PA 3.5: End of a Tail

Chapter XXXIV Part III

The voice held nothing back, a string of loud breaths and occasional murmurs cut the otherwise silent trek. When Lyro reached locker 452, the room released a sigh of relief, and the crackles left.

"Thank Dog that's over," Kav murmured.

"Aw heck," Lyro sighed, defeated. "My key, I uh... dropped it, it's around here somewhere so-"

He dropped the padlock, letting it jingle against the door, already making plans to distract the felines.

Digits raised into the air, Kav shuffled past the dog, doing a quiet little twirl gaining in excitement as he crouched down, withdrawing two small monkey wrenches from the interior of his belt pouch. Lyro stared on in confusion as he fit them on the inside of his lock's bars.

"Uh," Lyro began, "What are-"

With a light grunt of effort and a second of grit, the wrenches were pressed against one another and levered together, splitting the lock's mechanism in half alongside the bars keeping the locker closed.

Smug, the cat rose to his feet and opened the locker dramatically, waving one paw towards its contents and inviting the others to peer into it, a gasp ringing out amongst the volunteers.

Felix blushed, turning his face away and letting loose the beginnings of some protest while Ray studied the interior for a second or two with a blank expression.

Eyebrows cocked at the reaction, Kav flinched his head, turning it to face the inside of the locker. "What's-" he said, "... wrong..?"

Lyro burst past the cats, quickly grabbing things in an attempt to be over with the moment. His frame wasn't large enough to block the very visible pictures taken of Felix and Lyro, or just Felix, stuck to the inside of the door and the shelf with scotch tape or sticky tac. His eyes caught on the polaroids clustered around the side of the locker- studying them so hard he could barely register the ornate knife taken from its display, and the growl or whine that came from Lyro as he slammed the locker shut.

"... Why do you have so many pictures of you making out..?" Kav murmured, dazed.

The forest cat exhaled. "Oh dog, I look so bad in all of these."

Ray cried with a "MoW?" as a generic, half-filled notebook with a pen sticking out of its spiral bindings was slapped onto his chest. Piqued ears and rosy cheeks appeared as the tabby snapped from his trance.

"Here," Lyro said to Ray, moving away and towards Kav, ornate knife in paw.

Lyro let Felix hold his paw mid-stab, the mechanic cowering at the otherwise impending death.

"Sweetheart, haha, put your wand down?" Felix said, sweat beading on his forehead as he kept Lyro from plunging the weapon into Kav's skull.

"Look at what you've done!" Lyro cried, petulantly struggling as the other cats slowly took him away from Kav. "You ruined Ray's innocence, you broke my lock, and you embarrassed me!"

"W-Wha!? What- why do you have a shrine of your boyfriend at school!" Kav replied, confident the two cats would be enough to hold the dog back.

"IT'S NOT A S-SHRINE I'LL KILL YOU!" he bellowed.

"And why do you have a knife!" Kav said, pointing at the implement as Felix coaxed Lyro into calming down.

"It's not a knife!" he said, pointing the blade away from everyone and letting its silvery bits glimmer under the blanche fluorescent lights. "It's... was, a wand." He exhaled to himself. "But, it's sharp, so I thought it'd be a good thing to take."

Sputtering over himself, Kav murmured. "Who gave you a wand? Aren't you a dog?"

Lyro frowned, looking aside and allowing Ray to pick up the conversation, waving a paw around and gesturing to the catscratch made on the notebook.

"Yes Ray," Kav said, "We're fine."

Felix waved at Kav, taking the notepad and scribbling a response that made Ray smile and nod his head enthusiastically.

"What'd you ask...?" Lyro murmured, upset at being unable to read the script.

"I told him we're okay," Felix said, "And asked him if he wants to get out of here."

Ray scribbled onto another page, quickly after presenting the jumble of runic text to the dog, eliciting an explanation from Felix.

"He says thank you for the notebook," the cat said, creeping a paw around Lyro's shoulder and patting his back.

"Oh, well," he looked around, a little surprised. "You're welcome."

Ray excitedly waved in approval, then scribbled something onto his notepad, showing it off to the group.

"You saw someone behind us?" Kav said, alarmed. "Who?"

Ray waved, beckoning the cats to follow him, cheery with the current situation.