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The scent was sweet and caught up on the air, blocking out the stench of molten plastic, a beautiful change to a normally dismal realm. The Judge immediately got it on a breeze, his nose twitching, small feet moving before he could stop; this was different than manufactured sugar, different than the death hiding underneath that was way too strong for his liking. This was truth. This was real.
The path wound him down to the front of the library, the tall construct looming over him and covering him in a shadow that felt as ominous as it looked. The cat bared its teeth towards the darkness, cautiously resenting it before catching another moment of sweetness on the wind, something that made his head snap to the side. There, just outside of the strict line of looming blackness was the siren’s call, the dream in a place like this. Padding over, careful of shattered pieces of glass, he came to stop before a broken jar of strawberry jam and a bird (so bright, so bright in his light beyond the building) pecking at it.
“That hardly seems like it would be to your liking, my friend,” came the low purr and slow grin, all while he sat at the edge of the obscurity, bathed in the dimness. “I would be more than willing to clean this nasty mess on my own. It would be no trouble at all.”
The air shifted. There was a stillness that came with barely controlled rage, a tension that tugged the world into a thin string, and when the bird snapped its head up, the fire in its eyes was unmistakable. The rage. The anger. The betrayal. It wavered like an aura, something too large for its tiny visage.
“You would like that, wouldn’t you?” it chirped, staccato, fast, the sound of the rushing plastic nearly drowning out the words. “You would like to come here and take what I worked so hard to create!”
Well, that was unexpected. Behind him, the Judge’s tail began to sway, quick and jerky motions, left, right, a metronome keeping time of Anger.“I think we have come to a grievous misunderstanding,” he hissed. “I was simply attracted by the scent, just as anyone would b--”
Feathers fluffed, the bird leaning forward, its strawberry sweet beak daring to cross into the shadow but stopping as if it were a black wall, forbidden. “You are as greedy as the rest of them, taking what doesn’t belong to you, living off of me without any understanding or respect. Filth.”
The Judge found his teeth grinding. Was this little thing so prideful to talk to him like this? Claws slid out between the paws, scratching against the concrete, and his tail stood straight as an antenna, not attacking, but threatening.“I fear we are at an impasse,” Pablo said, not noticing the slow shift of shade and the way it slid over the broken pieces of glass, over the red mess of beckoning preserved fruits, the way it slid over this obstinate avian. “If you will ex--”
If a bird could smile, this one was doing just that; the Judge noticed that too late. Slight wings snapped out and grasped the Judge’s maw, prying it apart, wide, wide enough to hear it strain against its stubborn joints. Pablo wailed, swiped with one set of claws, tried to fall onto his back to get all four sets of ragged nails into play, but the bird (small, deceiving, still so white even in this shadow) held him fast.
“You should have just obeyed,” it sang. “You all should have just obeyed, wretched things.” Like a man in a circus act, the bird placed its head in the feline’s mouth, a slow feeling of being enveloped, cradling it. “Let us fix that.”
The Judge’s eyes flashed, then widened. He could feel it, this small bird, this imposing thing, filling his mouth, stretching it wide. Th-there was a beak at the back of his throat, sharp, intruding, but not painful, not yet. He gagged, tried to wretch this wicked little hairball up, but it refused to budge, it refused to move, just crawled in a little deeper. His eyes watered, leaked, unable to stop the tears from sliding down the length of his nose and into the whiskers.
“It’s all mine,” it breathed into the cat’s lungs, air mixing, mating, breeding until it was impossible to tell which breath belonged to whom. “You should be ever thankful.”
The shared air was like power incarnate, like every mouse caught, like every fish savored, and the Judge rolled his eyes back and opened his mouth a little wider. Somewhere down deep, he was calling, meowing, feeling the stretch even sweeten while claws dug into the ground. And as the bird made it past his jaw, pulled him open so graciously, he found himself craving a feline in heat, something to dominate, something to overtake.
I am your god.
Pablo swallowed the bird, felt it settle down inside and with smooth steps, brought himself back to the jam, and lapped at it slowly. It had soured in the shadow, wasn’t nearly as sweet they had hoped, but at least there was a tongue that could catch it up and savor it. At least--
NO!
The Judge stopped, coughed, wretched, gagged and vomited the jam, tainting that which was still untouched. No matter; he wasn’t exactly hungry anymore. Ears flattened, he bowed his head and kept coughing up what his body could.
You can’t do this! None of you can! Stop this right now!
He could feel it, feel the bird reaching inside him, playing with his insides, pushing past his lungs and up into his brain, feathers tickling in the back of his throat and hurrying along his choking, albeit for a moment. Then the wings were in his mind, were beating against all the carnal regions of his brain, making them scream, making them wail, taking him back to a simple beast.
hunteatdestroyminerutfuckfuckwherecanidoitallneedtoneedto
Shoulders arched, he meowed to the sky, wailed, feeling the need rush over him in waves. Everything, everything, he wanted it all, wanted to knowtasterutownkill everything, wanted it from the depths of his small body. It would be beautiful, it would be heaven, it would be what his greatness deserved. Swinging his tail, he straightened and took a few steps (over broken glass, who cared, it was only flesh and he was a god) into darker shadows. He needed to find someone to take, someone to own, someone to bite the back of their neck as he claimed them. He needed it now. Now.
“Brother?” someone meowed. “Miaou! Are you out here?”
Paw stuck in mid-air, that was when time stopped, suspended, a clock with its batteries stripped. A war broke where all the sides gathered their weapons, a battle of feathers beating in his mind (itsnothingitssmalltakeitownitfuckitpossessit) and the sense he had been born with (brothernohecannotseemelikethiscannotIwillnotlethim). It was an easy battle, truly, with a predictable outcome.
Planting his paws apart, the Judge dug his claws in and began to retch again, began to vomit up his world, vomit the bile and the acid, vomited until his stomach ached as if he had thrown up all of his organs, vomited until he threatened to black out. He vomited until the bird lay at his paws in a puddle of slime, strings of saliva, and rejection. Feathers matted to its small body, it glared with hateful eyes to where the cat was shaking, tired, but solid. Strong.
“You may keep the strawberry jam,” the Judge hissed. “I seem to have lost my appetite. Fancy that.”
Slowly turning, the bird watched as the cat tried to stagger away with as much dignity as his body permitted, moving to meet another white cat with matching eyes, one that worriedly asked if the Judge was all right. They wound around one another affectionately, a slow dance of tails, before he stated that yes, yes, he was fine, just a slight case of food poisoning.
Japhet stood up, shaking off his feathers as he gripped his beak together, shut. Insolent little furball. If he didn’t want to be part of something magnificent, perhaps his brother would make a better player.
And knowing how much it would trouble that little shit Judge, he almost hoped the brother would be.