Luck of Nines

6

     Oh you thought that was the end of the tragedy and Goldilocks would help him heal and they'd be besties, familiars, Hogwarts letter, and happily ever after riding into the sunset on the Hogwarts express, oh no; I promised dark, but I don't like too dark so here we are.

      Now we may suffer together. (Actually I kind of want to do that version...)  Anyway, enjoy.  *insert evil author laugh here*

-T.A.L.A.

       The water dragged him with it, him stuck helpless in its grasp until his paws finally managed to scrabble at the rocky lake bottom, and then finally, finally, as the sun was finally breaking for the day, he managed to drag himself from the raging, cold grasp of the river and onto solid, albeit damp, ground.

      Panting he lay there, chilled to the point where the cold had long since ceased to bother him seeing the sun rise up and into the sky even as his mind rang empty, somewhere else countless miles away. Not with the Dursley's or the Sully's, nor with Goldilocks, or filled to the brim of determined rage with Ripper and Marge. It was just elsewhere from that sunrise, and empty.

      There he remained, both physically and mentally, undisturbed by the ever present sounds of the world. The faint ones of cars and people from a distant city and quiet calls of life that echoed through the wilderness alike.

       Finally, as noon grew closer a sound finally breached his awareness. The pitiful, mewling sounds of young kittens.

       "Momma!"

        "Help!  Momma!"

      "Help!"

      "Ah! Cold!"

      "Help! Help!"

       The cries grew in fervour and desperation, no longer calling out for their absent mother, but instead any sympathetic source of aid.

     "Help! Help!" They cried, disturbing his silence and slowly gaining his attention, but also his rousing his frustration. He just wanted to lie there, in absolute silence, but they wouldn't just be quiet and he couldn't tune the shouts out either. For the first time he cursed his time as a cat, if not for which it he cries would be mere mews and as such far easier to ignore.

      Even as his temper bubbled beneath the surface, rationality held him back. He didn't mean any of the rage. He just... a part of him wondered if this was a final, equally as desperate, attempt to just feel something again.  Nonetheless he searched out the source of the sounds dragging himself to his paws, and quickly finding it.

The kittens were on the other side of the river, looking malnourished and pitiful from the leaking basket where they were trapped; earth hung over the nook the basket had found itself, somehow, in. The nook was annoyingly almost across from where he was, although a little upstream, semicircular and enclosed over the top, preventing the basket from moving or tipping, but also keeping the kittens from climbing to safety or even climbing out.

If he was going to save them, he would have to swim. Growling to himself he loped along the river, heading upstream and quickly picking up his pace as he went until near a run; he already knew what he was going to do. He passed the basket, charging along now, continuing for at least a full minute more before, without giving himself time to second guess, whirling about and dashing the last few steps on sore, cut paws from the river's stone. As the water splashed over the tops of his paws he leaped with all his strength, easily clearing halfway through the river and splashing into the rapid waters somewhere around three-fourths of the way across.

He cut out with his paws swimming as best he could immediately, aiming for the other river bank as the rushing waters did the rest of work for him as it dragged him downstream and closer to the basket.

He swirled past it, his jaws clamping as delicately as he could against the handle and a few seconds later he was charging ashore again, out of breath and sore. The kittens safely inside the basket, all five- he paused, sniffing carefully at the suddenly quiet basket. There were six scents, although only five had spoken. All alive still, but cold, wet, malnourished, and likely sick.

Finally one of them spoke up, hesitantly, "...Momma?"

"No," he tried to soften his gruff voice, which he doubted would ever lose its growling quality, but to no avail and a few of the kittens whimpered. At least he could communicate, for how long they would remain compliant, especially with what he was. It might be best to leave them in the basket if it wasn't too damp, "What is it like in there?"

"Cold."

"Wet."

"Hungry."

"Fang sick."

"Help."

Five responses answered him, none of which answered his question. He didn't bother specifying, they were likely too young to even understand, "Close your eyes, if you open them before I tell you to, I leave." They would understand what that meant though.

"Don't leave!"

"No! Please!"

"Stay!"

"Please!" All of their little voices, except one echoed, "Don't leave us! We'll be good."

"Close your eyes."

"They're closed." The cry was echoed four more times. "Please stay."

Carefully he nosed open the basket, the inside covered with a blanket too damp and dirty to do any good, the basket itself was dirty too. They had been in there for some time then. What really drew his attention though was the sixth cat, it was a tortoiseshell, but that wasn't what caught his attention; at first it was the glinting muddy yellow eye that stared up at him, but then it was the wounds.

His first instinct was to back up a few startled steps at the kitten disobeying so soon after agreeing, his lips drawn up in a snarl, but then his mind caught up with him. It's mouth opened ever so slightly, and painfully, as if to new something only to show an equally torn mouth. No sound came out and it's sad but knowing eyes made it clear the kitten knew it couldn't speak and wouldn't again.

A painful slash mark followed along the side of its face, from its left ear down, another went across the middle in the same diagonal pattern, and a third just missing the other side of its right eye. Another cut went from under the eye across its mouth, at a slightly less diagonal angle and another curled in front of the right ear and then down, curling about near its cheek. The mouth itself was cut open as if in a smile no feline could make and the tongue was missing. Each and every cut and line looked intentional, if clumsily carried out. The left eyelid of the muddy yellow eye that stared up at him and somehow been removed.

For awhile he just stared at the kitten and the kitten just stared right back at him, until one of the others mewed desperately for him, asking if he was still there.

"I'm here, keep your eyes closed, I'm picking you up, do not move." He briefly reassured before, with as much care as he physically could, he plucked one kitten up by its scruff and set it down near a dip in a tree's roots. Then another, carefully depositing the kittens from the basket, once settled, he clumsily hung the blanket up with his jaws and shook out drained the basket through a small hole he poked. That accomplished, he settled himself down. Mostly dry from a vigorous shaking, his fur and body warmth, damp as he still was, was the kitten's best chance.

The six shuffled even closer, the injured watching knowingly with both muddy yellow eyes. Satisfied, he set about carefully grooming each once as Rosy had once done with him.