E-MAIL: eli @ popullus.net
ARCHIVE: Ask, please.
RATING: PG
POSTED: Dec. 24, 2006
SUMMARY: The second time the rats came around, they were almost a rather small late-night snack.
AUTHOR NOTES: Written as a stocking stuffer for grit kitty in the Yuletide 2006 Challenge.
DISCLAIMER: Read
The second time the rats came around, they were almost a rather small late-night snack.
Well, one of them, anyway.
Ginger was at the fence watching for them, scuffing at the dirt and hoping in a strange kind of way that they wouldn't show. Was she more cracked than her shell, thinking of escape when half the hut didn't even understand the term?
There was a clatter of metal, and she ducked further behind the water trough into the smallest frozen ball she could before realizing that the sound had come from behind her.
"Y'canna ask for plastic! Disaster's what yer askin' fer, with the crrrackin' and the shatterin' and the--"
"Shhhhhhhhhh!" Ginger hissed, spinning up to her feet. Her eyes widened even further at the sight of the miniature flock headed her way.
Mac stopped as though she'd run into a wall. She stood there out in plain sight -- a white chicken in a dark night, the single light from the house glinting bright off her eyeglasses every time she blinked -- and then Bunty ran right into her, solid as a bag of feed.
"Ooof!"
"Ow!"
There was a poof of feathers, and the wing Ginger had been using to frantically wave them all back came up automatically to cover her eyes and her wince.
"Bloody--! What'd you stop for, then? Spot a hammer?"
"Oh! Have we found them? Did they bring hammers for everyone?"
Ginger spread her feathers just far enough to see, and yes, there was Babs, too. "Oh dear," she muttered, wondering if it was too late to hide from them all around back of Fowler's hut...
That was when the barking started up, of course.
Bunty immediately grabbed Babs by the wing and started dragging, which was likely the only way Babs was moving at that point, since she'd gone stiff as a board with her panic. Honestly, from the last look Ginger had as the two of them squeezed back into Hut 17, she wasn't sure if Babs was breathing.
Mac was already halfway to the hut herself, and Ginger was about to hurry after, when--
"Coming through! Rats and other rats first! Make way!"
Ginger turned back in time to see Fletcher toss a suitcase straight through one of the lower holes in the fence and scramble through after it, and for a moment she truly envied him that easy access to the world on either side of that barrier. His partner Nick, though, the loud one, he got stuck halfway through and snatched Fletcher's tail, making him yelp and fall back on his arse.
"Hey, give a rat a hand, here, if you've got one," Nick shouted, effectively pinpointing their exact location, and thus, not helping matters at all.
Fletcher was still on his back. As Ginger watched with her mouth falling open, he tilted his head back further. "I've got two, but they're attached," he said, and held them up while giving his partner a confused, upside-down frown.
Ginger choked on a laugh at the look of mental pain that flashed across Nick's face, but the barking was just around the other side of the house now, and the situation was rapidly turning into one where the options were "move it" or "lose it."
She leaned down, said, "Pardon," and grabbed ahold of Nick's paw and yanked.
Nothing. The fence jiggled, but the rat stuck in it stayed stuck.
As Fletcher hopped to his feet, Brutus rounded the corner of the house, his bark taking on new vigour at seeing prey, and with that, Fletcher was gone. Nick's legs started kicking at the air.
"Ah, a little harder perhaps?" he urged, craning his neck in a futile attempt to see what was happening beyond his hindquarters.
"Perhaps if you tried holding your breath," Ginger suggested through a tight smile.
"Now would be a gud time to have that plastic," Mac observed over Ginger's shoulder. "Fer leverrrage."
Nick started babbling. "Plastic, silver, aluminum, brass, anything you've got a taste for, ladies." He shot a terrified glance over his own shoulder, and then was looking up at Ginger with pleading, yet shrewd eyes. "So long as nothing gets a taste of me, you understand."
Brutus was almost on them, but even after only one interaction with these rats, Ginger wasn't about to pass up an opportunity of her own.
"Anything?" she asked slowly.
Nick winced.
Ginger felt a twinge of worry as she let go of his paw, because timing would be key, but...
He flailed after her, trying to grab hold of her wing again, and his eyes about came out of his head with the panic that filled them. "Anything!" he shouted. "Pull me through! Be just like taffy, promise!"
Mac instantly moved up beside her, and she and Ginger both took a paw and leaned back, putting all of their strength into the pull.
A deep, triumphant bark rumbled through the air, close enough to feel, and Ginger gasped.
"Again!" she urged.
Eyes screwed shut, she groaned with Mac as their feet scrabbled at the ground with their effort. Nick let out a grunt, there was a growl, and then something went ssshhrrrrrrp and they all went flying with the sound of big, sharp teeth coming together on nothing ringing in their ears.
"Run!" Mac cried, rolling over and getting moving even before she had her feet under her.
"Don't 'ave to tell that one twice!" Nick gasped. He didn't bother standing; just skittered after her for the hut as fast as he could on all fours.
Ginger sat there in the dirt, and turned her head to watch almost numbly as the violent mass of teeth and spikes hurled itself against the fence. Another light came on in the house, and Ginger quickly stood, but she couldn't help facing off with Brutus for another moment.
The snapping stopped. Brutus' eyes narrowed at her, promising all kinds of evil things as his low growl only grew louder. The light on the porch flickered on, and Ginger started backing toward the hut, and Brutus smirked.
Ginger gave in, stuck out her tongue, then turned and ran.
"Well, now, that was exciting," Ginger sighed with more than a touch of sarcasm.
She eased down into her nest, her feet throbbing, and didn't think anyone would've heard her over the chatter around the hut as the others demanded to know what had happened, was it dangerous, did anyone need a bandage? But then Fletcher spoke up from atop his little suitcase where he'd started setting up shop in the middle of the floor.
"Not really, yeah?" he mused. He tapped a finger to his chin, and then nodded. "Be more exciting when there's no possibility of being eaten, I'm thinking."
"Did the holes in the fence change?" Babs asked, trotting forward to peer between the two rodents as though they were nothing more than something interesting included in the feed. "Everyone said rats are small."
Nick cast a quick, arch look up and down Babs' girth. "Smaller than you, love," he said with an ingratiating smile.
Babs glanced away, back, then covered her mouth and giggled like a chick.
"Oh, lord," Ginger groaned, her head dropping forward. "I only wanted a spoon."
A white one popped into her field of vision, with Fletcher's grin right behind it. "Plastic?" he offered.
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