Lookin 4 luv (on the correct planet)

Ah finally a section of my TYGER BRYAN novel deals with a subject that I actually enjoy. The gist of today's chapter is that my hero who is a Burning Tyger goes out in search of a mate for his friend who is an ex-housecat. I would call this episode a romantic comedy, but it's neither romantic nor comedic.

P.S.

In other news: my Public Private Diary is fully printed; also I made a list of my latest novels that have been printed but not included in any collection.

Chapter Fourteen

On the morrow, I awake in my canopy bed. I lie there for a while and playfully bat at one of the tassels on the edge of the cloth that’s draped over the frame. Then, when I begin to feel invincible, I leap up and burst thru the top of this sumptuous fabric, tear past its elegant netting and glide out the bedroom window (which I left open because the exterior temperature was perfect all night long). I land on the shoreline of our peninsula, grab the platter of pan-seared salmon that I programmed the butler to leave out, and begin to feed the sharks. I toss as follows: One for them, and one for me. Like so, I alternate the distribution, until the platter is empty.

It is enjoyable to watch the sportive sharks leap from the water and chomp the salmon in midair, while every other morsel I myself gulp down, after tossing it overhead (each lands directly in my maw). Then I make sure the sharks are full — I don’t want any of them to go hungry, so I ask them if they’d care for more. Some days, a few of them will pipe up and say “If you don’t mind, yes, we could eat more meat,” but usually they admit that they’re sufficiently suffonsified.

On this particular morning, I linger for an extra hour at the shoreline discussing Diogenes with one of the sharks, before beginning my Secret Mission.

Now I need to build a mobile vehicle that can navigate the outer spaces, for I would like to visit Jupiter. So I saunter over to the Forest of the Night. Even tho it is morning, all the greenery of this realm remains in darkness, because the sun is not allowed here — that’s why it’s called the Nighttime Forest. I walk forth and back, and go to and fro among the trees, until they all catch fire; then I use my mighty right forepaw to knock down as many pieces of burning lumber that I need to construct my chariot. (I’m building a chariot of fire.)

Once my craft is finished, I harness myself to its frame and pull it thru the starry sky for a number of weeks (a little more than a month — forty days, to be exact) until we reach my favorite planet, which, as I told you before, is Jupiter.

I head straight for the Red Spot: my adventure occurs in the epoch before the insipid astronauts neutralized its exuberance; that’s why the Red Spot still exists — it is hellfire, essentially.

I spend some time walking among these fires of hell, delighted with the enjoyments of Genius; which to Angels look like torment and insanity; until I find the being I’m looking for: She is a Black Panther named Myala.

“MUSE!” I shout and wave my mighty forepaw to get her attention, “Remember me? I’m so glad that I found you here! I had begun to wonder if maybe you’d left for Venus.”

“Bryan the Tyger!” Myala pounces and gives me a tussle. “You look splendiferous! Where’ve you been? I kept thinking I’d run into you. C’mon, tell me all about what you’ve been doing, while I lead you to my palace.” She then eyes my chariot and inquires: “You haven’t become a slave, have you? Why are you harnessed to this contraption?”

“Oh, this is for you,” I say; “I just made it on a whim. I’m hoping to convince you to return with me to Earth; and, if you consent, I will let you ride on this thing, like a reindeer pulling a sleigh – it’s just a fancy idea that I dreamt up, which I thought might be fun to do, to give the adventure some bonus flair.”

Myala smiles brightly and laughs. “Alright, you intrigued me — go on, now: tell me what you’ve been up to!”

“Well I’ve been skulking around Planet Earth and getting to know the local wildlife. I freed a house-pet and met some nuns. Not much to report yet; I’ve only just begun to cause mischief.”

“They still have house-pets there?” Myala gasps. “Are you sure you’re safe?”

“Oh, I’m fine,” I say; “I’m the strongest creature on the planet — none of the humans dare to employ me. Plus I’m the only one who’s on fire, so everyone moves aside when I walk down the street — whole multitudes will part to allow me passage: it’s like when we helped Moses divide the Red Sea, during his own rescue mission, back in the day. . . . Ooh! speaking of seas, they also have really choice seafood on Earth. And I befriended two Leviathans.”

“Jeesh, as if this isn’t already enough to persuade me to join you, I must admit that the sound of your voice is animalistically magnetizing: I don’t think I could live without it again, for any span of time, now that you’ve come here,” sez Myala. “So what exactly do you have in mind, if I join your adventure?”

“Well, I haven’t thought things thru completely yet,” I admit; “but, if I am able to coax you back to Earth with me, then my first idea would be maybe that you and I could couple in some goofy way that would produce a diminutive cat: a type of tyger-panther hybrid that is an homunculus. You see, I promised to find a soul-mate for the house-pet I rescued.”

Myala looks down at the burning coals on the ground for a moment and ponders the situation; then she gets a bright idea and exclaims:

“Hey, I just thought of something – it might be the perfect solution to our dilemma: You see, I happen to have a kitty-cat staying at my palace, right now — a slinky little thing that I saved from a nearby harem, because the flames were too cold — perhaps my rescue would fit with your rescue. But this would be taking advantage of serendipity instead of biologically propagating — how important is procreation to you?”

“Oh, zero: not important at all,” I say; “I only mentioned it to amuse us.”

“Purr-rr-rr-fect,” smiles Myala (she rolls her ‘R’s when she talks); “then let’s get a move on and manifest this match made in heaven.”

“Yes, or hell,” I quip; and we laugh. “But, before we pace forward and present our proposal to your kitty-cat palace-mate, there’s one thing I forgot to ask: Does this harlot of yours look feminine? Cuz I sorta promised my Zephyros (that’s the name of this ex-housecat I keep talking about) that I’d find him a female feline. Only now do I realize that I shouldn’t have asked him to specify a gender preference — I don’t know why I bothered to bring that up; perhaps I’ve been spending too much time among human earthlings; but the fact is that I gave poor little Zephyros my word.”

“Oh, that shouldn’t be a problem,” laughs Myala; “for, altho this kitty-friend of mine, whose name is Nous, is technically a neuter (her position in the harem required that she be spayed), she is as radiant as any fille de joie. When one meets her, she unmistakably comes off as a courtesan. She even answers to ‘strumpet’ (for that was her calling before she found me).”

“Her name is Nous?” I look at Myala blankly for a moment; then she nods. So I say: “OK, that should work fine; cuz I believe that Zephyros is actually an eunuch as well. I never officially asked him, cuz I didn’t want to embarrass him; but it’s fairly obvious.”

So we enter the palace of Myala the Black Panther, and she and I have a chat with Nous the Kitty, who seems truly excited to go on a journey with us thru the stars. Admittedly I am relieved that this feline’s disposition is convincingly feminine — she is, in fact, a scarlet damsel: universally alluring.

“Alright, hop in!” I say to lovely Myala and her little friend Nous. They spring up off the royal davenport and land in the chariot of fire; then I pull them thru outer space until we touch down on our familiar green-blue globe.

“We’re here!” I say. “The asteroid field wasn’t too scary, I hope?”

“No! That was fun!” sez little Nous as she hops down from the box chair. (Myala smiles at me and winks.)

As the three of us walk to my castle, we enjoy a conversation about a novel, which we’re all surprised to learn that we share a love for: Giorgio de Chirico’s Hebdomeros.

My butler Devlin greets us at the front doors with a solemn obeisance.

“Wow you have sharks!” sez little Nous, gazing backward at the sea that surrounds our peninsula while Myala ushers her into the entryway.

“We’ll have plenty of time to play with the sharks and leviathans,” Myala pats little Nous on her Cat-head; “but now it’s time to meet your new feline-friend, Zephyros.”

My castlemate now enters the antechamber.

“Zephyros, this is Nous,” I introduce the Kitty-cats to each other. “Nous, meet Zephyros.”

They fall in love at first sight. “May we kiss?” the young couple looks up at us, their enormous guardians. We nod, and they press their noses together and purr. (Everything always works out well in storybooks. – If this were reality, the two would probably hate each other and exclaim: “This arranged marriage sux.”)

“Henceforward, you do not need our permission for anything,” I explain to the kitties. “Do whatever you like. You are now officially soul-mates. Zephyros, accept my sincerest congrats. And, Nous, make yourself at home; this castle now belongs equally to us all. The only thing I ask is: if you happen to make a mess, please clean it up — or else, just leave it, and I’ll either clean it up myself or make it worse. Nothing really matters.”

But just now I realize that I forgot to pick up the additional items that little Zephyros requested alongside of a soul-mate. So I quickly jet back to Planet Jupiter and buy a saucer of milk and a tweety bird, and then I begin to travel home again; yet, halfway to Earth, I think to myself: “I really should have bought two saucers of milk and two tweety birds, so that both of my kitty comrades can have their own treats.” So I turn around and land and make the extra purchases on Jupiter; then I blast off and return to my peninsula and place these gifts before the cute couple, and they are happy about these offerings.

After lapping up their milk and consuming their tweety birds, the newlywed Cats begin to chase each other around, in lieu of consummating their marriage. Immediately they singe themselves on the chandelier, which contains hundreds of actual candles (non-electric); then, to cool off, they jump in the sea surrounding the castle. But when a shark glides forth and begins to preach at them from one of the Apostle Paul’s mad letters (the inhabitants of our ocean are far from unified in their views — some are smart while others are stupid), the young lovers retire indoors. Nous and Zephyros spend the rest of the evening reading The Satyricon of Petronius.