Cleetus and Arnold arrived at the gate of New Babbage late in the afternoon, and he deposited the cat outside the city walls at his request. The cat stumbled, using the cane as he made his way to Tepic’s nearby camp.
His bandages were now covered with mud and old blood, but he couldn’t tell if he had a fever or if it was just the sweltering summer heat. He collapsed on one of Tepic’s buckets, but he didn’t have to wait long for the young urchin. The fox excitedly welcome him back to the city, and he would never convince him he wasn’t a hero now it seemed.
The urchin told him that Avariel had told him everything should be fine now…that they’d worked it out and it was all right for him to enter the city. It was weird walking, stumbling really, along the Babbage cobbles without fearing someone would try to kill him, though he kept away from the asylum completely.
He made his way across the streets, sitting down occasionally to rest when the pain and heat became too much. Eventually he forgot his cane as he stumbled along the streets, looking at the city which felt so different to him now. He needed a doctor, and the first one he found was Sonnerstein who was making his way to the Gangplank.
It was odd after his trials to just openly walk into the pub, which smelt strangely inviting. He entered the door, and looked around the building and at the patrons. They were smiling, joking around with one another as they enjoyed their drinks. Malus was teaching the new barmaid how to pour Emerson’s drinks for him, while the man himself flirted shamelessly with Junie.
The smell which was so inviting had become more pronounced as he went further inside. He looked around, sniffing, for the intoxicating scent. Finally he found the source near the couch…some of the catnip which had been offered around the city was here, and some had been stuffed in the hookah! Emerson had tried to smoke some of it!
Arnold tried to resist for a few moments, but surrounded by friends and relative safety he might as well have been Odysseus hearing the sirens call. He partook of this lotus, and then sank into a gleeful stupor behind the couch.
The effects of the catnip would last for a few days, and the medicine used to fight his infections and his fever would keep him in a stupor as well during his recovery. But at the very least, he would have almost no memory of the next few days at all.
He’s lucky he stopped clawing the couch when he did.
((Thanks for the pic, Kristos.))
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That was a couch? How did a couch attack me?! “You’re lucky I killed it!”
I’ve said it before – that cat is a bogart!
Felisa was returning to the urchins’ hideout when her sister Tealla caught up with her.
“Felisa!” Tealla called. “The large-cat is alive! He’s back here now.”
“He is?” Felisa was startled, and glad. “Where is he?”
Tealla pointed her tail eastward. “He’s in the large building with the human catnip drink. Someone’s tending to his wounds.”
Felisa sighed with relief, and leaned down to scratch Tealla behind the ears. “Thank you for letting me know. I’ll seek him out in a day or two, and see how he’s recovering.”