This is the beginning to the ending I really wanted to write for this story from the start but due to time restraints had to rethink. Now I am almost done and it has turned out longer than I expected so I will post in two parts. For the beginning of the story read my previous post That Cat's From Hell. You'll get all the good bits so your not lost and find out where the inspiration came from for this story. P.S. the second paragraph starts the new stuff. Happy reading!
By mid-morning Barm was tired of being in his cage. He had talked to all his troops, and received little new information. Just when he had decided to try unlatching his cage, a new animal control worker came into the cat room. She went around looking at all the cats, she seemed to be looking for something specific. She took two of Barm's troops out to the adoption room then came back. This time she spotted Barm and came right over to his cage and took him out. She grabbed another of his troops, and Barm realized she was getting all the larger cats this time. As much as he wanted to get away he didn't struggle, he could wait for the right time.
The human, holding the two cats, walked through several rooms before reaching the adoption room closer to the front door. When she reached the room, Barm saw the room was lined with similar cages as the room he had been held in and there were some larger ones with no ceiling, in the middle of the large room with a few humans sitting in them with other cats. Barm was placed in one of the empty cages that rested along the wall across from the door that the human brought him through.
Barm watched with fascination, as humans came in, looked at all the cats and maybe took one or two into the larger cages, seeming to enjoy waving puffy balls on strings in front of the cats. most of the cats seemed to like it too.
"Troops! Pay attention! These creatures are what we are supposed to be. Watch them and pick your behavior accordingly." Barm said as he stood up and stretched as he had observed the other cats doing.
"Yes, Sir!" Came from several minds around the room.
Barm had to wait nearly an hour for a little girl to tug her parents over to his cage and want to take him out into one of the larger cages.
"Mommy, mommy! I want to play with this one!" The little blond girl said looking up at Barm, who's cage was above her head, with awe and love on her face.
"Okay sweetie, we'll ask the lady to take him into the get to know you room." The Female human, Mommy, said and walk over to a desk in the corner where another female was sitting with stacks of papers spread out in front of her.
In a moment both were back outside Barm's cage. The worker opened the cage and lifted Barm out and carried him over to the get to know you room. The room was the size of a large closet set on the wall across from the desk the worker came from. It had large windows on both side walls and a full glass door set in the middle of the front wall.
"Are you sure you want to start with this one baby girl, it's quite big for a cat." The male human said to the little girl.
"I like him daddy. We need to see if he likes us too!" The little girl said as she bounced after the worker holding Barm.
"Here you go. Take all the time you need to make friends." The worker said setting Barm on the floor and giving a smile to the little girl.
Barm walked around the enclosure sniffing like he observed the real cats doing. When the little girl sat on the floor, crossing her legs under her Barm turned to watch her.
"Here, kitty, kitty, kitty." She called in her high little voice. Barm walked over and climbed on to her lap and stared into her face. The girl started running her hand from the top of his head to his tail, and a strange noise started coming from Barm's throat. "See daddy he likes me! He's purring!" The girl said looking over her shoulder at her dad.
"Here, kitty." The female called mommy said from a chair in the corner, holding her hand low and rubbing her fingers together. Barm looked at her for a few seconds, then got up from the girls lap and walked over to the 'mommy' and sniffed her hand. After he let her pet him, she lifted him onto her lap, witch was not very big due to her large belly taking up most of the room.
"Aren't you a beautiful kitty." The female said as she started running her hand down Barm's back. He started making the purring noise again, leaning up against the large belly next to him. Suddenly he felt something push against his side that was against the belly. It startled him enough that he almost fell off the little bit of lap he had been perched on. When he caught his balance he turned enough to stare at the offending belly.
"Oh, it's okay kitty, the baby was just saying hi. I think he likes you too." The female said putting one hand on Barm, to help steady him, and the other on her extended belly, which Barm watched move under her hand. Barm strained his improved hearing, trying to hear anything from this baby that is inside the mommy. He was about to turn away when the belly moved in a big wave and he started hearing a faint fast beating, that must be the baby's heartbeat. Barm decided to bring his head closer to the belly to see if he could hear more. To avoid suspicion he rubbed his head along the belly like he was happy about the thing inside it.
"Mommy, the kitty likes the baby!" The little girl exclaimed with glee. "Daddy why don't you see if he likes you?"
"Okay." The dad said with slight trepidation in his voice. "Hi, there kitty." He said as he reached his hand over to Barm, to let him sniff his fingers.
Barm did not like the human at all, but he needed to make nice if he wanted any chance of the mission to be a success. So he sniffed the fingers and rubbed his head on them, then let the human scratch him behind the ears and under the chin.
"See Daddy, he likes all of us! I think it's time to take Shadow home." The little girl said matter-of-factly.
"You already named him, Bryn?" The male human said to the little girl dropping his hand from Barm's head.
"That's what he looked like in his cage." She said simply.
"You don't want to look at any other cats? See if there is one you might like more?"
"No Daddy, I want Shadow!" The girl's bottom lip stuck out and started to shake.
"Oh, Bryn don't cry. Daddy just wants you to be sure of your choice. We don't want to take Shadow home and have you change your mind." The Mommy said as she put her arm around the girl's little shoulders.
"I won't change my mind. I promise." Bryn assured them emphatically.
"Okay baby girl. I believe you." The Daddy said with a slight smile for her seriousness. "Honey can I speak to you?" He held his hand out to help the Mommy up.
They walked out of the visiting room. Leaving the little girl sitting on the floor playing with the cat. Barm perked his ears at the leaving humans, making sure he could hear what they didn't want the little girl to hear.
"What is it Tom?"
"I just don't know about this one Jenny."
"Are you backing out again? You're going to break our little girl's heart." Jenny said with disappointment in her voice.
"No, honey. It's just this one. There's just something about him that makes me uneasy. There are so many others to pick from." Tom says sweeping his hand across the room, stopping and pointing at one of the cages. "Like that little orange one over there, or the small white and black one over there." Tom points at another cage.
"Is it because he's so big?" Jenny asks.
"That may be part of it, but there's something else about that animal I just don't like."
"I don't see what you mean, that cat has been nothing but sweet and loving to us all. Bryn really likes him too. And we said that she could pick the cat we get. I think you'll just have to get to know him better. You will grow to love him, you'll see." Jenny gave Tom a sweet smile and a small kiss on the cheek.
"Okay, I'll give it time." Tom said circling Jenny's waist and pulling her to him for a hug. "I love you. I'll trust your judgment on the cat." He kissed her lightly. Then they turned back to the door and saw the cat staring at them. Tom gave an involuntary shiver before he could suppress it. He quickly shook it off and opened the door for Jenny to enter first.
"Bryn, you're really sure about taking Shadow home to stay with us for ever?" Jenny asked.
"Yes, Mommy! I'm super sure!" Bryn said hugging Barm around his middle.
"Okay, we'll get the lady so she can put Shadow in a cat box so we can take him home."
Twenty minutes later and Barm desperately wanted out of the 'cat box'. He found out he does not like to be carried, especially in a small dark box. As soon as the box was set down for the second time, he was trying to push the top open with his head. This time it opened easily.
"This is your new home, Shadow." Bryn said in a quiet voice holding the top flaps wide.
As soon as the space over the box was clear Barm jumped out and stopped, looking around, absorbing his surroundings. He was in a hallway with wood floors and pale walls. He started sniffing around like a cat would, and headed deeper in to this home. He first came to a doorway on his left, it was full of large soft furniture, darker walls and the same wood floors. After glancing in that room, he turned to the large open area on his right. The floors changed in this space, cold hard stone met his feet as he entered. This room had many cabinets and more stone on top of some of them. It also smelled faintly of food in this room. As he stood in the entrance to the room he saw another room off to his right, and headed over to investigate. This other room had the same stone floors, but with a large rug, taking up most of the space under a medium size table, in the middle of the room. Each side of the room had a desk and chair facing away from each other. Two of the walls were filled with windows, making it very bright in the room. After circling around the room, Barm headed back to the hall, where a staircase lead up stairs. He went up the stairs and sniffed around all the rooms. Two were floored with cold stone and smelled like water and soap. The other three were floored in soft rugs that went from wall to wall. Two had beds, the larger room with the larger bed smelled like the Mommy and Daddy, the smaller room with the smaller bed smelled like Bryn. The last room had what looked like a cage in it and it didn't smell like anyone, it just smelled like many different chemicals. When he was done, Barm made his way back down to the room that smelled like food. The little girl was in there holding two bowls in her hands. Barm followed her as she took them into the room with the big table. She set them down next the desk that was against the wall with out windows. Barm now saw that one bowl had water and the other had the hard little bits of food he had that morning. He was not interested in the food but did go over to the water and drink some.
"This is where your food is going to be." Bryn said as she stroked Barm's back.
When he was done drinking she called him over to the windows that looked over the front yard.
"And this is where your bed will be." She said as she sat down on a wide built-in ledge below the window, patting it for Barm to jump up on.
He did jump up and stared out the window for a few long moments, observing the neighborhood.
