“I’m Tiberius,” the cat said. “I was a pet, too, for a little while. But I lived on my own for a couple of years before the war.”
The cat motioned to his friends, all still standing on the rooftop. “We all lived in the wild at one point,” he said. “So you can bet that Tiberius is not my slave name. I picked it for myself. If you live through this, you can pick your own name, too.”
“If I live through this,” Sebastian said.
“If you have EMSAH, you won’t want to. Trust me.”
Tiberius pointed out that Sebastian’s status as a choker made him even more suspicious. Neutered animals — or any former pets, for that matter — were rumored to be more susceptible to EMSAH. It had not been confirmed, of course, but Tiberius had to be prepared for anything.
“People like us have to work extra hard to earn everyone’s trust,” Tiberius said.
“How long are you going to keep me here?”
“Until Culdesac gets back. He’s the boss.”
Sebastian asked when that would be. Tiberius said that Culdesac operated on his own time.
“He speaks for the Colony,” Tiberius said.
“The Colony?”
“The ants,” Tiberius said. “Don’t you know anything? The Queen started the war. We’re the soldiers who are helping to end it. In return, we will be in charge of the surface.”
Sebastian knew about the ants, of course, but the discarded newspapers and placards he had come across had not used the words Colony or Queen. There were only mindless hordes of rampaging insects without purpose or remorse.
“Why did the Queen start a war?” Sebastian asked.
“Because the humans are dangerous,” Tiberius said. “I’ve already told you about EMSAH. And that’s one of their smaller crimes against us. We fight them, or we die as their slaves. Maybe you could join us.”
“No.”
“I mean, if I don’t end up dissecting you, of course.”
“No.”
Tiberius had apparently taken too long. The black cat hissed at him, a signal to hurry up. Sebastian wondered if this cat had told him something he was not meant to know. Tiberius finished and retreated to the building.
“Hang in there, house cat,” he said.
IN THE DEAD of night, after days of wriggling his tail, Sebastian was close to freeing it from the rope that tied it to the grate.
It was just in time. On that same night, he saw a human.
It began with a swooping sound in the air above him, like a massive bird. Something glided across the stars — a giant triangle made out of a translucent fabric. An object dangled from the bottom of it. When it landed on a building two blocks away, Sebastian realized that the triangle was some kind of motorless aircraft piloted by a single human. The man stowed the glider behind a satellite dish. He scanned the area, holding binoculars and whispering into a communication device. Then the man was gone.
For a few hours, Sebastian allowed himself to think that this new development would somehow end up setting him free. But then he remembered what Tiberius had said. The animals were at war with the humans. The humans had given them some kind of virus. Sebastian may already have been infected without knowing it.
Sheba could have been infected.
There it was again — a thought like that jumped into his brain whenever it wanted, like a parasite, like the virus that frightened Tiberius.
Sebastian tried to squirm out of the knot, the joints cracking in his tail. Eventually the knot gave. He imagined himself as Sheba as he wagged his tail freely for the first time in days. There was no point in resisting the random memories of his old friend. She was with him no matter what.
CULDESAC ARRIVED SHORTLY after sunrise. By then, Sebastian had shimmied all the way up the pole and hovered thirty feet above the street. But he could go no farther. The cables stretching across the top prevented him from pulling the rope over. He kept fighting it, trying to loosen the bindings. It was no use. The ropes were doubled around his wrists and ankles. While he could painfully go up the pole, he could not free himself. He dug his hind claws into the wood to hold himself in place.
Culdesac met with the black cat and several of her underlings at the base of the pole. While the other cats saluted her, she saluted him. Culdesac was no mere feral — he was a bobcat, much larger than the others. He had a shimmering sandy coat flecked with black, a camouflage suited to the wilderness from which he came. His charcoal-colored ears rose like horns over his massive head. He wore the black armband along with a belt weighed down with a pistol and several devices Sebastian did not recognize.
“What are you doing up there?” Culdesac asked him.
“Ask your friends.”
“We’re holding you for your own protection,” Culdesac said. “And for ours.”
“He’s displaying the symptoms,” the black cat whispered to him, probably knowing full well that Sebastian could still hear her.
“He doesn’t look like it,” Culdesac said.
“Delirium. Talking strange.”
“Well, you’ve had him tied up for two days.”
“Ask him about Sheba,” she said. “He was screaming her name when we found him.”
Culdesac stepped closer to the pole until he was staring straight up. “My friend,” he said, “my name is Culdesac. This is my Number One, Luna.”
The black cat nodded.
“Do not ask me my name,” Sebastian said. “I did not give it to them. I will not give it to you.”
“Fine. But how about you tell me who this Sheba is?”
This bobcat had an ease about him that Sebastian found unsettling. Culdesac could talk like a human, much like the anchorman on the looped news broadcasts. Meanwhile, Sebastian struggled to use his growing vocabulary. It was a huge disadvantage, like being tied up for a second time.
“I already explained this to your friends,” Sebastian said. “I was looking for her.”
“There hasn’t been a living thing in this city for weeks.”
“I saw one last night.”
“What does that mean?”
“I saw a human.”
A stunned silence descended on the group. The cats looked at one another. It made him feel as though he had the power somehow, despite being a prisoner.
“That’s impossible,” one of them said.
“Where did you see the human?” Culdesac asked.
“He flew in on some kind of … triangle.”
“I told you,” Luna said, laughing. “We need to put this animal down. Before it spreads.”
It was a line Sebastian had read somewhere among the books he had found. Put him down. She had stolen it from a human.
Luna seemed pleased with herself until she noticed Culdesac glaring at her. “ ‘This animal’ is one of us,” he said.
“There are no humans left here,” Culdesac said to Sebastian. “The ants chased them away. We were about to rendezvous with the rest of the army on the other side of the river. Then we found you.”
“I am not stopping you,” Sebastian said.
Culdesac and Luna exchanged glances.
“Wait,” a voice said. It was Tiberius, forcing his way past the others to get to Culdesac. “I know what you’re thinking. We can’t leave him here.”
“You’re right,” Luna said. “That’s why we’re going to put him down. It’s the only way to be sure.”
“Sir,” Tiberius said to Culdesac. “We can’t do that, either.”
“Yes, listen to Tiberius,” Sebastian said.
Tiberius winced at this. The others, meanwhile, burst into laughter.
“What did you say?” Culdesac asked.
“I said listen to him,” Sebastian said.
“No, what did you call him?”