I don’t trust that this zombie is actually dead dead, so I keep poking it with the stick from different angles. I growl at it. Trill at it. Finally, I climb onto its back and jump up and down on it like the trampoline that was in the backyard of my first house. Sonar and the 4077th re-emerge from their hiding spot to stare up at me.
“What are you doing?” demands the white kitten with the angry face. His fur is stuck full of forest bits from his squashing at the paws of his troop.
“Starbuck,” Sonar says, shaking her head with exasperation. “Emmy kills zombies all the time. Stop asking impertinent questions and get back in formation.”
Starbuck will not make it far in the military, I can already tell, the way the attitude is flying off his tail and whiskers. He’s more of a berserker than a soldier who follows orders — a young mammal I think I could hone into a terrifying warrior like myself. The rest of the 4077th are having trouble staying in line as well, but they seem united in their disapproval of Starbuck.
“Thank the Sabre-toothed Tiger we found you, Emmy,” Sonar says, turning her attention back to me, her black tail flicking her happiness.
“What are you doing so far from camp?” I ask, wondering if my own happiness at seeing them can be read by these kittens. I’ve never lived with other hamsters, but Ginger and Pickles were the best at interspecies communication out of all the cats, and they said they could tell my mood by the vibrations of my whiskers. Sonar has been getting better at interpreting non-feline messages with the amount of time she has been spending with raccoons and beavers.
“We escaped,” Sonar says, her tail halting its happy movements mid switch. “The humans are never sure how many of us there are in the 4077th, and we don’t have pets yet, so I don’t know that they’ve noticed yet. And Wally … that is … the General, he caused a distraction that allowed us to get away.”
“Pickles told us to come find you,” Starbuck announces, daring the ire of his troop by interjecting.
“All we knew was that you were across a rope bridge,” Sonar continues, ignoring the younger kitten. “Diana told us where to cross the bridge —”
“Wait, you escaped from the humans?” I repeat back at them, sure I am missing something. “Our human pets?”
The kittens all nod in unison.
“But, I saw Pal …,” I say, pointing toward the rope bridge.
The 4077th kittens suddenly look terrified, except for Starbuck, who starts hissing at the empty sky above us.
“When?” demands Sonar, her voice going high as her eyes scan the skies.
“Yesterday,” I answer, watching as their backs slowly un-arch themselves.
“Oh, good,” Sonar says, relaxing. “Raja, it’s time for field rations. Take the troop in a small circle around this grove. Bring enough back for Emmy too.”
Raja, a small gray cat who looks like a miniature Wally down to the Sia-like bangs, gives a quick salute and then pushes the rest of the kittens toward the perimeter with his nose. Starbuck looks like he wants to stay, but he also looks affronted that he was not chosen to lead the food-finding mission. I’ve also gotten better at deciphering cats’ feelings from their whiskers and tails. For example, Sonar’s whiskers are telling me that she’s worried.
“Spill,” I say as soon as the other kittens are out of earshot.
“Rabies,” she answers with a shudder. “Our human pets put everyone into cages apart from each other. Pickles did her best to explain that none of us were infected, but Connor couldn’t convince his mother.”
I glance down at the zombie I’m still standing on, and the froth around his mouth.
“But Diana made it back,” I say. “She told you where to find me.”
“Diana and the new dog, I think his name is Chewie?” she asks, waiting for my impatient nod before continuing. “They’re in their own cage, I’m not sure where. Wheels and Spike are in their own cage outside, we passed them as we ran out. All the cats are in one cage in The Menagerie. Trip was out with the other raccoons when the lockdown started, so I don’t know where he is.”
“What about Pallas?” I demand, scared I already know the answer from the earlier reaction of the kittens.
“The humans think Pal has the rabies,” Sonar says, frowning as she passes on this bad news, “but Ginger says birds can’t catch rabies, so no one knows what to think.”
“The rabies came from somewhere, though,” I say, almost to myself. “The humans wouldn’t be isolating us unless they had proof that someone had rabies.”
“An otter,” Sonar confirms. “She wandered into the camp’s outer fences, frothing at the mouth and shaking so hard she could barely walk. We were still trying to figure out where you all had disappeared to and what had happened around the tents when she showed up.”
“Pal flew out to check on her, didn’t he?” I ask, knowing my empathetic friend would be the first on the scene.
Sonar nods. “He was already looking for you and Diana, but he swooped in and crash-landed on the otter’s back. She fell over. And then he was talking to her when the humans came out to investigate. He flew off, we thought to keep looking for you, and then we didn’t see him again for a day or so. The humans were rounding up all the animals in the meantime, and when we saw him, it was far away, deep in the forest. He seemed confused and kept bumping into trees.”
“More confused than usual, that is,” mutters Starbuck as the kittens of the 4077th rejoin us beside the zombie.
“Which is why the humans think Pal has rabies,” I conclude.
Sonar nods, waiting for the kittens to pass around equal amounts of food before starting on her small pile.
“The otter, she had a bite?” I ask, taking a few overly ripe cherries offered by the kittens and popping them into my mouth automatically.
The kittens nod at me, mouths full of cherries and bugs. The redness of the cherries around his mouth gives a white cat like Starbuck an especially scary expression.
“A big bite or a small one?” I ask, spitting out a pit over my shoulder and watching the younger kitten mimic me.
Sonar frowns. “I’m not sure. Why, Emmy?”
I tap my hind paw on the zombie I’m standing on. “This zombie is dead, but he shouldn’t be. We barely fought. I think he has rabies. I think maybe he bit the rabid otter, and it killed him too.”