By RD Rivero

April 14, 2001
 

On one bright afternoon of a summer month of a year of no importance, WileyKat and WileyKit trekked about a lush clearing deep in the vast expanse of the central forests of Third Earth. The two youths walked wearily in the ankle-high grass -- their shins, unprotected up to their knees, scratched and bruised from four days of hiking. Although their fur was dense and covered-up most of their scars, on occasion sharp, serrated leaves, unseen thorns or the startled thrash of small, lowly creatures produced gashes deep or wide enough for dripping blood to be noticeable. The grasslands upon which they ran had dandelions and pussy willows that added an extra dimension of discomfort to their exhaustion, chiefly itchy noses and watery eyes.

WileyKat heard a slight whimper and looked back in shock for his sister had tripped and fallen forward. "Hold on, WileyKit," he said, holding out his arm.

She grabbed his hand in her own and used the leverage to prop herself up on shaky knees. "Do you think we're safe here?"

He was about to speak but hesitated for a moment, unsure of how to handle his newfound responsibility. He had never expected to be a leader to anyone, let alone to his sister -- no, not to her. As he looked into her eyes he saw something in them, something almost akin to helplessness, that he had seen from her only once before. The effect was alarming, bone-chilling. As if to divert his attention or to buy himself more time to think he looked up above, to the glaring blue sky and the omnipotent sun that shone down upon them mercilessly, unceasingly. Below the great vault of the heavens, white-capped mountains, hazy and distant, crowned the upper continents. At the level of the ground were the trees, thick, green blurs that teamed with life.

The air attained a sudden chill -- a breeze brushed by his mane across his face and, looking back on his sister, he drew his hair back.

"Not yet -- but we'll need to find a place to rest soon." She nodded. He took her into his arms and whispered: "We'll be all right, you'll see -- we don't need them anymore."

WileyKit understood perfectly well.
 

Yes, the other Thundercats had made it more than quite obvious that they did not want them or need them around. Busy with their adult lives, fawning over Liono's every word and command, fighting the Mutants, Lunatics or Mumm-Ra, tinkering with the Thunder Tank -- and on and on and where in all that were the twins? Always the last, always the forgotten, neglected and, when by chance the adults remembered about their existence, it was always with the excuse to do chores or work.

The two had had enough.

From the moment they had arrived on Third Earth they clung to each other for they recognized early on that they had no one else, no one else to trust, no one else to count on. They learned the hard way what their 'position' was in that brave new world -- and so they rebelled, they lived in a world all to themselves. Over the course of long, hard years they trained themselves to be self-sufficient, honed their crafty abilities and practiced to that point of perfection where they thought they knew they could go on out off by themselves and never return.

What was happening, what they were doing was merely the climax of a conspiracy that had begun from their earliest excursions into the woods. Back when Snarf would let them hike and wander about the outdoors unsupervised. As long as they stayed close to Cat's Lair they allowed to camp the nights under the stars for days at a time. They learned how to make fire, build or seek shelter, hunt food and prepare it, pick out the berries that were poisonous from those that were not. WileyKat taught himself how to fish with spears. WileyKit practiced the art of trapping small prey. All of that and more right under the adult's unsuspecting noses.

On many occasions they stopped to think about what they were doing but always their concerns over right and wrong turned into schemes designed to better shape their plans for the day, the moment when they would rid themselves of their uncaring tormentors at last and forever.
 

WileyKat and WileyKit continued to walk but at a slower pace. They treaded silently into the shade of tall elms that lined the border of the grassy clearing. Under the chirping of birds and over the rustling of bushes echoed the sounds of a running stream. They followed the beckoning call for their sacks were half out of food and the night before they had drunk what remained of their water. The idea of a stream was most tempting and reassuring.

The breeze had settled and the air, that had been hot and damp, turned into a refreshing mist.

Droplets of moister clung to bundled strands of their manes and glistened in the weak rays of sunlight that filtered down through the branches. WileyKit reached up and patted WileyKat's head, trying to dry his fur. The water was warm and the feel of it smeared on her fingers made her mouth run dry. She shook her head and more droplets sprayed out, falling onto the dark soil or hitting her twin's bare back.

It was her idea to leave that summer and in the four days since the trek began she was sure, absolutely sure that she had done the right thing. Neither of them fit in and, besides, they were already at an age old enough to set out on their own and make their own choices. Although she shrugged off her anxiety to her lack of water, still, a sort of angst lingered.

"Kat? Do you think they miss us?"

Again he stopped and again he looked back. Her eyes were open wide and despite her dehydration her glossy, white-orange orbs were wet with streaming tears. He wiped her face dry with the back of his hand.

"I don't know. Maybe they're angry, maybe they're upset -- or perhaps they haven't noticed -- but I don't care."

"I mean, Liono can use the sword to find us. Just because we destroyed our insignias --"

"That's the chance we knew we'd have to take. Kit," he kissed her and drew her into his warmth. "I need you to be strong, WileyKit. Don't you understand? I can't go on alone without you."

"I can't either." She squeezed him tightly. "We'll be strong for each other."
 

The fear of getting caught was always there, in the back of their minds. He thought that getting rid of their Thundercat insignias would help them evade the others but he also realized that manufacturing an 'accidental ambush,' as he put it, would greatly help them as well. His sister agreed that his devious ploy made sense.

On the morning of their escape from Cat's Lair and the Thundercats they took off on their boards and went as far as they could without stopping. Following a course that they had committed to memory, they landed near the Fountain of Youth where they arranged for their vehicles to smash into pillars of rocks -- the 'accident.'

They scratched off each other's clothes, taking out on their uniforms and symbols of their Thunderian past the anger and pain that they had been put through for so long by those who were supposed to care for them, love them. They threw the rags into a pile of wood that was quickly set ablaze -- the 'ambush.' And to complete the illusion they left behind bundles of decoy food stuffs scattered about the campground. A series of footprints, seemingly coming from and to the outlining forestry, were the last details added by the wily pair.
 

The river babbled in a soft, low conglomeration of sounds that at times gently and at times violently cascaded into one another. Its banks were rocky and coated by flapping leaves, covered by brittle bushes. Its rippled surface was overlooked by tall trees whose majestic green and brown colored profiles reflected in trembling swirls upon the water.

The twins approached the stream unashamed, even at their age, of the nakedness of their bodies. They reached down and sipped handfuls of water. Setting their sacks aside they filled their reserve bladders with that vibrant, life-giving substance.

"I feel like I could drink the whole river," she said.

"Drink away," he said, offering his handful. She eagerly sipped with a few, stray giggles. She was happy and smiling and for the first time since that ordeal began, for the first time since they landed on Third Earth, he was at peace too.

He sprinkled water in her face. She returned the favor with a splash. The simple game went back and forth, quickly escalating, until, at last, she dunked him backward into the waters only to end up falling on top of him.

Together they drifted gently away from the shore.

"Are you feeling better?" he asked.

"Lots and lots better," she answered.

"I like it when you're happy," he said, rubbing her chin lightly.

"And I like it when you hold me," she said, taking his hand below the surface.

"Hold you and never let go." He teased her hair with his free fingers.

"Never, ever let go." She wrapped her arms around him and drew him to her body. Her eyes welled with the tears of remembrance. It was the last thing he had said to her just as they were being put into their separate pods on the ship that left the dying Thundera.

He remembered, too, but more than anything it was his sister's eyes that haunted him. Time could never diminish how they stared into his. That he had seen it once was bad enough, he almost lost it when he saw it again no less than an hour ago.

"I love you," she repeated, her voice drifting into a whisper, into the softest timber that made even the flowered vines that drooped into the waters tremble with passion.

Holding her tighter, closer with every syllable, he looked out across the foamy crests behind her head and saw the reflection of his face on the glimmering surface. 
 

But he could not see the eyes -- glowing red with ire -- that watched just as closely, just as attentively from afar. Nor could he hear the intense laughter that echoed through chambers that had themselves seen the passing of millennia. The ancient one waved his arm and at once the frothing image on his cauldron faded and was replaced by the view of a second scene.
 

"Stop, Panthro," Liono ordered. The gray panther at his left complied. "This is it, this is what I saw in the sword."

From behind Cheetara ruffled out a hastily-folded map. "According to this we're less than a half-mile from the Fountain of Youth."

"What a desolate place this is," Panthro said as he stepped out.

The air was whipped by strong gusts of hot air, humid and uncomfortable. The sky was grayed-over with amassing clouds. Around the vehicle the land was barren, its rocky soil infertile. Tall monoliths loomed in the distance.

"Seems like it's going to rain," he added. "I hope the Thunder Tank comes out of this OK. I had just slapped on a new coat of wax yesterday."

Liono helped Cheetara out of the vehicle. He took the map from her and began to walk over to the imposing rocks as though guided by a force superior to his own. She, too, was lost -- lost in the senses that she felt coming out of the silent, tranquil scene in torrents and floods that screamed out to her alone.

"Anger," she said, shivering, "can't you feel the pain?"

"If you're cold, I could --"

"It's not that sort of cold, Panthro. Something happened here, something dreadful."

Over by the gray-faced monoliths, whose forms were withered with age, the Lord of the Thundercats fell to his knees. Panthro and Cheetara rushed up to him. He was kneeling next to a pile of burnt wood, pulling up from its white ash the broken fragments of WileyKat's tunic. Parts of WileyKit's clothes, pink and blue, lay already shredded at his feet.

Panthro was not sure of what to say. Yes, the twins had been Thundercats but in name only and out of respect for their parents at that. They had not earned their titles yet. To him their loss would be felt but easily forgotten too. Odd that he had quickly come to that fatalistic conclusion but then their deaths would -- he gasped. The hover boards he had made for the twins lay on their sides, crumpled and misshapen. He picked one up in his hands as gently, as lovingly as one would pick up a child and watched in horror as it crumbled to shreds in his fingers.

Cheetara noticed the red and black insignias -- although still recognizable, the fire had melted and distorted their once symmetric shapes. She felt another rush of emotion, conflicted and indistinct. It was not the sort of impression she expected to get from an ambush attack in the sense that there was no terror. Rather she felt a foreboding of things yet to come. She could not be sure of their deaths.

Liono stood and without uttering a word he stepped beyond the boundaries of the gray monoliths. Growing up sheltered by his elders, the WileyKat and WileyKit had been his only friends. He had been very close to them -- once. And then he changed. He grew up and, suddenly, a gulf existed between them that was not there before. As he stumbled about, his mind reeling, he wondered how much of the rift was his own doing. He could have gone on their trips together. He could have done this, he could have done that.

He stepped blindly on a pebble that was then sent soaring in a flat arc. A mob of vultures before him squawked and flapped their wings. Some took to the air, some perched themselves on the rocks and eyed him keenly. Their pointed beaks bobbing up and down.

With a flash of lighting and the crashing of thunder a few drops of rain splattered onto the grainy dirt.

"Who would do this? Mutants? Animals?"

"Who ever it was they must have done it quick and thoroughly," Panthro answered.

Cheetara was silent. Her gaze was fixed on a series of footprints that stuck out dubiously from the others around them, a trail that seemed to snake off into the surrounding country. But then the splattering rain turned into a violent down pour and the trail and the feelings once embedded in the scene were washed away.

"Now I know what Tygra felt when he found what was left of Bengali and Pumyra. Come on, Cheetara," Liono said, nudging her arm, "come on, there's nothing more to see here."
 

Refreshed from their dip in the stream, the two youths walked by its banks arm in arm -- faint smiles painted across their faces -- eager and willing to deal with the dreadful, uncertain future together. According to their map, whose every detail they had memorized to its minutest detail, they were still only halfway away from Cat's Lair. At their pace they estimated another two day's walk before they would reach the Etreum Basin, the last of the lush, fertile and unspoiled land left on Third Earth. The crater was dotted with the ruins of ancient civilizations, ruins in which they could make their home in peace. The area was so remote, so under-populated that no one would ever recognize them, know them for brother and sister or even that they had been Thundercats.

In the meantime the sun was setting, the day was ebbing. Soon, very soon they would heed to find a place to sleep. A warm, quiet place. In the nights past they had often found caverns or deep, empty dens in which to pass the howling night hours. Now they looked for such a spot again.

A bolt of lightning streaked down from the night sky and hit an object that until that moment had been unseen between the trees. The object -- a brick and mortar construction -- exploded in smoldering shards that tumbled to the ground around their feet. A small fire ensued in the forest and they followed its warm, yellow light through a thin path the led them to a terrain nestled just next to the river -- a clearing cut out of the thick woods many ages ago.

In the center of the up-sloped land was a small cottage. Its straw-topped chimney had been the mysterious object hit by the flash from above. The embers of the fire were fading. The stone masonry that supported the arched roof around the chute was shattered and the open holes let partial views of the darkened interior.

They walked through the leaf-covered landscape to a door that was half-on, half off its hinges, its wood shredded by time.

"Looks like no one's home," WileyKat said as he eyed cobweb-encrusted windows.

Thunder resounded in the heavens -- the storm had found them.

She smiled: "It'll do for tonight."

WileyKat and WileyKit stepped through the open doorway into the shadows of the cottage's interior. They felt along the walls for the entrance only led them to a rough passage. The smell of wet wood permeated the silent, still air. All the while they thought about starting a fire, eating food and making sure that they would be safe inside for the night.

One room was large but windowless -- or if it had windows they were completely blocked. The second room was equally as big but its two, open windows let in a dim, gray-blue light from the starry sky. Intermittent flashes of lightning brightened the chamber at random intervals. Chairs and tables lay in a corner, crumbled in piles of worm-eaten wood. Dust covered the spider webs that hung from the logs of the ceiling. The fireplace was unblocked -- a slight breeze echoed up its chute.

"Get me some wood," he said to his sister.

She was looking out a window, sniffing the air in a manner akin to her wild ancestors. She heard her brother and turned her head to the side, to the pile of scraps at the far corner of the room. There she gathered together dry stalks in her folded arms. She brought them to him and helped the wood chunks in the fireplace.

From his sack he pulled out a pair of flints. She shielded one of the logs with her cupped hands. He struck the rocks, sending sparks down on the extremely rotted, blackened wood. It caught on fire quickly and in a moment the light and heat thrived, crackling in its pit.

The sudden and abrupt flood of light lent the room a breath of life that had been denied it for innumerable years. The glow from the fireplace brought out a plethora of details that the darkness had veiled in shadows. Books were scattered on collapsed bookshelves, oil paintings lay across the floor -- their once vibrant colors had dripped and distorted with age. Momentos and trinkets, once invaluable to the cottage's original inhabitants, had at last been reduced to forgotten, meaningless trivialities through the irreversibility of time.
 

Unbeknownst to them, as they merrily explored their temporary shelter, a large, husky animal, with glowing, red eyes and flaring, smoke-fuming nostrils peered at them from the bushes into the open windows. It stalked nearer and with each, advancing step it drew its plans against them. It reached the door but, having been propped up by the twins, it had to wait patiently for the next pang of thunder loud enough for its crashing timber to mask its abrupt intrusion.

The sharp crash shook the cottage and knocked the two onto the floor.
 

"What was that?" WileyKit asked completely startled.

"Just thunder -- the storm must be closer now." He helped her up. "I'm sure it'll pass soon."
 

The sound of the heavy downpour that followed, the constant drip of the large pellets of rain windswept into the room, dampened the telltale chatter of the red-eyed beast's lurking in the dark passage.
 

"I'm sure it's not them, Kit, or else by now for certain they would have stormed in."

"What if they have found us and are just playing games?"

"They'd be too mad at us to do that."

The shaking of the cottage had loosened a part of the room's ceiling. A trap 'door' hung down at an acute angle. Beyond it was the open emptiness of the shack's attic. They jumped as high as they could and grabbed onto the edge of the slowly-swinging cantilever. With the pull of their weight, it arched to about forty-five degrees when an iron ladder, sturdy enough for them to climb, unfurled to the screech of oil-hungry gears.

She took a long stick of wood and wrapped the canvas of a fallen painting about one end. The colored inks and rubbish on the heavy, crusty cloth retarded the fire's appetite when she lit it over the cackling flames.

Driven by an unyielding curiosity, armed with a makeshift torch, they climbed the iron ladder, deciding to explore that upper part of the house. Up above the air was cold. Rain water from the raging storm outside entered through gashes that had been blown into the side wall by the earlier lightning strike. Smoke from the chimney blew into the room on occasion.

The pair found the remains of a bed that had been formed from straw and hay. Carved into one of the supporting beams was a small, thin closet. WileyKit reached into the small, storage room. WileyKat secured the torch on a large, pottery vase.

He walked up to her. She turned to him wearing a bright smile that he thought was more beautiful than all the stars in the night.

"Look what I found," she pulled out a pair of green shirts and threw one of them at him.

"Clothes?" he asked. "What are we going to need these for?"

"Silly, Kat," she giggled. "We need them when we meet other people. We can't be naked all of the time."

He looked at his shirt, crumpling it in his hands. "I'm afraid, Kit."

"I know," she said with a low, long sigh.

"I'm afraid of what it'll be like to be alone. It's never been just you and me before. Why, we'll have to do --"

She buttoned his lip with but a gentle press of her finger. "I know, Kat, I'm afraid, too. But we can't turn back now."

He looked up to see that not only was she wearing one of the green shirts but that she had shorts on as well. He stood, approaching her softly, thinking thoughts freely that he had been wrestling with for quite some time. She pulled off the clothes, staring at him in the way she had been catching herself doing lately.

"You are so beautiful," WileyKat said, his voice trembling with anxiety.

WileyKit sensed his retreating self-assurance, taking comfort in that she was not alone in what she was feeling.

She took his hand and pressed it onto her warmth, until his palm was at that point where he could feel the beat of her heart. He smiled with a nervous, playful giggle. He took her hand and placed it firmly over his heaving chest, panting out of breath. Together their bodies throbbed in harmonic unison.
 

A strange sort of clanging noise broke through the oppressive silence that had fallen upon the twins -- the sound came and went quickly and would have gone unnoticed had it not been for their heightened sense of perception.

They looked across at the head of the hanging ladder -- the flickering light of the fireplace lent an eerie glow to the arched ceiling and the rectangular hole. They approached the gap in the flooring on tiptoe, their eyes fitfully picking out the various details that were emerging from below.

"What do you think that was?" she turned to him and asked.

"It sounded like an arrow hitting a target."

She held onto his arm: "I remember those stories Tygra used to tell us, about the time he went to see Willa when those terrible things happened to Bengali and Pumyra."

He patter her mane, leaning her head onto his shoulder.

"That won't happen to us. We will live forever." He pulled up the folding, metal ladder, locking it tightly with a restraining bolt. Secure in that it would not open, he led his sister back to the straw piles under the dying embers of the little torch.
 

By the next morning the summer storm had passed and the soaked earth glistened in the shine of the rising sun. The young adults awoke from their makeshift bed. They stretched their scratched up, bruised legs and shook off the dust that had collected in their fur.

The two formed new uniforms for themselves from the cluttered shards of the closet. WileyKat was very happy with his shorts, they were not pants but at least it was better than the tunic he had worn up until then. WileyKit's outfit was much like her brother's but the color scheme was reversed.

The ladder's restraining bolt was removed and with a slight nudge it arched down, the metal frame extending itself. WileyKat was quick to descend and, making sure that the way was clear, he motioned his sister to follow him. They grabbed their sacks that they had left by the fireplace. The flames had died earlier that night and that morning all that was left of the wood was a pile of white ash.

The passage was aflood in the morning light -- and, thinking for a moment, they realized it should not have been that way for they had securely fit the front door in place. They stood aghast -- on the wooden floor was a trail of mud marking the distinct forms of hoof prints. It lead to the second room whose door was only partly open and into which only a little light entered. No second trail lead back out of it.

Silence permeated the cottage except for the hard and pronounced beating of their hearts. As they stood there it felt as though time was slowing down, as though their actions, reactions, movements and thoughts were sluggish, arthritic. They were utterly helpless in that lethargic state that have suddenly and unexpectedly overcome them.

"No!" she grabbed her brother by the arm and together they rushed out of the shack, trotting over the battered door upon whose boards a sword had embedded a torn sheet of paper.

WileyKat stopped to look at the sheet. He held it up in his hands, its loose, torn edges flapped in the breeze. He tried to read it but the rain from the night had eroded the printing. The paper turned into a slimy, mush in his fingers -- he threw it aside with disgust as soon as he saw that maggots and grubs crawling in the pulpy goo.

"WileyKat, come on," his sister implored.

He scurried up to her, wiping his fingers on his shirt, securing his sack over his shoulder. He ran his hands down her back, feeling her spine, rubbing the back of her ribs. "I don't know what's in store for us, WileyKit, but I'm not afraid anymore."

She hugged him from the side, reaching up his shirt. "You feel that, too -- oh, it's exhilarating! I've never felt so free, so at ease with myself before."

The twins kissed softly as they walked back to the side of the babbling river. They turned east to where the sun was still rising, to where their Eden lay in wait. Without another word, the ex-Thundercats went on, secure in the knowledge that they had won their freedom from Liono and all the others.
 

Mumm-Ra, to whom the passage of a day was a meaningless triviality, watched with a mix sense of unquenchable anger and deep-secret delight as WileyKat and WileyKit continued on with their lives unaffected by his plans to destroy them. He rubbed his chin in thought -- soon the beast would be on its way back to its master, soon the elements of nature would erode the cabin, its ancient stone masonry would crumble to the ground.

"Yes," he said aloud, pleased to have found the slightest gleam of hope in failure. "Yes," he continued, "one day even the Thundercats will be forgotten but I will always be here. I am forever, eternal."

The image on the pool faded just as the twins could be seen heading toward the delta of the river, passing by mounds of rocks upon which a speakled snake slithered in the shade. The magical waters of his couldron evaporated into a thin mist with but a wave of the mummy's arm. He turned and limped to his coffin.