MOUSE OF COMMONS. MOUSE OF LORDS.

PART 15 OF GLADSTONE MCWHISKERS AND THE LOST CITY OF BEARCELONA...

GLADSTONE MCWHISKERS AND THE LOST CITY OF BEARCELONA... - PART 15

Here for your delictation is the 15th and final segment of our new internet-exclusive mini-adventure by Paul Chandler, set in Spain and the Islands, which is a sequel to GLADSTONE MCWHISKERS AND THE PHANTOM PIE-CRAWL.

Majorca - Valdemossa, Late Autumn.

To be perfectly honest, Gladstone was furious. "Go on, then..." he taunted. "Eat me - see if I care..." he said. "Just don't expect to get away with it lightly; I have friends who are dogs at the highest level and like to eat cats for breakfast..."

The cats that were surrounding them looked uncertain for a moment. "But dogs don't EAT cats; they just chase them..." mewed one of the felines in the crowd, but sounded quite nervous all the same..."

"This one does..." Claud insisted. "I know because I met him and he tried to chew my tail..." he exclaimed and held up his tail for all to see. Indeed, it did look a tad scraggy; but Gladstone knew this to be because of the fight earlier with Augustus - it was partly that and also from years of getting his tail caught in the swing doors at the pie restaurant back in Barcelona.

"We want to know if you saw any bears..." Gladstone continued, wondering if he should mention that his father once tried to eat a cat, but then deciding that as the cat had ended up eating his father, then this was a very poor example indeed, to show just how you shouldn't take a mouse for granted. "Did you see where they went!?" he continued and then added for extra-dramatic effect. "IT'S EXTREMELY URGENT!!"

The cats thought about it for a moment and bundled together into a rather haphazard looking huddle. In the end a grey lady cat came forward with their answer. "We saw two bear; one who looked very sticky and one with a bucket over his head; they both went this way - please, now - follow me..."

Gladstone smiled; it appeared that their earnest words had worked...

Meanwhile, back on the balcony overlooking Valdemossa; Ollie watched in fear as Charlie and Augustus finally confronted one another...

"I should kill you, my boy - except that what you did has actually helped me..."

Charlie quit chanting for a moment and took in the further changes in his appearance. "You really are taking this mid-life crisis thing a little too far, father... Did you get surgery or something? I'm sorry - but it doesn't suit you? Are you trying to attract all the young, hot pies or something!?"

"Silence. I may still have to kill you, Charlie - once and for all. You are a perpetual thorn in my side..."

"Awww..." Charlie made a disappointed face. "What have I done now, Papa!? Well, other than let your little cart shoot off down the hill. You seem to have survived that extremely well..." Augustus said nothing in reply and simply moved closer. "Anyway..." continued Charlie confidently. "I have no time to be killed... I'm busy opening a portal to another dimensions; busy opening the way through to the lost city..."

At that moment, Gladstone, Claud and their entourage of village cats arrived at about this point and Ollie hurried across to be reunited with his friends. "What's going on?" Glad asked.

"Augustus just showed up and Charlie had got some magic incantation going on to open some kind of portal to the lost city..."

Gladstone nodded, but it was Claud who pointed out that something odd was occurring. "So why is Augustus laughing?" he asked and the other turned to look.

"What's so funny, father?"

"You - dear boy... That you've followed me all this way; when there is no lost city; at least if there was then it was never here on this spot..."

Augustus was probably expecting Charlie to be surprised or furious - but there was no time for that; for something else was going on that was taking up everybody's attention...

There, down in the valley - where there had previously been a maze of streets that made up most of the town of Valdemossa - was now a shimmering bubble of light and it appeared to be coming closer and closer towards the bears...

"CHARLIE!! WATCH OUT!!!" cried Gladstone, but the bear wasn't listening.

"If that's not the lost city, father - then what is it? What portal have I opened through all my chanting?" he enquired, casually.

But for the first time ever Augustus genuinely looked afraid. "I DON'T KNOW..." he gasped and then suddenly, before he could say any more the bubble shot towards the two bears and enveloped them in rather cheap looking flash of light and smoke...

"Oh my..." gasped Oliver and Gladstone together.

The two bears, father and son, were gone...

EPILOGUE

Gladstone, Ollie and Claud waited on the hill top all that day, into night - all that night and even into the end of the next day. Even the village cats waited too.

"How much longer can we wait for them, boss?" Ollie asked as the cats bought them food from the village, in between nursing the sick Kob back to health.

"Another day..." replied Gladstone, sombrely.

In the end they waited a week and a day and yet still the bears did not return...

...And at that point there was really nothing for ir but to turn around and head, reluctantly, back to London...

COMING SOON LATER THIS YEAR ON THIS WEBSITE - GLADSTONE MCWHISKERS AND THE HULLABALOO DIMENSION.

This instalment of GLADSTONE MCWHISKERS AND THE LOST CITY OF BEARCELONA was originally written in London between Wednesday 5th and Thursday 6th of December 2007. It was finally completed on Wednesday 23rd January 2008, due to unforeseen delays in producing the post.

BEHIND THE SCENES OF GLADSTONE MCWHISKERS AND THE LOST CITY OF BEARCELONA...

Here, for the final post, I present the remaining photos from my Majorcan trip in December 2007.

Photos and text - copyright Paul Chandler, 2007.

Labels: Charlie Grrr, Gladstone McWhiskers, Mouse of Commons, Oliver Louse

posted by Paul Chandler @ 10:46 AM