“Let’th do thith!” hissed back Peter.
THE FINAL SHOWDOWN
It was time for the big fight. Time to see which of the world’s two most popular types of house pets would run the neighborhood. Each of the Terriers chose a cat to fight and then ran off to do battle.
The shortest fight started when Georgie ran into the “Foods of the World” aisle to face Petunia. In case you’ve forgotten about Petunia, he was very large for a cat, very fluffy for a cat and not very bright for a cat. Petunia thought that he could intimidate Georgie just by slowly waving his claws in front of her.
“Scared?” he asked before answering the question himself. “Well, you should be.”
“I’m a Westie you goof ball,” Georgie sneered in response. “We fear no cat.”
To prove her point, Georgie let out a deep, glass-shattering bark. Which was a really good strategy, as the shelves on either side of Petunia were stacked with glass bottles filled with foods from all over the world. The bark caused the bottles to explode. Petunia was quickly covered in chutney, tahini, refried beans and dulce de leche. The combination of sticky mango jam, thick sesame seed paste, gooey, spicy bean puree and sweet caramel sauce created a goo that was more adhesive than the craziest of glues. And that goo was all over Petunia. Georgie let out a second bark and Petunia instinctively covered his ears with his paws. Sadly for him, his paws were so syrupy that they stuck to the hairs on his ears. Georgie was kind of disappointed that Petunia didn’t put up more of a fight. She did however like the sight of the paste and jam covered cat struggling to pull his paws off of his ears.
While Georgie was turning Petunia into a helpless, sticky mess, Jackie and Precious were having a high-speed chase up and down the pharmaceutical and toiletry aisle. Precious used his claws to grab onto diaper packages in order to climb out of range of Jackie’s snapping super jaws. When he got to the top of the shelf, Precious spat super-powered hairballs that barely missed their mark.
“You, you, YOU!” spluttered the enraged Jackie, “are going down!”
Jackie attacked the shelves and began to chomp his way through them. The taste of shredded diapers and shampoo were hard to deal with, but after the nightmare of the skunk spray, he could handle it.
“Well dog,” said Precious, “for once you’re right. I am going down.”
Precious stood like a high diver and jumped, long claws out, towards Jackie. Luckily, Jackie saw a glint of claw and rolled out of the way at the very last second. Even so, one of Precious' claws clipped Jackie on his hip. It left a shallow cut, but one of the things that Jack Russells do better than almost any other breed is overreact.
Jackie let out a shriek that would have been blood curdling... if blood could actually curdle. He was too angry to remember Molly warning the Terriers to be careful because cats were pretty smart. If Jackie had remembered this, he might have thought twice before he chased after Precious when the cat ran up the aisle.
The pharmacy sections of many grocery stores have special chairs that old people sit in when they want to measure their blood pressure. They consist of a padded seat on a metal frame with a tube for people’s arms. Inside the tube is a rubber cuff that inflates to squeeze the upper arm. Somehow, this contraption gauges a person’s blood pressure.
Precious squeezed himself through the arm tube, and when he emerged, he smacked the red “start” button. If Jackie weren’t so angry, or hyper, he would have tried to figure out why Precious pushed the button. But he was angry, and he was hyper, so he couldn’t stop himself. Which is why he tried to squeeze through the narrow tube just as the rubber blood pressure cuff began to inflate.
Jackie was stuck. It was embarrassing, painful, frustrating and extremely dangerous. Slowly but surely, the cuff inflated. Jackie went from being unable to escape to being unable to breathe. In just a few seconds, the cuff would crush him.
“I can’t believe you fell for that,” taunted Precious. “I guess it’s true what I say: I’m more than just another pretty, kitty face.”
Jackie’s eyes bulged and what was starting to seem like his final breath was being squeezed out of him. Needless to say, he couldn’t come up with an insult for Precious.
“Why so quiet mutt; cat got your tongue?”
Precious cackled at his terrible joke. He was still laughing as Jackie bent his neck so he could get his teeth on the edge of the cuff. When his mouth was over the tube, he summoned the last dregs of his strength and bit down.
The imprisoning tube cracked as Jackie’s teeth bit through the metal. The cuff quickly deflated as it was pierced by his canines. Small Terriers tend to revive quickly, so it only took a single breath for Jackie to get back to full strength. Which meant that his teeth and jaws were back to super strength. Which meant that Precious was still snickering as Jackie scurried out of the arm tube and picked the entire chair up in his mouth. The cat’s brain had just started to send the signal to run when the large metal chair came crashing down on top of him.
Jackie took a couple more deep breaths before walking over to the fallen cat. Precious was stunned but was otherwise fine. If “fine” can mean being trapped under a four hundred pound chair. There was a horrible screeching sound as Precious' super claws desperately tried to rip through the thick metal of the chair. Jackie smiled, as he knew it would take Precious hours to scratch out a cat-sized hole.
Precious hissed weakly. “This isn’t over dog.”
“It sure, sure, SURE looks like it is!” gloated Jackie.
Over in the dairy section, Puss Puss laughed in Duffy’s snarling face.
“Real scary,” said the cat sarcastically. “You look like a stuffed toy.”
“Shut up cat!” snapped Duffy who actually did look more like a stuffed toy than a real dog.
“Forget what I said,” snarled Puss Puss. “Your smell is too putrid for you to be a stuffed toy.”
Duffy bared his teeth and sprinted towards Puss Puss who held his ground. In a situation like this, a Dandy Dinmont usually wishes that he or she was bigger and more intimidating. As a breed, they are keenly aware that they don’t frighten anyone other than squirrels.
In addition to wishing that he was scarier looking, Duffy now wished that he had a power other than super vision. Sure, he could see Puss Puss clearly enough, but he would have been much happier to be able to unleash a gust of super breath or a loud head-shattering bark. No such luck for Duffy who didn’t even need his super vision to see Puss Puss shoot out his unbelievably long tongue.
He tried to swerve out of the way, but the tongue whipped, caught him and flicked him up and into the nearly empty milk fridge. Duffy would have been badly hurt if it wasn’t for the row of untouched buttermilk jugs that he crashed into. The jugs split open and coated Duffy with what has to be the most disgusting and smelly product made from anything to do with cows.
Humiliated and soaked with the raunchy, lactosey badness of buttermilk, Duffy wondered how he was going to defeat the cat. Crouching as low as he could, he crawled along inside the milk fridge. He used his super vision to watch Puss Puss who was busy licking his paws so he could clean and groom himself.
“Who cleans themselves during a fight?” wondered Duffy.
The obvious answer was “cats.” They are so obsessed with cleanliness that it’s a wonder they don’t use alcohol wipes to clean their paws.
As Puss Puss began to lick his hip, Duffy had an idea. Being coated in buttermilk, dirt and skunk smell gave him a weapon that Puss Puss would fear; the weapon of grossness. Once he jumped on the cat and spread some of his buttermilky filth, Duffy would be battling a severely freaked-out opponent.
All that Duffy needed was a chance to sneak up on Puss Puss. And to do that, he needed a diversion.
It seemed as though Sasquatch was either reading Duffy’s mind, or this page, because at that very moment, he flew down the aisle and swooped threateningly at Puss Puss. The shocked cat turned and swiped his long claws at Sasquatch. He missed, and
Duffy seized the opportunity to leap out of the milk fridge. A dog with longer legs would have been on Puss Puss in a single bound. Duffy made it in two and a half bounds.
As he landed on Puss Puss’s back, Duffy performed a very strange move for a dog in a fight. He didn’t bite or scratch. Instead, he hugged and squeezed. Puss Puss shook as if he’d been electrocuted. The stench from the Terrier was horrifying. Puss Puss’ eyes watered as if he was having an allergic reaction to the skunky buttermilk stench. Even worse than the smell was the feeling of having chunky milk and dirt smeared onto his skin.
Puss Puss let out a long, shocked howl and squirmed like a crazy cat. This made things worse as rubbing against Duffy activated his super static power. Duffy clung even tighter.
The smell was making Puss Puss lightheaded. He quickly did an inventory of his super powers to see if he could get rid of the dog before he passed out. The projectile hairballs couldn’t be deployed as Duffy’s head was directly behind his own and the shots were sure to miss. The static power was partially responsible for his current predicament, and the thought of using his tongue made him gag. Tasting Duffy’s skunky fur when he flung him into the dairy case was bad enough. No way was he going to wrap his tongue around him to try to yank him off. That would take about ten seconds of tasting dog, skunk, dirt and buttermilk. Which was about eleven seconds too many.
Slowly, a smile formed on Puss Puss’ face. Why panic when he had very long and very sharp claws? With just a couple of swings, Puss Puss could hurt Duffy so badly that the dog wouldn’t be able to stand up again, let alone inflict his stench on him.
Puss Puss relaxed and held up his front paws. The claws slowly slid out and glinted menacingly in the light.
“Just look at what I brought,” he sneered. “This is going to REALLY hurt.”
“Duffy, let go!” Sasquatch called as he swooped down at Puss Puss.
The cat momentarily forgot about the smelly Terrier and instead swung his claws at Sasquatch. Duffy saw the claws and tore himself off of Puss Puss.
As Duffy backed away, he tried to figure out his next move. Before he could come up with a single useful idea as to how to defeat a violent and heavily armed opponent, he heard the flapping of many sets of wings. He looked up and saw Sasquatch along with an entire family of starlings as they landed on the light fixtures above the aisle. Each bird occupied a different fixture, and as Duffy made eye contact with Sasquatch, the Cardinal winked mischievously.
Still unsure of what to do, Duffy continued to back away from Puss Puss who waved his claws menacingly.
“Okay Terrier, this is it! I’ve had more than enough of you!”
To Duffy’s amazement and horror, Puss Puss’ claws grew even longer as he prepared to pounce. He closed his eyes in fear as Puss Puss reared up on his hind legs, howled and prepared to pounce. Duffy didn’t see what happened next, but he did hear it. It sounded like this...
“Plop.”
Duffy opened his eyes and saw Puss Puss’ gaping mouth as it formed a silent scream. The cat was so upset that he couldn’t even make a sound. What was upsetting him was a splat of Cardinal dropping that had landed on his head.
Luckily for him, Puss Puss remembered to retract his claws before trying to wipe the mess of his head.
“Plop.”
Sasquatch’s aim was perfect. Puss Puss looked at the bird mess on his hand and finally found his voice.
“NOOOOO!!!!”
Cats hate being messy. And there are just no words that can properly describe how they feel when they get this type of messy. It got worse, because as Puss Puss jumped around in panic, the Starling family let fly. More accurately, they let drop. Not all of their efforts hit Puss Puss, but enough of them hit the feline target to send him halfway to Breakdown City. Which is located close to both Mental Cat Corners and Crazy Kitty Village.
When Duffy last saw Puss Puss, he was running out of the store in a complete frenzy trying to figure out how he was going to clean himself.
Duffy looked up at Sasquatch and the Starling family and barked a happy “thanks guys.” Never again would he doubt that Sasquatch was a valuable member of the team. From now on, he’d always call their group the “Super Powerful Organization of Terriers and Songbird.” As far as Duffy was now concerned, “S.P.O.T.S.” really did have a nice ring to it.
Nearby in the beverage section, Buck and Patches faced each other from opposite ends of a long aisle. It was like a duel from an old western movie, except that there were eight combined legs instead of four.
First Patches would take a step forward, and then Buck would do the same.
Patches.
Buck.
Patches.
Buck.
With each step forward, the duelists made a comment. First Patches said “Just you and me Buck.” Then Buck said “Just you and me Patches.” Then Patches said “you’re going to be sorry,” which was immediately followed by Buck saying “No, you’re going to be sorry.” Then came Patches’ question of “Any last words?” and Buck answered with a question of his own; “Any last words?” Technically, that wasn’t really a question of his own, but his accent made it sound a bit different than when Patches had asked it.
They continued on like this for five more small steps. You don’t need all the details of their conversation, because it really became quite boring after a while.
Finally, the two of them stopped stalking forward. Buck looked at Patches and noticed for the first time how big he was. But unlike most big cats, Patches wasn’t just a fur-covered blob. He was a muscular beast who looked like he got a lot of exercise. Buck stared at Patches’ ugly, scarred face. No doubt about it, Patches must have stayed fit by beating up on other cats. In a word, he looked like a “bully.”
Meanwhile, Patches was looking at Buck. The only thought going through his mind was how much fun he was going to have while beating the daylights out of the Irish Terrier. As is the case with many good fighters, Patches liked to visualize his battles. Patches figured he’d start by using his tongue to grab a nearby jumbo bottle of root beer which he would then hurl at Buck. While the Terrier was off balance, Patches would shoot some high-speed hairballs towards his stomach. After they found their target, Buck would be too winded to unleash one of his super breaths. And that’s when Patches would pounce with his long claws.
“Yeah,” thought Patches, “that’s what I’m going to do.”
Patches never did get the chance to put his plan in motion. Exactly three seconds after he finished his thought, and two seconds before he would have attacked, a rack of sports drinks fell on him, knocking him out cold.
As all of the dog versus cat battles were happening simultaneously, there’s a logical reason as to why a rack of artificially flavored, colored and sweetened “health” drinks fell on top of Patches.
And to find that reason, we have to move to the next aisle and go back precisely four minutes in time. For that was when angry Molly stomped into the breakfast food aisle just in time to see Peter climb to the top of a rack.
“You afraid of me Peter?” she asked.
“Ha!” laughed Peter. “Thinth I got my powerth, I fear no dog!”
“Then come down here and we can settle this.”
Molly was aching for a fight. She was also just plain aching. Slamming into dumpsters and lampposts is not particularly good for an older dog’s body.
The sounds of the fights between the other Terriers and cats could clearly be heard throughout the store. The two leaders listened carefully to try to figure out which side was winning. It was hard to tell until Georgie’s bark rang out. As the sound of exploding bottles and falling glass filled the air, Peter had a feeling that the dogs would soon have the upper hand. That’s why he offered Molly a deal...
“The neighborhood ith big enough for dogth AND cath. Leth thplit it in half. You guyth can do whatever you want to the rodenth and other mammalth. Juth leave the birdth to uth.”
Molly thought about her
new friend Sasquatch. There was no way she’d agree to anything that would put him, or others like him at the mercy of a bunch of powerful and nasty cats.
“No deal Peter. This fight isn’t about controlling the neighborhood.” Molly said. “It’s about keeping it safe for everyone and everything.”
“Even thquirrelth and racoonth?” Peter asked.
Molly sighed heavily before nodding.
“Even squirrels and raccoons. Unless they do something that hurts the neighborhood.”
“Hmmm,” said Peter dramatically. “Would your familyth garden be part of the neighborhood?”
Molly’s eyes widened in anger.
“Are you threatening Susan’s garden?” she growled.
Peter sneered. “Put it thith way; after they finish hiding our food, the raccoonth are going to vithit the garden. I told them it’th filled with berrieth.”
Molly’s eyes widened further with anger. If they opened any further, her eye balls would have fallen out.
“You leave the garden alone,” she growled.
“Oh, I will,” answered Peter. “If you agree to my termth.”
Feeling that his extortion had worked, Peter leaned down.
“Tho? Do we have a deal?” he asked.
Sometimes good people and good dogs are confronted with something or someone that is just plain bad. In this case it was a cat that was born mean, grew up spoiled and angry and would live its entire life thinking up nasty things to do. Every single thing that a character like this does is done for its own gain. The feelings of others - even of his team mates - meant nothing to him. There could be no doubt that any deal that Peter offered was not one that would benefit the Terriers or the neighborhood.
For a good dog with super powers there really was only one thing to do. And that thing was to run at full speed into the rack of granola that Peter was sitting on. The force of the collision between Molly and the rack sent Peter shooting through the air. It also caused the rack - which had granola on one side and “sport” and “health” drinks on the other - to fall into the next aisle where it flattened Patches.
Back in that aisle, Buck looked at the fallen rack and the pile of drinks and cereal boxes that covered the prone Patches.