe, voluptuous figure bobbing as she waded through the street.

"Aaah!" The twang of pain was excruciating.

The clang of heavy cat boots tromping down steel stairs rang through the city canyons. The Cat Gestapo was on its way. She wouldn't have much time. With all of her strength she reached out a horribly broken hand and a shattered wrist and dragged her maimed body across the street. It was slow progress, moving only inches at a time, but she had to make it to the pallet and a place to hide behind the dumpster.

Steadily, she dragged herself. The sound of clanging boots ceased. They were getting closer. She had to move faster. Jessica could hear nothing but her heavy breathing as she struggled to make it to safety. Piercing the thick air, she heard an, old familiar sound--the faint, metallic whine of a squadron of Corsac Air Bombers. They were coming—the friendly Fox Forces. But bombers? Why would they send bombers?

The night sky exploded with a thousand searchlights. Air raid sirens burst out from every direction. The city came alive with electric panic. The reflections of light were turning night into day. Jessica didn't know which would get to her first: the vicious Cat Gestapo or the battering bombs of friendly fire. Streams of liquid light poured out of anti-aircraft guns strategically placed on the city's rooftops. The shrill sound of artillery pounded on her ear drums.

Scattering on elbows and knees, Jessica continued her crawl with renewed vigor, scraping herself along the exposed brick and rubble where the asphalt had been blown away by earlier bombings. The dark side of the dumpster was within reach when she found herself swallowed up by the large shadow of a menacing figure. She looked up. He was tall, broad and enormous.

"You're a cat!"

"I'm in horrible pain. Won't you please help me?"

"This whole city is about to be leveled. You better run for shelter."

"I can't," she pleaded. "I fell from the rooftop. Both my arms and one of my legs is broken. I can't run anywhere."

He moved forward, out of the darkness. His snout was long and narrow. His ears were wide and tall.

"Oh my God, you're a fox." Jessica's heart pounded with excitement. She was saved.

"And you're a cat! You can't know I'm here," he said in a deep, steady voice. "Which means either I have to take you prisoner or I have to put you down; and I ain't got any place to hold prisoners."

"No, no, you don't understand. I'm a fox, too. This is just a disguise. I'm an agent for the Fox Forces, working undercover. This is a costume, I swear. Pull off my nose and you'll see."

"This is a trick, isn't it?"

"I have two broken arms and a broken leg. What could I possibly do to you?"

He moved forward and gently placed his thick, furry hand beneath her jaw. With his thumb he caressed her cheek, feeling his way around for something.

"You're right. This doesn't feel like real fur." He pulled at her snout and the adhesive slowly gave way. "You are a fox." He tore off her fake cat ears. "What are you doing here dressed like this?"

"I was on a mission…deep undercover. My assignment was to portray a cat scientist who developed a new weapon that would turn the tide of the war in favor of the cats. But my real purpose was to discover the weaknesses of the cat defense network. And I succeeded!"

"You have the information? Can you give it to me?"

"No, it's all in my head. Fox Command figured that was the safest place to keep it."

"Then we have to get you home."

"So, you'll take me with you?"

"I would, if I could. I'm on a mission myself. I'm a saboteur. This is a coordinated bombing raid.  It gives us a very short window to reach our objective. Time is of the essence."

"Then you'll leave me here?"

He scooted down and swept her up with his muscle-toned arms. "I can't do that. You're much too beautiful…and, we need that information in your noggin."

She buried her head deep into his chest. "Thank you. I was certain I was a goner." She sighed and breathed in his musky smell. "My name is Jessica Whitetail. I'm a major in the covert operations unit. I was attempting to make contact with headquarters when I was discovered by the Cat Gestapo. I tried to run, but I miscalculated a leap from the rooftop…up there…I hit the pavement pretty hard. If you hadn't found me, they would have thrown me into prison and tortured me."

He gently placed her down by the pallet. "Sergeant Arturo Fennec. I'm with a detachment of commandos. Our objective is classified." He gently lifted Jessica's horribly mangled left hand. "You were going to use pieces of this pallet as splints, weren't you?"

She nodded.

"You'd have a hell of a time doing that with two broken arms."

Arturo cracked the pieces of pallet into small flat bits that he used as splints. He removed a roll of gauze from his kit bag and started carefully winding the wrapping about Jessica's damaged limbs.

"I need to let you know. I need to let somebody know," she said. "I've seen terrible things."

Arturo arched his eyebrow as he continued bandaging Jessica's arm. "What kind of things?"

"Horrible things." Jessica lowered her gaze. "These cats. I've lived among them for a while now…you may not believe this…,"

"Try me. I'm quite gullible."

"They lick their own assholes. It's revolting."

"That's truly grotesque," Arturo said as he winced. "Surely, cats are the lowest of all life forms."

"That's not all." She paused to collect her breath. "Then they lick their privates. And…if that wasn't enough...when they give birth, they hack up their kittens from inside their stomachs. The kittens come out sopping wet and slobbery. They're savages--every last one of them."

"You've made it all so clear now…why we must win this war. Is that any way to birth children or wash your naughty bits? Such reprobates." He proceeded to bandage her wrenched ankle.

"You shouldn't worry about me," she said. "You'll miss your objective."

"You assume my objective is more important than your bit of knowledge. But as we both have our secrets, only time will tell." He delicately picked up her shattered wrist and wrapped it with gauze to a piece of planking. "I'm going to give you my homing beacon."

"But, what will you…"

"Don't worry about me," he huffed. "I'll flag down one of my buddies. The important thing is that we get you home in one piece. Now, the beacon is activated by this switch here on the side. But don't turn it on until you hear the helicopters. It has a powerful red laser light and makes a hell of a lot of noise. Every cat in the area is going to come crawling out of the cracks when you set that thing off, so don't hit the switch until the helicopter is directly above you."

"I understand. But where will you be, Arturo?"

"Moving forward," he said and removed a rubber cat mask from his kit bag and pulled it over his head. "You might want to squeeze in behind that dumpster. Things are about to get real hairy."

"I hope to see you again, Arturo," she yelled out as he moved into the intersection with his rifle drawn.

"You can count on it," he said. "I'll be waiting for you after the war."

Sergeant Fennec disappeared into the night, just as the first bombs began to fall. Explosions ripped through the sky. Jessica, with two bandaged and splint arms, dug her way behind the back of the dumpster for cover. The next explosion landed closer, dropping chunks of pavement and masonry on top of the large tin can.

Jessica looked up into the night sky. Above her, the silhouettes of bombers blotted out the stars. No sign of a helicopter, but there were bombers for as far as the eye could see. There was a whistling sound…then nothing. From out of the silence came a tremendous explosion from across the street. The façade of a brick tenement building collapsed in a landslide. A horrible roar rang through Jessica's ears, followed by the rumbling of the pavement and a terrible cloud of dust and filth. Hurt and stricken cats howled in pain as they lay in the street or ran for cover.

Another whistling sound and another explosion shook the very building Jessica was leaning against. Brick and masonry fell like a heavy rainstorm against the pavement and the dumpster. One chunk tore through the center of the large tin container crushing it like an empty beer can. Her former shelter flattened, Jessica sat huddled on the asphalt, an injured fox totally exposed in a cat world. She buried her face in her hands hoping no one would see her tail or whiskers.

There was a pause in the bombing just long enough for Jessica to detect the familiar sound of Cat Gestapo boots clomping nearby. She looked around her. Running was out of the question. Piles of rubble were everywhere, but nothing nearby offered protection from the falling debris.

A break in the buzz of the bombers above was followed by the familiar whirring sound of a helicopter.

"At last," she thought. "My way out of here."

As the shadow of the great flying machine hovered overhead, Jessica flipped on the switch of the homing beacon. The air pulsed with a tremendous throbbing sound as beams of bright red light shot out of the beacon. She aimed it in the direction of the helicopter and the craft lit up bright red against the black sky. The helicopter dipped as though it was acknowledging her presence; then it shifted into high gear and sped off into the distance, before completely disappearing.

"Wait! Wait!" she pleaded. "Don't leave me here."

There was the sudden clacking of stiletto-heeled boots. Jessica found herself surrounded by a half dozen Gestapo Cat Girls, dressed in ankle-length, black leather coats, black peaked caps, black hose and elbow length black patent-leather gloves. Their tails swished devilishly. One of them, holding a riding crop, stepped forward.

"What have we here?" she said in a slippery voice. "It looks like our foxy little friend was directing the bombers to their targets."

"And they would have nailed you if you weren't dressed all in black!" Jessica said, swinging vainly at her nemesis.

"They never want to go down the easy way, do they?" the riding crop girl said.

Jessica saw the tip of her shiny boot headed straight toward her eyes. Then everything went black.