The Catbyrd Seat
Authors: Emmanuel Sullivan
The Catbyrd Seat
Emmanuel Sullivan
This book is a work of fiction. Reference to real people, events, establishments, organizations, or locales are intended only to provide a sense of authenticity, and are used fictitiously. All other characters, incidents and dialogue, are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real.
Copyright © 2015
Emmanuel Sullivan
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
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Cociel pedaled excitedly on his bike, whizzing round the dusty lanes, weaving in and out and dashing past the various mice going about their daily business.
“Watch where you’re going!” one of them yelled, an older mouse with a walking stick which he waved rather furiously at the young and carefree Cociel.
The boy mouse just laughed and carried on cycling. It was a lovely sunny day, he was having a wonderful time, and no one was going to stop him. Not the miserable old mouse with the walking stick, not his conservative father Davetil, not even the bullying cats and their stupid rules.
He knew it was illegal for mice to ride bikes on the grass of the Reservation, but that just made him want to do it even more. Cats were allowed to do anything they liked, after all. There was one rule for them, one rule for the mice and goodness knows what kind of rules for the remainder of the animals that lived outside the confines of the Reservation.
He raised up the handle bars, causing the wheel to hop upwards into the air over the curb, so that he could ride his way onto the perfect, neatly cut grass and leave track marks from the bicycle in his wake, laughing to himself as he did so.
“Hey you! Mouse!” someone shouted. “Get off that grass!”
Cociel turned and quickly looked back over his shoulder. It was a cat. An official looking one too, with a blue police hat on.
Time to get pedaling.
He sped up, his little legs going as fast as they possibly could, and his mouse ears pinned back as the wind hit them.
He cleared the grass and landed back on the pavement with a thud of his wheels, then raced off on the path again, back in the direction of home. Not even the cats, with their much larger legs, could catch up with the speed of his super bike. Cociel grinned to himself, screeched to a halt outside his house and, pottered inside.
The home he shared with his dad was just like any other on the Reservation, identical in every respect, so much so that you could barely tell one from another. Even personalization was frowned upon, but not entirely forbidden. You had to apply for permission from the Government if you wanted to do things like that.
All the houses had been built that way, years ago, by the Founding Fathers. Cociel didn’t even understand why they called them that, seeing as they weren’t their real fathers, but they did, and it was apparently disrespectful to call them anything else. Most of the mice he had grown up around and lived with on a daily basis were flat out afraid of ever speaking out against the cats who governed them, or saying anything bad about them at all. Cociel was rebellious by nature. He didn’t feel confined by those old rules and he didn’t want to stick to them.
“What have you been doing?” Davetil asked as soon as he arrived home. He could just tell by the look on his son’s face that he’d been up to no good. “Causing trouble again?” The rotund, portly form of his furry father followed him through to the living room as Cociel ran through and jumped onto the sofa, picking up a magazine to thumb through it casually.
“No,” he lied, raising one paw and ruffling up the soft light brown fur on the top of his head. He hated having his fur neat. He was a total rebel in every way.
Davetil looked at him for a moment, then tutted and shook his head, turning on his hind paws and toddling off back to the kitchen, to continue preparing that evening’s meal of cheese pie and peas.
“One of these days you’re going to get yourself arrested,” he chastised him. “I really wish you’d grow out of this phase you’re in. Do your schoolmates behave like this? I don’t think they do.”
“Because they have no imagination, no intelligence,” Cociel argued, tossing down the magazine and turning round to look back over the sofa at his father, his beady black eyes shimmering slightly with the passion that burned just behind them. “They have no desire to better themselves, not really. They’re just…happy with the status quo.”
“And why can’t you be happy, hm? Do I not feed you enough or something? You’ve been like this ever since your mother...”
“Well, what do you expect?” snapped Cociel. “And it’s not a phase! I can’t be the only one who wants to see some serious change around here. Other people think it. I know they do. They’re just too afraid to say it out loud.”
“And you’re not? Is that it? You’re all big and brave, are you?”
“Yeah, actually, I am.”
“Why don’t you go join the army if you’re that brave? Do something useful with your life, mm?”
“And be cannon fodder for the cats? No, thank you! The cats never go into battle themselves, you know that?”
“I don’t think that’s true, Cociel,” said Davetil gently. “That’s not what Whiska says.”
“And you believe what Whiska says, do you?” Cociel scoffed and then turned back round with disgust, folding his arms across his chest angrily. “You’re just as brainwashed as the rest of them, Dad.”
Huntsville was a glorious place. When the sun was shining and the weather was warm, the animals that lived there claimed it was the most beautiful place on Earth, and certainly the most welcoming and friendly of all the animal kingdoms throughout the land. The same could not, sadly, be said of its rulers, and Whiska was one of them.
He was the Prime Minister, and had been ‘democratically elected’ to rule over the Mouse Reservation, but everyone knew there was no such thing as democracy within the walls of the Reservation. Not really. It was just a pretend democracy; a sham. Sometimes, Cociel wondered whether even the king really knew how bad it was. The king didn’t seem as controlling and psychotic as Whiska could be. Although still a cat, Nine Lives was fairly laid back in his legislation and, these days, the royal family acted more like figureheads than anything else. They could intervene and pass laws if they really wanted to, and they could overrule Parliament, but they never did.
Nine Lives was the king of the whole of Hunstville.
Whiska was the prime minister of the Reservation only, and had no say in any of the laws that took place outside of the Reservation. He could only decide on what happened in the lives of the mice.
The Kingdom, although still officially ruled by the Palace and by Nine Lives, was nearly entirely self governing and autonomous. The animals who lived there came from all different backgrounds and species. They had gotten used to life how it was. Nine Lives didn’t interfere in the day to day running of things too much, and everybody kept to themselves. There was rarely any crime, and if there was, it was brought to the attention of the community run police service, and the residents held monthly community meetings at the town hall to discuss what needed to be done in terms of road building, repairs to houses, and things like that.
To the mice who spent the majority of their lives confined inside the high walls of the Reservation, the Kingdom seemed like a haven; a wonderful, heavenly place they were only allowed to visit once a week.
Cociel always enjoyed his visits to the Kingdom, and took advantage of them whenever he could. Some mice didn’t even bother going. They’d grown so used to the sheltered life of the Reservation that they didn’t even care that there was a whole other city out there, a whole other world even.
He grabbed his schoolbag and went upstairs to his bedroom to get on with his homework. He didn’t feel like being in the same room as his father right at that minute, not after the remarks he’d made about Whiska. They just couldn’t see eye to eye on the issue.
Not that there was any point in doing his homework anyway, he thought to himself glumly. The school system in the Reservation was appalling. The cats didn’t actually care a single bit about educating the mice. Two hours a day, two days a week. That’s all they got. It was as though they wanted them to remain stupid and uneducated, just so they didn’t start to question the lives they were living.
Davetil had taught Cociel to read from an early age, knowing that it would take him longer if it was left to the school system. Perhaps that was where he went wrong; perhaps that was why Cociel was so rebellious. As soon as he could read, he wanted to learn more; he was positively devouring books and information, and absorbing as much as he could. He read up on history the most. He knew about the rest of the world, and all the other animal Kingdoms out there, and he knew about the history of Huntsville, and how the system they now lived under came into existence.
DING DONG!
The doorbell rang, interrupting both Cociel’s thoughts and his schoolwork.
For a moment, he thought it might be the Cat Police coming round to tell his father about the bike riding incident. Or maybe it was one of the elder mice, who always sided with the cats and enforced their silly laws.
He strained his ears and listened, and was overjoyed when he recognized the light, high pitched squeak of his best friend Tails.
He abandoned his homework in an instant and dashed down stairs. “Tails! Want to go out and play?”
“Yes, please,” she answered with a smile that showed her neat white teeth. “But your dad says you can’t.”
Davetil was standing in the doorway looking very serious. “Not until you’ve finished your homework and had your dinner.” He waggled his clawed paw in Cociel’s general direction.
“I’ve already finished my homework,” Cociel fibbed again. “And I can eat dinner when I come back. I’m not hungry.”
And with that, he dashed out through the door before his father could protest, followed by an eager and excitable Tails, her long eyelashes fluttering as she looked at Cociel with admiration. He was a cool mouse, and she liked him.
“Won’t you be in trouble when you go back?” she asked as they pedaled along on their bikes, not knowing particularly where they were going and not caring.
“Nah,” Cociel shrugged. “I’m never really in that much trouble. My dad’s pretty relaxed.”
“You’re so lucky.”
“I wouldn’t say that.”
Cociel veered his bike onto the grass again, then whizzed it back off, just teasing one of the cats that was standing nearby.
“Cossy!” Tails laughed, ducking her dark head down and trying to hide her face from the cat. Tails had a different shade of fur than Cociel and his family, but that had never bothered him. They were all mice together; he’d never seen the point of furcism.
Cociel grinned across at his friend. He liked trying to impress her, and he knew she enjoyed it when he did ‘naughty’ things, like; when he rebelled against the cats.
“I don’t know where you get the nerve to do these things,” she gushed.
“You should try it sometime,” said Cociel.
“Don’t you worry you’ll end up in prison? Like your mother?”
Cociel stopped riding for a moment, hitting the brakes. “My mother didn’t do anything wrong.”
“I know, but – “
“If all the mice were a bit more like her, maybe we wouldn’t have to put up with the cats for much longer.”
Tails sighed and carried on riding. It was a conversation they often had whenever they spent time together, and one that never seemed to get any further along. Cociel was touchy on the subject, and she could hardly blame him. “There’s nothing we can do about it,” she murmured in resignation. “Mice have tried, over the years. Now and again a rebel comes along. And you know what happens to them.”
“One day a rebel is going to come along, and they’re actually going to change something. I know it. Come on!” Cociel took off pedaling again, steering them off in a different direction from the park where they normally went to play.
“Where are we going?” Tails asked as she picked up the speed to follow him. Cociel was her hero. She would always follow him anywhere, no matter what stupidity or danger he was leading them both into and, as they began to get closer and closer to the Kennel of Parliament, she began to doubt the sanity of her best friend even more. “What are you doing?” she hissed at him under her breath.
They pulled their bikes to a stop and quietly slipped off, leaning them against the circular fence that circled the Kennel and stopped mice from easily gaining access. There was a main entrance just round the corner, but that was always guarded by two very fierce lions, and no one ever dared approach unless they had been specifically ordered. Even then, they were only granted admittance whey they were expected by someone in the Government, in which case, it usually meant bad news for whoever had been summoned.
“Haven’t you been paying attention to local politics?” Cociel asked. “They have a meeting here tonight to discuss Section D. You should be interested, seeing as you live there.”
“What’s there to discuss?” Tails asked innocently. Cociel was quite right. She didn’t pay the slightest bit attention to local politics, except when her activist best friend brought it to her attention.
“About the empty houses,” whispered Cociel, creeping round the side of the fence as much as he dared, wanting to keep well away from the eyes of the lions.
The Reservation itself was split into four sections; four different specific areas where different mice could live. Sections A, B, C and D.
Sections A to C were heavily populated – some might argue too much – but Section D was only home to a handful of mice at best, and the majority of the specially-built houses were empty and unoccupied. Although Cociel was a resident of Section C, he had an interest in what was to be decided for the future of D, due to the fact that Tails lived there. In his opinion, more mice should be moved out of the other overpopulated sections and spread out into Section D to make it more comfortable for everyone. But nobody would listen to his opinion. Nobody ever listened to the opinion of a mouse.