The Birdcat

YThe BirdcatZ

Y1Z

“We’ve been in the tunnels a long time, Cat. Don’t you think it’s been a long time? I’m not saying I don’t like it down here, not at all, it’s very interesting, but I do miss seeing the light of the sun.

“That sun in the other world didn’t count. That wasn’t our sun, so it didn’t feel warm, not really warm, you know what I mean? Maybe in different worlds we don’t match up, particle wise. Our little ions and quarks and muons and what have you, they can’t fox trot with the nuclear stuff of another planet. If that’s what these other worlds are. Do you think that’s it? Or maybe they’re parallel, you know what I mean? Alternate realities.”

Bird chattered, birdlike, and the tunnels repeated word parts. Time, time, time. Here, here, here. Miss, miss, miss. Count, count, count.

Cat’s pores tightened, her eyes narrowed, the corners of her mouth curved downwards. The skin of her scalp and ears tightened unpleasantly. She didn’t answer.

Bird’s proximity, just behind and to her left, made her hair stand on end. It wasn’t always the case; after all, Bird was her best friend; but why couldn’t he shut up, why couldn’t he walk without each step clicking on the rock floor? The noise echoing back grated on her nerves. Her normal pace was leisurely, with time to look around, a but now, rather than snap at Bird, she walked faster, taking pleasure in the concentration it required, and hoped Bird would calm the fuck down.

a The bare rock underfoot magnified even Cat’s smooth, controlled footfalls. Whispers came back from distant forks and hidden rooms, fissures that traveled to the surface of where-worlds. She could imagine a the rind overhead of her own, layers of ancient forest and lake bottom, dirt held fast by roots, tall grasses rolling in waves like a soft ocean. There would be clouds, fat with ideas of rain. Beyond it all a limitless blue sky, with a sun that was just right, perfect, the only sun anyone could ever imagine or wish for.

The underworld had doors to worlds of all kinds, days of distant eras, but finding your own time and place—Cat wondered again if it were possible, or if the underworld took you where it wished, with its own hidden plans. a

There were no clouds in the actual tunnels of the underworld. No grasses. No rain. Lava flowed in glowing streams, demons picnicked on the banks. The green snake was always just ahead, the tip of his tail disappearing past a curve in the wall, insinuating a direction.

“And I really think we should find a place to stop and sit for a minute, Cat, my feet are killing me. I sure would like to stretch out, you never feel like you can down here, always something to stop you, a low roof, a pillar, I’m sure I’m covered in bruises. Don’t you think it’s time we took a break? Let’s look for a world to sit down in for a while.” Bird’s tone was bright but Cat could hear the edge. He was probably hungry, which he could never bear for very long, and tired, and like a three year old would soon burst into tears. Bird was Bird, thin-skinned, sensitive to everything and everyone. a

“All right, Tweet, let’s look.” Cat waited for Bird to catch up. All she really needed was a wild run alone following scents and sights, free to move at her own pace. Just long and far enough to get lonely and wish Bird were there to talk to. This thought made her soften enough to feel her own hunger and weariness. When he reached where she stood waiting Cat was genuinely glad to feel his warm closeness. a

“Thanks Kitty,” Bird said, a little breathless from trotting to catch up. They leaned together, a foreheads touching, eyes closed. Two hearts beating fast, Cat thought.

Y2Z

I wonder if Cat noticed that it’s getting colder.

Bird rolled and shrugged his shoulders, squeezed them up and dropped them down. He’d been hunched like an old man, as if that would keep him warmer. All it really did, besides making his muscles cramp up, was cast an aura of nervousness and oppression around him that he didn’t like. He stretched his chest, tilted his head back and forth. The fresh angle of view revealed a corner of light at the top of the wall to his left. Ah! He turned to see where it came from. The green snake was just disappearing around a curve. Of course.

“Cat!” Bird said, pointing after the long, bright snake at the empty tunnel floor. He changed his aim to the patch of light. “Cat!”

“I see it,” said Cat. “Maybe!” She let the word hang, smiling half to herself.

Not just any world, Cat, don’t worry, Bird thought, trotting ahead. At the next turn of the tunnel all he saw was more tunnel, but a streak of light skipped down it’s length, and he thought he could hear water. Then he could smell it, and the streak of light changed from a thin line to a wide band. Was that the spicy smell of earth and decaying wood?

A world with woods and water was no guarantee of food or comfort. Could be, not necessarily though, a good place, could be home, probably not, but it was, he thought, a possibility.

“Doesn’t that smell good, Kitty?” he said, smiling back at her.

She was walking at her usual ambling pace, looking up at a row of sleeping bats. “It does, my Tweet.”

Y3Z

“Who the hell is that?” The red demon gnawed the last bits of flesh off a charred bone. Little flares leapt up off the streams of lava, sizzled, and then died back into the red glow.

The blue demon was madly in love with the red demon. He leaned on his elbow and watched her gnaw, using only one eye at a time, switching off, as though he couldn’t decide which eye had the better angle of view. A long night of drinking had left him the worse for wear; the red demon’s movements, the flares of fire, left trails of confusing after-images.

The blue demon rummaged through his memory banks. He had seen the two strangers climb down a ladder from the upper world, and then catch a ride with a couple of turkey vultures. He was in the form of a small bat at the time, so as to do some random eavesdropping, but he caught only a few words before he got bored and moved on.

“Cat and Bird. They’re looking for midnight.” The sound of his own voice was painful.

The red demon broke the bone and sucked out the marrow, tossed the pieces in the flow. “Midnight? Everybody knows where midnight is. Same place it always is.”

“To a demon, yes. To Cat and Bird, midnight is a different story.” The blue demon rubbed his head with his knuckles. It wasn’t enough, so he started rapping on his skull, first with only one hand, then two, then all three.

Y4Z

“I know they could care less about us, seeing as we don’t taste good and can’t fight, but those demons make me nervous.” Bird whispered, with an exaggerated glance toward the pair of demons slumped at the next picnic table.

Cat laughed. It was true that when they first visited the demons were intimidating as hell, with their leather jackets and their motorcycle boots, their superior strength and magic powers. The facts were other than they appeared. Some of the demons were even extraordinarily kind. They told vulgar jokes, licked their fingers after they ate, and looked mean and strong, but they were so old and knew so many things that there was no creature in any world they couldn’t have a decent conversation with.

The streak of light in the tunnel had turned out to be the twin suns of a hall big enough to hold a mountain, a river, and two banks of picnicking demons, laughing, drinking, eating, roughhousing, flirting, and passing out. The sound of water and the smell of spicy woods were only decorations.

Y5Z

The green demon saw them peering in at the door. “You folks hungry?” He said. “Step in here and pull up a chair.” Bird was confused by that, since there weren’t any chairs to be had, just benches of various sorts.

“Excuse me, but we don’t know how to act at a picnic in the underworld,” Bird said. He looked anxious. His eyes were slitted with trying not to see too clearly what was going on, which wasn’t much, but he didn’t want to cause any demon to say “What’re you looking at, punk?”

Cat felt embarrassed for him. Cat was cool as a cucumber. She smiled at the demon to let him know that Bird was cool too, just shy and innocent.

The green demon took them around to a long table covered with dishes of delicious food. Bird and Cat took their blue fire-glazed plates (redware, of course—red rock and red clay were ubiquitous in the underworld) and moved down the line. There were platters of charred meat, bowls of indecipherable greens, roasted onions, bright dishes of grilled peppers and squash, and every kind of cake, pie, and ice-cream.

“You may as well stop here with us and gather your strength,” the green demon said. He sat down at the table with them.

Cat couldn’t keep her eyes off a handsome demon who was standing at the very edge of the river of lava. He was completely covered in soft-looking iridescent feathers.

Bird being Bird, he could barely enjoy his cake and meat, feeling conspicuously not a demon, unwanted, etc., so the green demon put his arm around Bird’s shoulders and gave him a big warm hug. Bird burst into loud, wrenching sobs and buried his face in the demon’s shoulder, who patted his back with his big, warm hands and said soothing words.

Y6Z

I loved those demons. They were nice to me. They were warm. They burned off the bullshit and left just me. They didn’t want me to be anything other than what I was. All the tar that got on me, they burned it off. The bad thoughts became ashes. All the pain all through my body, the heartache, the loneliness, the fear, they cleaned with their colorful fires.

I was alone in the world. How else was I going to stay alive? Who else was there to comfort me?

Y7Z

Bird did not feel at all well. Too much grease and sugar, eaten while fearful. It wasn’t the demons that frightened him, but Cat, the way she looked away, not meeting his eyes, embarrassed by him. Bird stuffed his mouth full of cake and pork chops and masticated grimly. Once he looked up, and was startled to meet the green demon’s kind eyes. Then the food sat in his mouth, bulky and dry. His eyes stung, his nose ran, the plate of food blurred.

Y8Z

“You were wrong about those two.” The red demon squeezed the blue demon’s head, side to side, front to back, over and over. “It’s not midnight they’re looking for. I knew that sounded stupid. It’s the meaning of midnight. That’s what they’re after.”

The blue demon groaned with pleasure and pain. He inhaled the smell of the red demon’s warm skin. “The – meaning – uoh – of – midnight?” He gasped between squeezes.

“It’s about time! Undiscovered meanings are genuine treasure. Shit, I’d do it if there weren’t so much else to rise to.”

Y9Z

That demon covered in feathers—what a specimen! Remarkable. It was impossible to look away. Every path the eye traveled away only led back. Why deprive herself of the pleasure of such beauty? A direct stare would not have been wise. Cat looked through her hair, bent over her plate of pie and greens, forking them up, noticing the fibrous, tart slime of the greens, the silky, lumpy sweetness of the pie, but barely attending. She had an ear out for Bird, she thought, although at that moment Bird to her was a fuzzy shape across the table, a nagging thought, a scratchy shirt tag.

She was astonished when Bird suddenly flung himself on the green demon, with big gulping sobs and intermittent wails. a

You’re all right, Bird,” the demon said. We’ll clean you up good if you like. Would you like that?”