Chapter 11: 11. One Yarn Puppet For 100 Mischievous Cats

Mafia Joe felt on the verge of unconsciousness, he had been hit by some of the rockets The Empress had been launching towards the kid and he had been seriously hurt. He was being carried away in a stretcher to a Mafia Ambulance by some Mafia Goons in scooters that had decided to escape the forest.

If anything, being close to death made him appreciate those moments of life more, Mafia Joe looked at his side, the scooters were at such high speed he felt the forest was running away from him as he looked at it. He wanted to hold onto the beautiful landscape, and be able to appreciate it a little longer.

In a way, it made him happy he had gone so far away from home, if anything just to be able to see such a beautiful place. Everything just felt so… unreal. The whole forest had this feeling of melancholy and grief due to the lost past, but there was also a sense of hope and happiness for the possibilities the future could bring. The undead trees, the magical creatures. Every single being had gotten a scar in the long past since its conception, but it was learning to heal in its own way

Mafia Chad told him once he was scared of the forest and the energies of it, but Mafia Joe had found out the truth, Subcon didn't have an evil magical energy trying to take control of the emotions of its inhabitants, it wasn’t that Subcon was inherently evil and its creatures were always ready to kill all the people who dared to adventure into it. No, the truth of Subcon was… it was....

Mafia Joe died right afterwards and turned into a bright, red big pon.

“Gimme!” Hatkid jumped over the stretcher and grabbed the pon, absorbing it and harvesting its power. She took out her hookshot pointing to a high branch to jump above a pond but got hit by a tree.

“Aww!” She got hit by some cats with bats on them, she then would jump and escape with her hookshot, only to fall over when hit by a rocket.

“Aw! Woah! Aw! Woah!” She would get kicked out by Mafia Men and then would try to escape again.

She got to escape once again and ran towards the edges of the forest with a sprint hat as fast as she could.

The problem was it seemed to be there weren’t any other health pons in Subcon Forest…

Snatcher was fighting with his minions towards all the cats and Mafia Men that were coming after him. He would throw potions and make his minions run towards the cats coming after them.

“Not enough? What about this!” Snatcher took one soul after the other, so many were dropping dead on the floor, but no matter how many he took out, more would come to fight back, it seemed as if the amount of Cats and Mafia Goons was endless.

***

It would probably be easy, she had seen Hatkid fight the guy before in the Mafia Theatre, Mecha Boss could only attack backwards or forwards and his boomerang knives could only move only from left to right.

Immediately afterwards Mecha Boss had started to move in circles all around the circle like a crazy, manic yoyo.

“AAAH!”

“You are out of luck, Mustache Girl! I have upgraded my abilities and now I am… invincible!”

“No!” Mu yelled when she was kicked over, she quickly stood up and started throwing bombs at Mecha Boss. “Take… this!”

“Ha! Try again! I’m gonna get you!” Mecha Boss charged right to her but Mu jumped over, dodding him.

Moonjumper was watching from above the trees. He could help if he wanted, but that wasn’t his place to do so. He wanted to watch if the girl would be able to fight once the time came to it. Besides, the kid was just someone he was using to finish his plan.

“Booyah!” She threw some ice bombs towards him, freezing him out, but then Mecha Boss would overheat himself to get out of the ice prison and then go back to charge at her using his spin movement.

Mu didn’t have any timepiece power anymore, she couldn’t no longer levitate for a while or use an energy beam to attack. “Blam!” She resorted to doing a homing attack when Mecha Boss was dizzy., but ended up missing the shot more times than she didn’t.

“Super charge!” Mecha Boss would throw energy beams one after the other, Mu had seen that attack before when Hatkid had a fight with him back in Mafia Town, but now the beams were being sent not only in one direction, but all over the clearance in every direction imaginable. “Ultra Charge!”

“Quit it!” She ended up getting launched away towards the other side of the clearance and got hit in the head.

Moonjumper felt a sense of worry deep inside his heart, which was weird because he was sure his heart had stopped beating a long time ago. Still, he was sure that Mu would end up winning, if something the girl had shown him, is that she was strong as no other. He saw her slowly standing up to attack once again, when Mecha Boss finally did his final attack.

“HYPER NEW AND UPGRADED ULTRA DUPER DUPER CHARGE!” In an overwhelming visual array of colors, Mecha Boss launched a massive energy wave all over the clearance.

“No!” Mu couldn’t stand up in time. She got hit by the massive wave of energy and fell over once again. This time, she didn’t stand up.

“Ha! And that’s what you get for staining the good reputation of the mafia! You won’t get in the middle of our plans any more!” Mecha Boss screamed in victory. A couple of Mafia Goons who were around the clearance clapped enthusiastically. “Oh well, let’s go home boys, tonight we are going to eat some Mafia Pasta, my treat.” He turned around and the group started walking away from the clearance.

Moonjumper floated back down to where Mustache Girl was and picked her up and tried to check on her. Her eyes were crossed out and had bruises all over face.

“Oh well, it’s not like she’s dead–”

Then a ghostly light came out of her mouth and started floating towards the sky.

“WHAT?” Moonjumper tried to catch the cloud of energy, but it passed right through his fingers. “Wait!” He tried over and over, but he couldn’t grab it at all. What the hell was that? It wasn’t her soul, so was it some kind of energy or life force, something, but what was sure was that it was going faster and faster towards heaven itself.

“I mean, I guess she had it coming—” Moonjumper tried to convince himself, but he felt his undead heart palpitating at an incredible speed. The kid could be dead, sure, and he didn’t care about some lousy kid who had ties to the Mafia, but maybe he would still need her to come up with his takeover plan? Yes, that was the real reason. He needed his minion, so he had to think fast, if he allowed the life force thingy to get away, Mu would be dead for good. Well, she was already dead for good, but she had died in the Horizon, there had to be a way to put her life back into her body before it escaped away.

“Snatcher.” Moonjumper frowned. Perhaps he didn’t have the ability to grab and manipulate souls and life, but Snatcher could. He would have to go and find him to convince him. “Alright, hold on tight little girl, you wait here for me and I will be back as soon as I can.”

He floated towards the exit of the Horizon, and found the Mafia along with Mecha Boss trying to get out of the Horizon’s gate.

“Need help?” He smirked.

“Oh! A g-g-g-ghost!” A Magia Goon pointed at him in panic.

“Don’t worry boys!” Mecha Boss exclaimed. “It’s for these occasions that I have prepared myself! Mecha Spider Web!” He pointed his arms towards Moonjumper and transformed his hands back into canyons. This time, instead of spider web, a bunch of bubble wrap came out, the wrap did a twist on itself and started covering Mecha Boss in a bubble wrap roll until making him fall.

Moonjumper raised an eye in confusion.

“Ugh! Thor! What is this even for?”

“Umm, I actually don’t have an explanation for that one.“ Thor scratched his chin.

“Heh.” Moonjumper smiled and unleashed all his strings towards them, like a hundred million of tiny red tentacles, the strings pushed the Mafia and Mecha Boss out of the gate from the horizon with such force that they got catapulted into the other side of the forest once they got out.

“THOOOOOOR!”

***

“I hope you guys are having fun!” Snatcher laughed as he threw more potions to cause explosions towards the cats, he was having a bit of fun with all the mayhem, but the truth was that he was worried on the inside. He hadn’t heard Hatkid in a while and even when he kept floating all over the forest, he couldn’t find her anywhere, at least not without all the amount of cats that were coming after him.

“Snatcher!” He heard someone call out his name and turned around, it was Moonjumper.

“What the hell are you doing here?” He asked while he kept throwing attacks to the cats coming after him.

“Look, there is no time, I need you to go to the horizon to do something for me.” Moonjumper attacked back to the cats with his strings and made himself some space so he could talk with Snatcher.

“Ha! Don’t you see I’m a little busy, moonyboy?”

“I need you to catch Mu’s spirit before it leaves the forest’s horizon for good, I need you to put it back on her body or she will be dead forever.” He didn’t pay attention to Snatcher’s complaints, in a task like that, every second counted.

“That mustache brat died? Ha! Good riddance, she was just a nuisance at the end, she couldn’t even do all my jobs properly.”

“Snatcher!” Moonjumper was about to yell at him and fight him, but he stopped himself, he had to convince him.

He tried to calm down for a moment. Easy, steady, it will be alright.

“Please, come with me, you are the only one that I can help.”

“Yeah and I don’t want to. I’m here fighting a bunch of–”

“Watch your tongue!”

“I'm in a bit of a furry situation. These cats came to the forest looking for the hat brat, and now I have to get rid of all of them or there will be no forest left once they finish!”

So Snatcher was also trying to save the kid, that meant there wasn’t probably anything to do anymore.

“Wait.” He got an idea. “I will deal with the cats here, you go and fetch that spirit for me.”

“You? And what are you even going to do with these cats yourself?”

“I’m going to make a puppet that looks just like her so the cats can catch that instead. They are coming for her, right? So once they have the puppet, they will leave her and the forest alone.”

“I can deal with this on my own!”

“Yes, you can, but will you be able to save the kid at the same time you save the forest? Mu died just now for pity's sake! Hatkid could be in the same situation right now, just as we speak!”

“Yeah, and I don’t care about that brat!” Snatcher grunted and looked away from Moonjumper.

“Well, fine, if you say you don’t, you don’t, but just think that you can get rid of all these cats just if you accept to help me out!”

Snatcher thought about it for a second while he kept throwing attacks towards the cats. Maybe Moonjumper could be a bit useful after all.

“Fine! But you will have to let me enter the horizon if I am going to do my job!”

“It should let you in if I’m not inside at the same time, now, go!”

Snatcher launched a final big explosion towards the cats and moved as fast as he could towards the horizon.

“Alright, time for me to find that other kid.” Moonjumper unleashed his strings into the cats that were around him, making them fall over and then escaped.

Hatkid was not so far away from Moonjumper when he left. She had managed to escape the clutches of the cat gang but she didn’t know where to go, she didn’t have any pons left and all her body hurt, and she just wanted to go to rest after all the running.

She felt she was about to fall when she saw a red ghost floating towards her, or what it seemed to be a red ghost, to this point her vision was blurry and she could barely see at all.

“Woah!” She didn’t see the cliff in front of her and started falling towards her doom. Before she could fall any deeper though, she felt a hand grabbing her over, and a pain that was so incredibly awful she just started to cry. “Aww Aww!”

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“Wow kid, I almost didn’t catch you there… Hey, are you alright? Why are you crying?”

“My arm! My arm!”

“Your arm?”

“AAAAAAH!”

Moonjumper grabbed her whole body and carried her in his arms to avoid having to grab her arm. She was rubbing her arm over and over as she complained.

“Damn, I think it’s better if we get you to a doctor soon, kid.” Moonjumper looked around, he heard the screams of The Empress getting closer and closer. “But first, let’s get you out of here.” He went deep down into the well and left her at the side of the small pond where there wasn’t any ice. Hatkid started trembling.

“Sorry kid, it is a bit cold here, but it is the only place I think they won’t find you at all while I get rid of them.” He looked upward towards the top of the well. “It seems they didn’t see us coming. Now wait here for me, I will get rid of them and then we will get you some medical attention, I promise.”

“Aww aww aww.” Hatkid only kept rubbing her arm as she complained, her teeth chattered constantly as she complained.

Moonjumper sighed. “Be right back, I promise.”

Snatcher entered the Horizon and looked for Mu. “What the hell even is this place?” He got confused by the mirrored landscape, but when he got to the clearance he saw Mu’s body deeless at the side of a tree.

“So, alright kid. Let’s get your spirit back.” He floated upwards the sky of the horizon and looked for the cloud of energy that Moonjumper had mentioned. Finally, he saw it almost a few kilometers above the forest.

“Ha! Don’t think you can escape so easily from me, kid!” He grabbed it and then looked back at the forest from above. There was this orange and purple fog all over the place, so it was hard to see how far The Horizon extended to.

“Well, going down!” He launched himself back towards the earth at fast speed with Mu’s spirit in his hands. He felt as if the spirit was a squeaky, slippery balloon that was about to escape from his hands, but once he saw Mu’s body, he launched the spirit with all his strength back into her body. “Kaboom!”

“AAAH!” Mu screamed back to life. Snatcher got closer to her and gave her a better look, she was bruised all over and her mouth looked swollen from the hits she had taken.

“Welcome back kiddo! We lost you there for a moment!”

“What… what happened?” Mu tried to stand up but couldn’t even move without trembling.

“You died for a bit, so I had to get your soul back, I never let a contract leave with work unfinished, kid!”

“AAAAH!” Mu tried to stand up but screamed the moment she tried to move her legs.

“Wow, you really should… umm, get that checked.”

“I think I broke my leg!” She looked hurt, and while it was funny to Snatcher to see, he had something else to do.

“Umm, I would love to stay here and chat in the meantime, but I have to check back on my forest. The Moonyboy should be back soon after we get this over with.”

“Wait, don’t leave me here! I need help!”

“Bye bye!” Snatcher left the Horizon despite the girl’s angry cries.

“Snatcher? Snatcher!”

Back in the Forest outside of the horizon, only the cats were left, the Mafia had been kicked out, and The Empress was still looking for Hatkid with her rocket launcher at hand.

“Where are you, thief? I’m not getting out of this forest either without my timepieces or with your corpse in shambles!”

Moonjumper looked from above the trees, trying to not be seen, he had made a puppet that looked just like Hatkid, and was now placing it close to The Empress way so she could find it soon.

“Sup! Did you finish with plague control?” Snatcher moved through the shadows of the trees and finally arrived at the small treehouse where Moonjumper was watching.

“I’m on it, did you save Mu’s spirit?”

“Sure did, but her soul is still all mine, you can bet on that.”

“Right.” Moonjumper looked back down and focused on the puppet he had made. Snatcher looked in the same direction as he was and saw a Hatkid look like dancing.

“What the hell is that?!”

“Sssh! Quiet! You don’t want them to see us, right?”

“What the hell did you do to the kid?”

“That’s not the kid, that’s just the puppet!”

“Yeah? And where are the strings?”

“I had to make them as thin as I could, otherwise the cats would notice.”

Snatcher looked back at the puppet, its eyes looked hollow, but aside from that, the puppet looked just like the real Hatkid.

“This is sorcery.” Snatcher muttered.

“Big words coming from a ghost.” Moonjumper replied back.

“Timepieces! Yay! I have all the timepieces! Timepieces are mine!” The puppet started dancing at the side of the trees, its movements were clunky, but her voice was identical.

The Empress finally saw her from afar with a couple of binoculars she was holding to.

“Ha! We found the rat! Now, charge with all that you have!”

“Sure thing boss!” The Cats took over and launched all the rockets they had in their ammunition.

“No! Wait!” The Empress yelled over, but it was too late. All the rockets were directed right towards the puppet, ending in a huge explosion that almost blew the trees over.

“You idiots! I mean let’s go and catch her ourselves! How am I supposed to find the timepieces if the one who stole them from me is dead?”

“Uh, sorry boss.” One of the cats apologized shily. The horde got closer to where the puppet had been and saw all the stuffing scattered around the place. “Wow, I guess aliens are fluffier than we thought!” A cat exclaimed.

“Let’s just go back now to the Metro.” The Empress facepalmed. “I have left it unattended for too long, and we have lost too many people in this thing.”

The cats packed every weapon they had over.

“Well, what do you think?” Moonjumper smiled back to Snatcher. “Pretty clever, don’t you think?”

“Yeah, sure, I think it's clever. If it wasn’t for the fact that they still blew up a bunch of rockets into my own forest! Couldn’t you have done this far away from here?”

“Ha!” Moonjumper laughed. “You could keep discussing with me right now, or you could go and find Hatkid and help her out, she is hurt and if you don’t go to look for her soon, she is going to freeze to death.”

“What? Where did you leave her?”

“Well, the only place I could hide her was at the bottom of the well, so…”

“Oh no matter, she will get out of that place in no time.”

“I don’t think so, I think she broke an arm.” Moonjumper scratched his head coyly.

“Ugh. Fine, I will go and find her then.”

“Great work my friend! I will go and look for Mu then, make sure she is alright.”

“I don’t think she is, once she woke up she just kept complaining and complaining, it seemed like she was about to cry.”

“What? Why? What does she have?”

“I have no clue, so you go and better check. See you later Moonboy, and don’t even think this makes me forgive you.”

“Right.”

Snatcher went back down into the well and saw Hatkid on the floor, barely alive.

“Hey kiddo! I was told you needed some help! Lucky for you! I could give you a hand! If you sign my contact of course…”

Snatcher looked back at the girl, but she wasn’t answering or moving at all.

“How rude! You should answer to your elders when they are speaking to you, you know.”

Nothing.

“To think I was going to get you out of here! Oh well, I guess you are on your own now.”

“...”

“Kid?”

Snatcher sighed. “Fine, I think we should go and get you a doctor, somewhere…” He finally took her in his arms and carried her over outside the well.

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