《Princess Snugglypants Saves the Earth》


 Chapter 1: Distress

    I had been sleeping lightly when my little girl rushed into the room and frantically scrabbled at my cage door. It was the middle of the day, which was normally when I slept most deeply, but I had been noticing strange noises and smells for several hours that were keeping me on edge. When they first started, I''d been on high alert, but after it became obvious that there was no immediate threat I had retreated to my box to try and catch a little shut-eye. Not that it had worked particularly well, and there was no way I could ignore my little girl''s obvious distress.


    I poked my nose out of my box and sniffed the air. I didn''t get much of a chance to do a full inspection of the room before my little girl successfully unlatched the door and reached her hand into my cage.


    "Come here, Snuggles," she said, voice so quiet she was practically whispering. "Come on, Princess Snugglypants. There''s a good rat."


    Something was definitely wrong. It sounded like my little girl was on the verge of tears, and she only ever used my full name when she was very serious or angry. But she was holding her hand out in the way that she did when she had a treat, so I exited my box and ran over to her.


    Sadly, no treat was forthcoming, but she did scoop me up and deposit me on her shoulder where I could nestle into her hair. I wrapped my tail around the back of her neck for added stability.


    "Shhh, Snuggles. We have to be quiet."


    That was rich, coming from a human. They were about as subtle as a rockslide, most of the time.


    With me on her shoulder, my little girl did her best to creep from the room, peering fearfully around the corner before she entered the hallway. A rat would have done it better, but you couldn''t hold that against humans; they were so absurdly oversized, after all.


    Strange. Although the apartment was typically quieter during the day, thanks to Mommy being away at work, it was unusually still now. I sniffed the air and looked around, but Daddy didn''t appear to be here and there was an odd smell coming from the entryway. There was definitely something wrong; Daddy never left the apartment for any length of time without taking my little girl with him.


    As we entered the front hall, I discovered the source of the odd smell. The door was hanging partially off its hinges, and there appeared to be a hole punched through it where the knob normally lived. This sort of damage would make Daddy absolutely livid; had he gone to get things to fix the door?


    "Quiet as a mouse, quiet as a mouse," my little girl chanted under her breath, clearly gearing herself up for something. Though mice weren''t nearly as sneaky as they thought they were, the rude little stinkers. "They won''t catch me if I''m quiet. Daddy said." Her pulse throbbed under my paws, and I nuzzled her cheek to cheer her up. At the movement, she reached up and gave me an almost uncomfortably tight squeeze. "I can do this. For Snuggles'' sake."


    She crept to the door, and after carefully peering both ways down the hallway proceeded into the outer hall.


    I don''t get out of the apartment much, since my humans are a little over-protective, but I still remembered the general layout from when they brought me home from the Bad Place. Our apartment is on the second floor, and there''s an outer hall that wraps around the edges of the building, terminating in a stairwell that leads down to the ground floor. Or up, I suppose, but I''ve never been up there so I''m not sure what''s above us. Presumably more apartments, judging from the rude things Daddy has said about the upstairs neighbors when there are clomping noises from the ceiling late at night.


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    There are windows spaced along the outer edge of the hallway at intervals, and my little girl did an admirable job of creeping low and staying to the wedge where the wall intersected the floor under the windows. It made it a little trickier to remain stable on her shoulder, but I had plenty of practice. I was proud of her for finally displaying some properly ratty behavior. Normally humans stagger around on only two legs, which¡ªspeaking from personal experience¡ªis very awkward and painful. I don''t know why they insist on doing so, but admittedly their knees and hips bend in very disturbing ways, so maybe they can''t help it.


    Whatever it was that was making my little girl so scared didn''t show up, and we successfully navigated the hallway and down the stairs. At the bottom of the stairs, my little girl eased the outer door open, checked in all directions, and then braced it with her opposite hip while she knelt down and scooped me off her shoulder with her hand.


    She paused for a moment, cradling me in her arms as her breath hitched, and then to my utter shock she set me down on the ground outside. I stared up at her, unsure what to do. Although my humans occasionally let me roam around the apartment, they had never taken me outdoors like this.


    "Go on, Snuggles," said the little girl. "At least I can save you." And she started to cry.


    I didn''t know what to do. On the one paw, the smells outside were amazing and I had always wanted to explore them more closely. But my little girl was clearly in great distress, and I wasn''t sure how to cheer her up. I took a tentative step toward her, and she reached out and stopped me with a touch. Although she seemed to want to push me away, she almost involuntarily curled her fingers against my side. "No, go! I have to go back inside and¡ªwait for Mommy. If they haven''t got her, too..."


    And she began to sob in earnest.


    This was not alright. I was about to climb up her arm to properly comfort her, when a sound caused me to twist around. Standing at the end of the path leading from the side door to the street was a very strange looking creature.


    It was walking on two legs like a human, and was of a similar height to Mommy, but the similarities ended there. The thing had deep blue skin, which was something I''d never seen before, and it appeared to completely lack hair. Its eyes were large, without pupils, and protruding from its head. It was lightly clothed in what appeared to be oversized boxer shorts, and on its hand was some sort of gauntlet that it currently clutched in a fist.


    My little girl''s focus snapped to the thing, and she moaned in distress.


    The creature made some sort of squawking sound and began to advance on us. My little girl jerked back toward the stairwell, and through the corner of my vision I could just make out her curling in on herself. "No! Get away! Run Snuggles!"


    My little girl was deathly afraid of this thing. From what she said, this thing or maybe things like it had taken Daddy and perhaps Mommy somewhere they did not want to go, leaving my little girl alone. This was unacceptable; leaving kits who are too young to take care of themselves alone is not done.


    Most importantly, it was making my little girl cry.


    It was clearly a foe that so greatly outclassed the both of us that my little girl had already given up and was now quivering in fear on the ground.


    I never wanted to see something like this. My little girl was warmth and treats and freedom and everything good in this world. She might not be my kit, but alongside Daddy and Mommy I was certainly helping to raise her.


    Without conscious thought, I began to run.

 Chapter 2: The meaning of kung fu

    Shortly after I joined the household two seasons ago, Daddy watched a documentary called The Meaning of Kung Fu. My cage has always been located off to the side in the living room facing the television, so I watch a lot of the things that Daddy and, less often, Mommy watch after my little girl has been put to bed. A lot of it is human nonsense, of course, but something about that particular show resonated with my younger self. I was fresh out of the Bad Place and had only been exploring my new environment for a couple of nights, but while my cage was much larger and provided far more interesting things to do, and although I was occasionally allowed to run around on the floor of the living room, I still was dealing with a lot of nervous energy.


    I won''t get into it too deeply, but the documentary was effectively exploring how "kung fu" has come to mean some specific type of Chinese martial arts in English, but it actually means something closer to a practice that takes patience and hard work to complete. I didn''t care much about that¡ªalthough it did provide some context for a few of the movies that Daddy watched later on¡ªbut I was fascinated by the physical training showcased in the movie. This concept of "kung fu" covered everything from unarmed combat to dance to tea making, but although none of those things applied to rats thanks to humans'' weird bodies, the idea of physical excellence through determined practice resonated with me deeply. After all, I was most awake during the night when my humans were sleeping (have I mentioned humans are weird?) which meant I had a lot of free time. Inspiration having struck, that night I feverishly brainstormed, experimented, and by morning had come up with a seven-step plan to gradually increase my physical capabilities while simultaneously translating what I had seen of kung fu¡ªor wushu, I suppose, if I''m using the term introduced by the documentary¡ªinto a practice that was appropriate for rats.


    And uh, I might have gone a little overboard.


    I hadn''t thought that my hours upon hours of nightly practice would ever amount to anything other than a nice exercise regimen, but evidently I had internalized more than just the movements because when I took off running with my little girl keening behind me, I didn''t run away from the blue home invader; instead, I ran directly toward it.


    Something I''ve noticed: bipedal creatures are just so slow! You''d think, what with humans having so much more muscle mass than me that they''d be a lot quicker, but no; they accelerate slow, from what I''ve seen their top speed isn''t that fast, and they''re barely maneuverable.


    I covered the eight feet separating me from the blue invader in less than a second and in that time the invader only took a couple of steps.


    I had no specific plan, but I''d done a lot of nightly visualization during the last two seasons of my life and when I was a couple of feet away from the creature, I leapt. The thing didn''t even have time to jerk in surprise before I had latched onto its thigh, dug my claws in, and accelerated across the top of its boxers and up its torso.


    I had briefly entertained the idea of running inside the boxers, as rats in their clothes always caused my humans to freak out a bit¡ªor a lot, in the case of Mommy¡ªbut I was worried that I''d be trapped. My biggest advantage over such a large enemy was my sheer mobility, and causing a brief scare by running up its shorts wasn''t going to keep it away from my little girl. She was clearly incapable of escaping properly right now, which meant that I was going to need to incapacitate or drive off the enemy, not cause it to momentarily panic.


    The thing slapped at its chest as I tore across it, but it was too slow. Not even my tail was caught, and then I was at the thing''s shoulder.


    Once again, I leapt¡ªthis time straight up into the air. I traveled a good three feet straight up before whipping my tail around at the top of my arc, forcing my body to rotate so that I was once again facing the invader and propelling me straight back down toward it. The creature barely had time to raise its head in surprise before my paw impacted a point in its neck where humans have a pressure point.


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    The creature loosed a screech, and as it began to collapse to its knees it simultaneously swatted at its shoulder, but I whipped my tail around for leverage and launched myself upward once more. I repeated my trick of throwing myself downward with my tail at the top of my arc and this time slammed my foot into the creature''s exposed temple, using my forefeet to summersault myself into a forward flip away from it. I landed on all fours as behind me the creature collapsed bonelessly to the ground.


    I glanced over my shoulder, but it appeared to be unconscious. Huh. Not bad at all, considering the thing was at least 100 times my mass.


    Now that the worst threat was dispatched, I sat up on my hind legs and began grooming my fur back in order. All those flips and fighting moves had fluffed it up something fierce.


    I paused mid-groom to find my little girl staring at me with a slack-jawed look on her face. "Snuggles...?"


    Oh my! I couldn''t believe that I had left my girl alone in distress. I scampered over to her and reached up so that she would pick me up, which she tentatively did. Once I was secure in her arms, I climbed up to her shoulder and did my best to groom her. I could only reach the fur just around her ears, of course¡ªhumans are so awkwardly large¡ªbut hopefully it was the thought that counted.


    She patted me. "Stop it, Snuggles, that tickles!" She grabbed me around my middle and held me out in front of her face. "How on earth did you do that, Snuggles?"


    I cocked my head at her. Well, I mean, I watched a lot of martial arts movies with Daddy while she was asleep, extrapolated and generalized their basic movements and patterns, reframed and tested them for rat physiology, and then practiced them so obsessively that Mommy called me fat when she picked me up a few weeks ago.


    I''m not fat. I''m a lean, mean, sunflower seed-munching machine. Muscle is a lot heavier than fat, thank you very much.


    I wasn''t sure how to communicate that to my little girl, though. She was remarkably bad at interpreting even the most obvious examples of body language, and I was convinced that humans couldn''t hear worth a darn because whenever I said something they just blithely ignored it.


    She leaned in closer to me, and her voice dropped to a whisper. "Snuggles, are you...a ninja?!"


    What? No! It''s kung...stop looking at me with those sparkles in your eyes!


    "You''re a ninja, right?"


    No, no, no, that''s a completely different culture! And I couldn''t handle a throwing star or sword even if I wanted to.


    "You''re a rat ninja, right?!"


    Okay, fine, you win, I''m a ninja.


    My little girl laughed and cuddled me to her cheek. "Well, whatever it was, that was amazing, Snuggles!" She suddenly lowered me and looked around, her breath hitching. "But what if one of the other aliens heard? It cried out when you hit it the first time."


    Oh, they were aliens? Well, I suppose that was likely. I''d never seen anything quite like them before.


    "What should we do, Snuggles?" My little girl set me down and stared expectantly at me.


    Finally! For a kit, she often seemed to think that she was in charge. I tried not to be too frustrated about it, because she treated Daddy and Mommy the same way often enough, but it was a little annoying to be handled like a child when you''re one of the few responsible adults in the room. I''ve lived a whole three seasons, after all!


    In any case, it was obvious to me what we needed to do first. My little girl was getting old enough that she needed to start learning to protect herself, and I''d noticed that the alien''s arms and hands were surprisingly thin and small compared to a human of the same height. I didn''t think the boxer shorts were going to be much use, but that gauntlet-thing deserved another look.


    I walked over to the gauntlet, nudged it with my nose, and looked back at my little girl.


    She approached slowly, looking exceedingly nervous. "You''re sure the alien isn''t going to wake up?"


    Well, I didn''t know for sure, but I sure hadn''t held back against it, and it appeared to be a bit more fragile than humans, so it was probably safe enough for the moment. Also, it hadn''t so much as twitched since I nailed it on the temple.


    It took some encouraging, but at last my little girl approached the alien, eased the gauntlet off its hand, and then scooped me up and quickly retreated back to the wall near the apartment building.


    She set me down on the ground and sat down nearby before turning the gauntlet over in her hands.


    "What exactly is this thing?"

 Chapter 3: The deadly grace of yo-yos

    The gauntlet was made of a thick gray fabric or hide that I did not recognize, even when I gave it a sniff. The aliens evidently had four fingers, which was the first sensible thing about them I had noticed. I''ve never understood why humans needed so many fingers, when four are perfectly sufficient for gripping things and moving about. The middle finger was thicker than the other two fingers and thumb, however.


    Unlike my little girl''s gloves, though, there was no evidence of stitching on the fingers. As she turned it around in her hands I did notice some lines of another material running around the cuff and into the palm of the gauntlet, but I didn''t pay much attention to them because when she revealed the palm we finally got a good look at what the alien had been gripping.


    It looked like someone had taken two halves of a ball and mashed them together into a hamburger shape. Like the gauntlet, it was made from some material I couldn''t identify, although this one looked more like some sort of metal or plastic. There was a very strange-looking strand extending out of the gap where the two halves met; when I looked at it with one eye it seemed almost like a thick string of plastic, but when I turned my head to look at it with my other eye it almost seemed to fade into transparency as I moved. I couldn''t make snout nor tail of it.


    "It looks like a yo-yo," mumbled my little girl. "But like, an alien yo-yo." She lifted the bulbous thing out of the glove and the strand attached to it went taught a few inches away. "I wonder¡­"


    While she stood up and fiddled with the gauntlet, I tried to place the term "yo-yo." I had a vague feeling that I had heard that term before, but it wasn''t¡ªno, that was right! I''d overheard Mommy say something about yo-yos to my little girl shortly after they brought me back from the Bad Place. If I remembered correctly, it was some sort of toy that my little girl had played with quite a lot before I arrived, but whose string had broken. Daddy was evidently supposed to procure replacement string, but hadn''t gotten around to it, and I suppose everyone must have forgotten again when I joined the family.


    I was curious to see what this "yo-yo" the alien had been toting around could do.


    My little girl made a few funny faces while she tried to adjust the gauntlet and fit all five of her fingers into it, but she eventually must have found something somewhat workable, because she turned her hand palm up with the alien yo-yo or whatever it was resting in her palm, then with a quick jerk threw it at the ground.


    I hopped away in surprise, worried that it might rebound toward me, but strangely the yo-yo thing never hit the ground. Instead, when it neared her ankles it suddenly stopped and remained rotating in mid-air as it made a surprisingly loud humming noise. I tentatively stepped closer and sniffed it before pulling back with a sneeze. It was making a very different smell than it had sitting in the gauntlet. At that time it hadn''t smelled like much of anything, but now it had a hint of something I couldn''t place. The closest thing I could think of was a screw that Daddy had left sitting in the sun coming in the living room window, back when he had been putting together what would eventually be the table my cage sat on. The screw had evidently gotten quite hot, and it had a very distinct smell that wasn''t actually all that like the smell coming off the yo-yo thing, but was closer than any other smells I could remember.


    As it continued to spin, the yo-yo thing also began to give off a little bit of light, although I think it was the type that humans can''t see because my little girl didn''t make any noises about it. She did, however, exclaim, "The string disappeared!"


    That caused me to look higher, and indeed she was correct: the discomforting tubing had faded from sight. My little girl tentatively waved a hand between the gauntlet and the yo-yo, and it passed through the air undisturbed. She then gave a tug of the wrist with the hand that had the gauntlet on, and the yo-yo thing whisked upward and slapped into her palm.


    Her eyes sparkled. "That''s so awesome. It has a bit of a kick, but a yo-yo with an intangible string is so cool!" She threw it downward again, but almost immediately jerked it back to her hand. She then proceeded to throw the alien yo-yo forward, caused it to whip around behind her with a flick of the wrist, and then tugged it back into her palm with a snap. "It looks like the string doesn''t disappear right away. I guess I have to sleep it a bit first." She proceeded to go through a series of increasingly-complicated-looking throws and loops and I backed away a few feet.


    That yo-yo thing was making me nervous. It definitely didn''t seem cool or sleepy to me, and I couldn''t help but remember the hole in our door where the handle used to be, which was only a little bigger than the yo-yo thing and come to think had smelled similar, as well. If anything, the more she used it, the more the smell and light it emitted grew, and I was worried that it might be getting hot. She didn''t seem to notice anything awry when she caught it with her gauntlet, though, so maybe I was just feeling the adrenaline rush from confronting that alien.


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    Before I could think of some way to distract my little girl from the yo-yo, something made an outraged-sounding squawk, and I twisted around to see not one, but three more aliens staring at us from the path near the street. The first was wearing what appeared to be swim trunks, the second had on a plaid flannel shirt and what appeared to be a full-length skirt, and the third was wearing nothing at all aside from a pair of swim goggles.


    I was not at all confident I could take on three aliens at once, but perhaps I could distract them long enough for my little girl to escape. I launched myself in a sprint towards them.


    "Snuggles!" yelled my little girl behind me, but I was already drawing within range of the closest alien and didn''t have time to glance backward.


    Figuring that what worked once would hopefully work twice, when I got close to the nearest alien, I launched myself into the air and latched onto its leg, then scurried upward. This time, however, I made sure to aim for the side of its body opposite the hand it was wearing its gauntlet on. As I''d hoped, the alien hesitated, unable to grab me properly thanks to the yo-yo thing it was clutching, and I made it to its shoulder without even needing to dodge. As I had the first time, I launched myself into the air, whipped myself around, and landed a perfect paw strike to the alien''s pressure point.


    Unfortunately, this time the alien wasn''t alone, and as it collapsed in sudden pain toward the ground I had to throw myself to the side to dodge a swing from one of its compatriots. Leaving the partially-downed alien behind, I grabbed onto the arm of the alien that had swung at me, just behind where its arm emerged from its gauntlet.


    The alien clearly hadn''t been expecting my rat-like reflexes, because it paused in apparent bafflement when instead of whacking me off its fellow I ended up latched onto its arm. I attempted to scamper up its arm toward its more vulnerable head and neck, but one of my claws caught on the fabric of its shirt.


    Out of the corner of my eye I caught some movement and realized the third alien was about to hit me. I was stuck; this was going to hurt. I yanked desperately at my claw, but freed it just a little too late and¡ª


    There was a hissing noise as something whipped past behind me, a whumpf! as the alien that had been about to smack me disappeared, another hiss as something flew past me in the other direction, a solid thump noise, and the remaining two aliens and I both froze.


    I turned my attention to my little girl, who was still standing where I''d left her instead of running away like a good kit. Her hand with the yo-yo thing was held straight out as if she''d just caught it from a forward throw, her other hand bracing her arm and a look of utter determination on her face. "Don''t. Touch. Princess. SNUGGLYPANTS!"


    The aliens gaped at her. I surreptitiously freed my claw, accidentally pulling the flannel shirt up and exposing some of the alien''s blue arm as I did so.


    The muscles in the arm of the alien I was currently riding tensed, but before it could do anything I bit its wrist as hard as I could.


    The alien shouted and flung its arm outward toward where its compatriot was struggling to stand up.


    Just as I''d hoped. At the perfect moment, I let go, allowing the momentum from the alien''s thrown arm to shoot me straight at the first alien. My paw connected with its temple, and it collapsed in a heap.


    I flipped over its shoulder and landed on the ground out of sight of the one remaining alien, taking a moment to locate the third alien. It was lying several feet away on its back, and there was a thin plume of smoke curling up from its chest.


    Looked like the yo-yo gauntlets packed quite the punch.


    And speaking of yo-yo gauntlets¡­


    I launched myself around the prone alien to find the final alien lining up a shot from its gauntlet aimed at my little girl. Unacceptable! I threw myself into the air, briefly landed on its opposite thigh which was extended as the alien took a step forward, then immediately vaulted into a backwards flip to briefly touch down on its gauntlet arm as it raised it to throw its yo-yo and used the added moment and a third leap to send myself straight into its temple.


    The alien fell sideways, its yo-yo hissed harmlessly into the sky, and I jumped away, landing in front of it as it hit the ground behind me, shortly followed by the yo-yo slamming into the ground and throwing dirt into the air.


    I didn''t look back, though, because action movies are always way more fun when the main character doesn''t look back. Plus my field of vision is wider than a human''s, anyway.


    My little girl rushed over to me, scooped me up, and frantically looked me over. "Princess Snugglypants, are you alright?!"


    I checked myself over, and aside from feeling slightly exhausted from my unexpected mid-day workout¡ªand needing a good grooming¡ªI was in surprisingly good shape.


    "You were amazing!" my little girl continued after verifying that I wasn''t hurt.


    Hey, she was pretty amazing herself! Good work figuring out that alien technology so quickly!


    My little girl turned her attention towards the road. "But what should we do now?"


    I followed her gaze. There were three aliens collapsed near one another on the ground, and a fourth still smoking a little ways further out. Pretty sure that particular collection was going to bring nothing but trouble to our unassuming little apartment building. This area was definitely not safe anymore, if it ever had been in the first place.


    But I realized my little girl wasn''t looking at our vanquished foes when she walked forward a few steps, ignoring them entirely as she approached the street proper. I couldn''t quite make out what she was looking at¡ªI think humans might have better distance vision than me¡ªbut she was staring intently at something as she raised me to her shoulder and set me into my favorite position.


    Unusually, she didn''t take her hand away once I was in place, but left it resting against my flank. "Snuggles," she said, still staring down the street. "We made a pretty good team just now, didn''t we? Do you think we could go rescue my dad?"


    I licked my paws and ran them across my ears as I thought about it, then booped my little girl on the cheek with my nose.


    Looked like I wasn''t going to finish my nap this afternoon.

 Chapter 4: Breaking and entering

    As my little girl strode down the street with me on her shoulder, I finally was able to see what she''d been looking at. All the way down the block, towering over the roundabout and the sidewalk, was the alien''s spaceship. It was a giant, rounded thing shaped similar to the alien yo-yo lying on its side, except without the divot where the tubing connected. Nothing appeared to be holding it up, but a ramp extended down from its lower belly to the street, and it was this ramp that my girl was striding towards.


    No, no, no, this was no good at all! Any proper rat knew that scampering straight into the front door was not the proper way to infiltrate! Far too much danger of being spotted and kicked or chased with a broom. I nudged my little girl, but she didn''t pay any attention to me so I had to scurry down her side to the ground.


    That brought her up short. "Snuggles? What are you doing?"


    I ran forward a few steps toward the bushes that bordered the sidewalk where we were currently walking, then turned to look at her over my shoulder.


    My little girl looked between me and the spaceship. "You don''t want to come with me?" She sounded like she was on the verge of tears.


    Ugh, humans are so dense sometimes. I scampered up to her, nudged her foot with my nose, then ran back toward the hedge and stopped to look at her.


    "You want me to follow you?"


    Yes, thank you! That really shouldn''t have been quite that difficult. I took a few more steps, then once again looked back at her.


    "Okay, I suppose." She followed me, and I led her around the bush¡ªshe was a little too large to go under it, which had been my first inclination¡ªand into the yard of the house that bordered the road.


    We continued parallel to the sidewalk toward the roundabout, but partially obscured from the road by the bushes and trees that these homeowners had planted.


    It was a good thing we''d done so. After walking only a few feet, a group of four more aliens came down the ramp of the alien''s ship and began loitering near its base. The little girl spotted them and froze before slowly bending down until her head was much closer to me. "You''re so smart, Snuggles! They would definitely have seen us if we''d stayed on the sidewalk."


    Honestly, they might still see us. We could see them, after all. Fortunately, they all seemed fairly distracted for some reason, squawking at one another and making gestures that were even weirder than the ones Daddy and Mommy made when they were talking to one another.


    "What will we do, Snuggles?" said my little girl. "They''re blocking the way onto the ship, and I think Daddy must be in there."


    She didn''t need to fret; if I knew anything as a rat, it was that there''s always another way in. We just needed to get close enough to find it.


    The two of us worked our way further from the sidewalk and began slowly making our way toward the intersection with the roundabout by traversing the side yards of the homes in the area. Fortunately for us, this area was big into bushes and trees, and not so big into large wooden fences, so we were able to make our way without too much difficulty.


    Eventually, we reached the house on the corner, and I spotted our likely way in. The alien ship was so large that it overshadowed not only the roundabout, but the street and sidewalk, as well. In the yard of the house across the street there was a large evergreen tree whose branches started right near the grass, and which had its upper branches partially crushed by the edge of the alien''s ship.


    That tree was our entry point. Now we simply needed to get across the street without being spotted by the aliens who were still at the foot of the ramp. I watched the aliens closely, my little girl hovering nervously just behind me.


    "What now, Snuggles?" she whispered.


    Patience, kit. Any moment now¡­aha! One of the aliens let out a squawk and as a group they all moved down the street. One of them must have noticed our defeated foes.


    Although only two of them kept going, all four wandered far enough away from the spaceship''s ramp that we were likely out of their peripheral vision.


    I chittered quietly to my little girl, and the two of us took off scampering across the street. Although my little girl''s breathing was hitching like she was afraid again, we made it without being spotted, and took shelter under the evergreen I had spotted earlier.


    "Where¡ª" began my little girl, but I was already working to climb the tree. "You think we should¡ªoh, you''re right! The branches are right up against the spaceship!"


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    I was making perfectly good progress, but my little girl still scooped me off the trunk and placed me on her shoulder before starting to climb herself. It was a bit awkward for her thanks to the yo-yo gauntlet, but she discovered that she could let the yo-yo hang on its weird connecting strand. She grumbled when it knocked against her knee a few times, but in good order we made it high enough up to access the top of the spaceship. The only really dicey moment was when my little girl moved from the trunk towards the ship itself. The branches of the tree were quite a bit thinner up here, and they bowed in a fairly dramatic fashion as she put her weight on them. Fortunately, she was able to throw herself forward onto the spaceship without making too much racket.


    The effort appeared to have cost her, however, as she set me down and sprawled on her stomach as soon as she was on the spaceship proper. "I''m sorry, Snuggles, but that was really scary. I need to rest a little."


    Well, that was fine. I nuzzled her and turned to go exploring myself.


    Before I could, though, she placed a hand on my back. "You''ll¡­you''ll come back, right?"


    Silly kit. I nuzzled her, groomed her shirt sleeve a little¡ªalthough it didn''t do much good¡ªand after those reassurances she let me go.


    I admit, leaving the shade of the tree branches was a little difficult. I''d never been somewhere so utterly exposed before. Anything could be lurking up in the sky, and I''d never see it coming. After pausing to survey the area for a bit, however, I forced myself to move out onto the roof of the spaceship proper. My little girl needed me, and we couldn''t be sure how long the spaceship would remain here. It would be catastrophic if we were still on the roof when it tried to fly back wherever it came from.


    The top of the spaceship was not particularly flat; it bulged and dipped in strange contours that made it difficult for me to navigate. As I tried to approach the central portion, I found myself stumped when I came across one such bulge that was particularly smooth and high. My little girl could probably get herself over it with a bit of effort, but I instead turned and began making my way around the perimeter.


    I found what I was looking for a quarter around the ring from where we''d climbed aboard. Nestled between a pair of those weird metallic swells was an access panel of some sort, made obvious by the hinges and recessed handle. I didn''t have the leverage, size, or opposable thumbs necessary to try and open it, but with my little girl''s help I was pretty sure it would give us unobtrusive access to the inside of the ship. I whipped around and scampered back the way I had come.


    When I arrived, my little girl was sitting up and peering down the street toward our apartment building. I grabbed onto her pant leg to get her attention. "There you are, Snuggles! I hope you found something. A whole bunch of those aliens just went running off toward our apartment. I think they found the aliens that you fought."


    We fought them together, thank you very much! But in any case, that was good news for us. I quickly led my little girl to the access hatch and sat back on my haunches expectantly to wait for her to work her magic.


    "Good job, Snuggles, I think this is a trap door of some sort!" She prodded at the recessed area where I assumed the handle was and frowned. "I can''t get anything to move."


    Well, it was kind of a long-shot that there''d be external access that was unlocked. Presumably space wasn''t quite as forgiving as the yards that usually surrounded human living spaces. I moved over to the hand she was wearing the gauntlet on and nuzzled it.


    My little girl gave me a skeptical look. "I know this yo-yo packs a punch, but I don''t think it can force its way through a metal door."


    No no no. That wasn''t what I was thinking at all. I ran along the edges of the trap door, then turned around the ran back along the edges until I reached her gauntlet, which I nosed again.


    "Oh! I did notice that the yo-yo felt hot when it was sleeping. I wonder¡­"


    My little girl carefully knelt and stared off in the direction of our apartment, although I wasn''t sure if she could actually see anything from here, as the swell of the central portion of the spaceship rose higher than her head. Evidently reassured, she pushed herself to her feet, and did a couple practice throws of the yo-yo before winding up her arm and tossing it down hard to spin level with her shins.


    As the thing kept spinning, I noticed it was again starting to put out heat and a little light, just like before. My little girl carefully moved her free hand toward it before yanking it away. "Yeah, this might work." She grinned at me. "Never thought I''d use Walk the Dog quite like this, but¡­" She gently lowered the spinning yo-yo thing until it touched the line where the trap door met the rest of the spaceship.


    It took off fast enough that it surprised both of us, but while I simply sat back my little girl lurched forward and followed the yo-yo as it hissed along the edge of the trap door. I wasn''t sure what would happen when the yo-yo hit the hinges, but surprisingly it passed through them like they weren''t even there. When she reached the corner of the hatch, my little girl pulled the yo-yo back into the gauntlet with a jerk, and spent a moment just staring at it. I carefully approached the area where she''d been running it and gave it a tentative sniff.


    "I did not think this would work so well," said my little girl. She sounded nervous, and no wonder. Where the yo-yo had run along the metal of the spaceship it looked like something had taken an ice cream scoop and just gouged out the metal from one end to the other, leaving a divot an inch or so deep in its wake.


    I was really happy she''d never touched the yo-yo when it was spinning except with the gauntlet.


    She shook herself slightly, turned, whipped the yo-yo down into its sleeping position again, and after waiting for it to heat up, ran it along the next side of the door. I still didn''t see what this had to do with dogs, but a couple more repetitions of this and she completed her circuit. After carefully stowing the yo-yo in the palm of her gauntlet and tentatively feeling the air near it with her free hand, she grabbed the recessed portion, said, "Here goes nothing, Snuggles!" and heaved it open.


    The hatch must have been lighter than she expected, because it shot completely out of the hole. My little girl let go of it in surprise, and it went clattering a few feet away down the roof. Not good! That racket was sure to have alerted any aliens that might be down below.


    Without waiting to see what she would do next, I scampered forward and vaulted into the hole.

 Chapter 5: Extra-terratrial

    The walls of the spaceship whizzed past me, but fortunately I was not some foolish young rat who would jump straight downwards and hope for the best. Instead, I''d thrown myself forward as well as down, so that I quickly approached the far wall. Twisting my legs beneath me, I absorbed the impact with all four paws, and after the briefest of twists to eye the descent, pushed myself off. This allowed me to bounce between the walls twice, each time absorbing some of my velocity, until I reached the point where the walls disappeared and I pushed off toward the remaining wall of the corridor below then jumped the last few feet to land on the floor.


    I quickly spun around. I was in a corridor tall and wide enough for humans¡ªor those blue aliens¡ªto comfortably traverse. Fortunately, no one was in sight; the corridor took a sharp turn to one side and arced around the curvature of the spaceship in the other. I didn''t hear anyone, either, although¡­


    "Snuggles! Snuggles, are you alright?! Wait for me!" My little girl was clambering as fast as she could down the foot- and hand-holds embedded in the wall leading up to the hatch. As soon as she reached the floor, she snatched me up and hugged me close to her chest. "Thank goodness, you''re alright. Don''t scare me like that!"


    As much as I would have liked to enjoy her pets, we needed to move. I was still worried that an alien might have heard our racket on the top of the ship and come to investigate, so I squirmed out of her hands, and scampered down her to the floor before heading for the sharp turn in the corridor. My little girl grabbed her yo-yo and got it back into the gauntlet¡ªshe evidently had to let it hang free to climb down¡ªand then followed me.


    We reached the corner and both peered around it. The hallway ahead of us proceeded to a large, closed door, but also had an off-shoot to the left. No aliens were present, which was a bit of a surprise to me. Maybe more of the crew had headed off to investigate their fallen than I''d thought.


    "Do you think we should¡­oh, I guess so. Wait for me, Snuggles!" said my little girl as I proceeded down the hall, pausing to check if I could detect any aliens down the off-shoot before proceeding toward the door.


    When we reached the door, we both paused. I had been kind of hoping that it would just open automatically, but nothing was happening. My little girl prodded at something that looked like a control panel, but aside from making a single beep, it didn''t do anything, either. "What do you think, Snuggles? Do you think Daddy is through here, or should we check the side corridor?"


    I wasn''t sure. The door sure looked big and official, but if I were designing this spaceship I would be more likely to put a control room here than a prison¡ªor whatever it was that was confining Daddy.


    We probably should explore more of the spaceship before the aliens got back, except while my little girl continued to prod at parts of the door with both her hand and gauntlet I had noticed something. Off to the side at the floor level there was what looked like a miniature hallway that was the perfect size for a rat. Perhaps there was an alternate way around the door, but the problem was my little girl wouldn''t be able to fit much more than her hand in the hole.


    Evidently tiring of her failure to elicit any particular reaction from the door, she crouched down near me. "What have you found, Snuggles?" She peered at the hole in the wall, going so far as to put her head right next to the floor to try and see down it. "Do you think this is a way around the door?"


    Well, I certainly couldn''t be sure, but it was our best lead. The problem was¡­


    My little girl rested her hand against my back; not trying to restrain me but present nonetheless. "I don''t really want you to leave me alone," she said in a small voice.


    This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.


    I leaned into her touch, then gave her hand a lick and trotted over to nose the gauntlet with its yo-yo.


    My little girl drew a deep, if shuddery breath. "You''re right. I''m not defenseless, at least." She leaned over so her head was level with my own. "You won''t leave me here, will you?"


    I bumped noses with her. Of course not, silly.


    "Okay. Okay, just¡­be quick, please." She sat back up, gave me a quick squeeze, and let me go.


    I wouldn''t consider anything else. Before either of us could have second thoughts, I scampered into the rat-sized corridor.


    The walls of the corridor curved up and over my head, allowing enough room that two rats could squeeze past one another if they wanted and with a comfortably low ceiling. To my surprise, the corridor proceeded relatively far, and although it didn''t have any sharp corners it did curve consistently to the left. Depending on the size and shape of the room behind the large door that had blocked our progress, I estimated that I was pretty close to or underneath the room. After several seconds of moving swiftly and silently as only a rat can, I finally rounded the final curve and found myself facing something utterly unexpected.


    I''d entered a small room with an equally low ceiling and curved walls, like a cube full of sand that had been compressed from the top and bottom. There was another exit in the wall to my left, while the wall to my right was unbroken. The room''s lighting was a lovely twilight level caused by a row of glowing screens and strange controls along the left side of the far wall.


    But what really grabbed my attention was the room''s occupant: in the middle of the room frozen in surprise was an alien¡­rat? It was utterly bizarre: the face, fore limbs, back limbs, and tail were very standard-looking rat, but the body was slightly too long and there was an extra set of limbs sticking out at awkward angles near where a normal rat''s ribs would terminate. Plus instead of typical rat fur colorations, the whole thing was some sort of shimmery turquoise¡ªthough the exact color might have been different given the low lighting.


    What in the great something-or-other?! said the alien rat and reached for the nearby bank of controls with its fore-paw.


    I moved faster. As the alien rat extended its paw, I threw myself forward and grabbed the base of the thing''s tail with my teeth. As its paw drew within millimeters of the control it was trying for, I was rolling myself backwards and threw my head back, launching the hind-quarters of the alien into the air. As it arced partially over me I let go of its tail, tucked all four paws up against its belly, and shoved it hard into the empty right-hand corner of the room.


    The alien rat soared through the air with a squeal before impacting the wall and collapsing in a heap, mouth working as it tried to regain its breath. Meanwhile, I wasted no time in whipping myself onto all four paws and positioning myself midway between the banks of controls and the exit behind me, ensuring that no matter which way the alien rat jumped I would be able to intercept it.


    The thing levered itself to its feet, middle limbs flailing ineffectually, and stared at me with a look of shocked fear. For a few moments neither of us moved, each sizing up our opponent. I was the first to break the stalemate. What are you? I asked.


    Excuse me?! The alien rat drew itself up in indignation. As you can see, I am a perfectly normal rat native to this planet, just like you.


    I bared my teeth. Rates on this planet don''t have six limbs.


    The alien slumped. Extra limbs were very something when I was a kit, it muttered.


    I cocked my head. Assuming this was indeed an alien rat, I hadn''t been terribly surprised that I could understand it, to be honest. Rats certainly had different dialects, but because we relied more on body language than vocalizations¡ªunlike humans¡ªI''d never seen a rat I couldn''t mostly understand. This alien rat, however, had used two terms I wasn''t familiar with. Extra limbs were very what?


    The alien looked at me with what appeared to be pity and stood up straighter. Popular and sophisticated.


    Ah, maybe it was using something like slang the way my little girl sometimes did. Honestly, when she got to talking about things her friends liked, I didn''t understand a word coming out of her mouth.


    That said, no proper rat would ever consider extra limbs to be popular or sophisticated. They looked idiotic. But I was getting sidetracked, and my little girl was waiting for me.


    Nevermind that. I gave the alien a hard look. Are you in league with the blue aliens stealing humans?


    The alien gave me a haughty look. Well, as haughty as something with six limbs can. In league with?! I''m in charge of this ship!


    Wrong answer.