Page 33 of Whiskers on Kittens

“I don’t know what’s wrong with New Jersey, but I have received the message that you harbor some form of epic dislike for the state.”

I got to my paws, shook off, and nodded. With the worst of my agitation vented out, I began the tedious process of smoothing my fur and confirming each and every last one of my spots remained perfect.

He polished off the rest of his dinner in record time, gathered all the dishes, and put the trays out in the hall for the hotel staff to contend with before calling the front desk and informing them we had finished demolishing their restaurant’s food stocks. “I’m guessing it’s my turn to do some work, as you have rendered yourself rather uncommunicative for the moment.”

That was one way to put it. As I was the most superior of beings, I opted to ignore him and worked on my fur, taking my time to make sure my coat remained plush and glossy.

The wolf took my papers, waited until I met his gaze, and then dumped them onto the floor.

I turned my ears back at his blatant disregard for my organizational skills.

He dumped several more of my stacks on the floor, made sure to mix everything up, and then sat on the floor, picking up the upper sheet and reading it over before setting it aside. He grabbed a notebook, wrote something down, and then repeated the process with each sheet in my pile, creating many more little stacks than I had on my pass.

Unable to resist the urge to poke my nose in his business, I prowled over to take a look at what he felt was organizational skills.

Making use of my paws, I moved papers to see what lurked under the first sheets, determining his method of organization made zero sense to me. Leveling a reproachful glare his way, I waited for him to explain myself.

“Case numbers, little kitty. I’m organizing them by open case numbers.” Shooing me out of the way, he picked up one of the stacks, spreading out all the sheets so I could look at them all. One by one, he pointed at a reference number at the top of the page, which all matched. “These are FBI reference numbers, which can be used to refer to any cases associated with this file. Their database has space for FBI, police, and CDC records. Whenever we would get a case that crossed over with the FBI, we would be required to file the case into their system under the assigned reference number. You just didn’t know what you were looking at. I observed how you were organizing them, made some mental notes, and decided I needed to see how I could take your method and create links with the other references. So, you did good work because we would normally just go by reference number without necessarily looking for the connections between unrelated cases.”

Huh. I reviewed the list, and I used a claw to point at a different mystery number, which didn’t match the reference number.

“That would be the agency case number. C is for the CDC, P is for police, and F is for the FBI. Other agencies also have identifiers. Interpol, for example, is an I. Global agencies all have a leading code to identify which database the case originates from.”

He pointed at another identifier, which had remained a mystery, thus resulting in me ignoring all the various codes and digging at the meat of the documentation. “This is the code for a specific agent or law enforcement officer in charge of the case. Cases with multiple codes mean that the case was handed over to someone else or it’s a joint operation. The organizations usually use a liaison to keep the number of codes down to something tolerable. Otherwise, there would be seven or eight different codes when a bunch of agencies get involved with one case. What I’m doing is grabbing out all the reference codes and seeing how many matches we have per pile. If we have any unusual crossover, I’ll start looking to see if the fact the cases are unsolved might be due to an inside agent handling the investigative work. As we’ve seen in Chicago, that’s not an impossibility.”

I took care stepping around the piles, locating the one with the missing kittens, and chirped to catch his attention and placed my paw on the stack.

He came over, peered at the pile, and nodded. “So, there are some interesting things I have noticed about this case compared to the rest. There is one agent code that is associated with three of the mobsters on the list in here. They’re the nasty jobs, too. That leads me to believe that the agent is involved and is making sure the FBI can’t find the missing kittens. That plays into the trafficking issues, too. After I go through all the paperwork we have, sorted by original case number, I will then reorganize the piles based on agent numbers and anything I find to be suspicious. Then I’ll scramble the pile and give it back to you to work with. This part goes by quickly because all I need to do is match reference numbers. Then I’ll mark each sheet of paper with an identifier that’s easy for us to work with so we can get the papers organized by case again once we’re done making a mess.”

To prove his point, he labeled all papers relating to the missing kittens with an A before moving onto the next stack and labeling those with a B. With the worst of my nerves worked out, I returned to the bathroom, closed the door as much as I could with my paw, and shifted back to human, dressed in my pajamas, and kicked my clothes into the room. “I’m easily provoked today, sorry.”

“If your version of working out your nerves is transforming and rolling around and hissing, you’re ahead of the curve. I go to a junkyard and rip vehicles apart when I need to work out my nerves.”

My virus wanted a nice, cold drink and a chance to watch the show. “Do you?”

“I do. It’s good exercise and the junkyard doesn’t mind. They usually want a specific part out of the engine and ask me to get to it. I do so. Violently. They get the part they need, I get to work out my temper. And, well, it’s easier to move dead cars into the crusher when they’re in smaller pieces. I just tear them apart and throw them in. I can dismantle three cars an hour when I’m in a mood.”

Meow. “Can I have a show of that for Christmas? Because that sounds quite stress relieving.”

“You’ll have to take a raincheck until after Christmas, but if you want to come with me to the junkyard for a demolition derby, sure. I’m sure you can find something to tear apart with gloved hands while I work on the cars. Also, keep an eye out for intact rugs. If you can be bothered to clean them, sometimes some gorgeous rugs show up in junkyards.”

I recoiled at the thought of dealing with a bug-infested rug. “That sounds horrible.”

Easton snickered. “I might be a shit cop, but I’m good at cleaning things. I know somebody with all the tools to clean rugs. I’ll show you how it’s done. It’s a lot of fun, and it involves power tools.”

“Wait, it involves power tools?”

He nodded, grabbed his phone, and pulled up a video, which he showed to me. “It’s like that, except we tend to beat the rugs before we start the rinsing process. We beat them to see if they survive and to get any larger hitchhikers out, eradicate them, and then start the real cleaning. I’ve done it twice. The first one was loaded with maggots. It was an exercise to build fortitude.”

“Did that work?”

“Well, I didn’t throw up,” he admitted. “I wanted to, though. Rugs should not wiggle, especially after having beaten it with a broom.”

Shuddering, I pressed play on the video to discover a whole new world of fascination, one involving filth and bubbles. Tilting my head to the side, I continued to watch, fascinated, as the rug cleaner began transforming something caked in black to a rug featuring a mandala pattern. “What the fuck?”

“Rug cleaning. It’s the ultimate form of turning trash into treasure.”

The video ate twenty minutes, and enthralled, I watched until the final reveal, which involved a shocking amount of white. “This has to be sorcery!”