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by Stephen Kilbane
Dark Fantasy, 2 pages.
Originally Published in Odyssey Magazine #2, 1997
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Putrid neon light coats the rough brick walls and littered pavement, draping shadows over the alleyway between buildings and hiding stars in the first slivers of frost. The air lies heavily, a mantle of pins; tonight, even the wind sleeps.
Cloaked in darkness, a cat watches the deserted street with a single remaining rheumy eye. Bristled against the cold, its once-black coat is coalface-coloured and thinning to reveal ancient scars. Ragged ears twitch, seeking prey, while its breath mists and rises, life's heat ebbing away like smoke from burnt-out embers.
Ears swivel as a distant rumble approaches, and the cat backs deeper into the alleyway as the pavement vibrates through numb paws. Closer now, and the car's headlights burn through a pupil that is a vertical line, a terminating boundary.
This is not stalking. There is no tensing of hind muscles, no bedding of paws, no isolating focus upon quarry. The cat does not lunge to intercept its victim. This time, ancient joints need not tear in a desperate, brief battle between food and flight. But this is still hunting, and there is still predator and prey.
The cat rises. Stif -- [End of Preview.]