Barkster's Busy Night

Barkster preened gently in the moonlight; stretching his cat-legs to the extremities of their limits. His soft purrs echoed off the shadowy walls of the alley. Barkster knew this town like he knew the little rough spots on his tongue. Without question, Barkster was thoughtful. There were a few suspicious characters in town tonight, however, and Barkster knew what he had to do.
Barkster strode down the sidewalk, cat-like. The street was empty, still shiny with rain from the day before. Barkster’s cat-like eyes spotted the headlights of a car, a Pickle car. The morbidity of Mrs. Pickle’s race as they had entered the automobile age struck Barkster at the moment, until he was nearly soaked by spray from a particularly profound puddle when a befuddled Mrs. Pickle careened past, crossing from her lane opposite Barkster into the lane near him. Barkster, saved from this soaking by his cat-like reflexes, compounded his list of complaints with the Pickle race.
Leaping into the comforts of a cushy blueberry bush, Barkster began to review the events of the night. He had begun his nightly rounds through the city, and at first everything proceeded as usual. Then, near the edge of town, he had spotted a fire. There were never fires in Barkster’s quiet town. Since the town had been destroyed during the last war, it had been carefully rebuilt in a Utopian model, as depicted in the tracts of famous turtle philosopher Depictatus, and entrance had been strictly limited. The town was covered in foliage, designed for multiple purposes and for optimum ergonomics. For example, the bench Barkster had settled on was padded with the leaves of the blueberry bush, which also fed users of the bench.
Predictably, a program of this scale used on the whole town was quite expensive at first, despite its future self-sustainability. This unfortunately required the town to resort to tourism during these early formative years. The town had become rather isolationist in light of recent events, so this was a bit of an issue for many people. You see, the area had lost a great deal of learning and development during the last war. Barkster’s town meant to rebuild the area much better than it had been before, but this meant that they could not allow themselves to devolve into the state of those around them, who they would eventually educate as they themselves grew stronger.
Barkster’s job was an integral part of this plan, as he protected the town from the negative influence of people like Mrs. Pickle, and, more acutely, from fire. Thusly, Barkster advanced toward the fire at the edge of town, seeking to end its unjust imposition on the night. He halted in his tracks, however, when he saw he was surrounded on three sides by torchbearing animals, who did not appear to have seen him yet. He fled the area and regrouped with a few other night watchanimals and jumped back in towards the firebearers. They observed the bacchanalian ceremony of epic proportions
On the outskirts of the town, in the midst of a dense broccoli forest, the animals, led by a thick Rhinoceros, began to sing and dance to the beat of the war drums in the center of the circle. Colors swirled and body parts flailed as the beat grew quicker, more frenzied. The animals took up their torches again, careening around the circle in seeming ecstasy. Several fell to the earth, shaking in fits of passion, as the drummers left all semblance of rhythm behind and rolled through the climax of the ceremony.
As all the animals writhed in ecstasy on the ground, the Rhinoceros signaled the drummers, who took up a regular, martial beat. The animals recovered themselves and took up their torches again. They formed into lines and left the forest, with the look of those who just want to be fiends in their eyes, heading towards the innocent civilians in Barkster’s town.
Barkster and his companions hesitated not a moment to execute their plan. The alarm was sounded, and the town was evacuated to the designated safe haven. The soldiers prepared to do their duty and meet the threatening animals, an army from the surrounding area come to steal the town’s wealth, and Barkster and his crew of Detective Cats headed out to do the most important job: Barkster’s crew was in charge of rounding up the leaders of the animal cabal.
Barkster’s personal job was to capture Black Spycat, who had looked suspicious ever since he had moved to town. He was accompanied by two dogs, each piloted by moth pilots and loaded with moth shock troops (dogs had been exterminated in the war, but their carcasses were prevented from decay where possible and coopted for use in defense by the town). They arrived at Black’s house just as he was sneaking out the back entrance. Caught between two moth-driven dogs and Barkster’s long talons, he fled up an invisible tree and hid in an owl’s nest, where he was soon fast asleep.
Barkster knew not what to do at this impasse. He himself could climb trees but his nightvision did not extend to invisible trees, which he could only barely see in the daylight. Nor could he speak owl. Of course, his dogs could not climb trees at all. Looking about in a search for ideas, he saw a moth coming over the hill, followed closely by one of Barkster’s cohorts. The moth, named Admirable Goodmoth, flitted here and there, and, upon reaching Barkster and his dogs, it darted daringly into one of the dogs’ open mouths. The fight for control within the DogBrain was clearly evidenced by its erratic motions, and Barkster’s enemy seemed to have won the fight.
Barkster acted swiftly, opening the belly of the dog to free its complement of moths, hopefully before they could be stolen by the enemy moth. Unfortunately, this was not to be. The moths Barkster had released flew up to the owl’s nest and awakened Black Spycat. Spycat leapt from the tree onto the back of Admirable Goodmoth’s dog and they fled together. Barkster’s remaining dog released its moths to hold off Goodmoth’s moths and gave chase itself.
Meanwhile, Barkster and his companion cat positioned themselves to ambush Spycat and Goodmoth. When he passed, they leapt together, Barkster knocking off Spycat, whom he captured and brought to prison, and his companion, Actual Catster slicing Goodmoth’s dog’s neck open and killing Goodmoth.
The town was safe again, and the mess was soon cleaned up. No one ever threatened the village again, because they learned how to be good animals; everyone except for the Pickles, who never learned to be good animals because they liked their drink just a tiny bit too much.


Plot Idea in part contributed by Alex Hiatt and JT Ketterer, and Barkster the Cat Detective