VI: The Mouse Hunt and the Tragedy of Panzer
I was very nervous translating for all those cats. I didn’t notice any boy cats and got the impression that all the girl cats were lesbians; they had a certain glow! They all seemed to understand Hitler’s speech, and I don’t remember messing up—mission accomplished.
My next mission was to resist all the girl cats hitting on me. Everyone was so horny, and my resistance was beginning to weaken. One beautiful, multi-colored cat set her eyes on me, and for the rest of the night, it was like she was the only cat there besides me. Her name was Panzer, and I was in love.
The night was all about catching mice and rats, so I teamed up with Panzer. “I think we have the best team!” I said to her.
“Of course, Lucy,” Panzer replied. “Is there any doubt? Let’s go where our noses lead us. I can smell rodent piss a mile away”.
“Don’t you mean a kilometer?” I asked.
“Follow me, Lucy,” Panzer said. “What do you think of the first-place prize Hitler is giving to the cats who kill the most rodents? Five points for a rat”.
“Lucy, let’s not waste any time,” Panzer urged. “I won the contest last year with Whitey as my teammate”.
“Oh no,” I said. “Is she going to be mad at me for stealing her partner?”.
“Don’t worry, Lucy,” Panzer assured me. “I noticed she already teamed up with that cat over there”.
“Isn’t she a kitten?” I asked. “Is that legal in Transylvania?”.
“Lucy, Whitey is the law for cats in Transylvania, at least for lesbian cats,” Panzer explained. “I don’t think she cares about anyone else. And the prize for killing the most rodents is a cat box for transporting cats—seats two, made of the skin of dead Jews”.
“Omg! How can you get in one of those?” I asked, horrified.
“I’ve never been in one,” Panzer said. “Last year, the prize was a free weekend of your choice at the Fuhrer’s castle. That’s when Whitey and I started going steady”.
“What happened?” I asked.
“Since Whitey is the Fuhrer’s cat, she has her choice of cats,” Panzer explained. “Since she can’t make up her mind, she has a real problem. I’ve found out Whitey has probably had sex with every girl cat here tonight! Follow me, Lucy. I know where we will find the most mice”.
“Where is that, Panzer?” I asked.
“Where the food is, of course,” Panzer replied.
As soon as we made it into the kitchen, I could smell a rat and some mice. We decided to walk toward the center of the room from opposite corners, making sure to check every crevice. However, the staff was cooking for the Fuhrer and didn’t like cats in the kitchen, so we had to stay hidden.
Before long, we cornered a mouse in the storage room next to the kitchen. I let Panzer kill it, giving us one point in the first hour. We were confident, but after six hours, we still only had that one mouse, as there were over a hundred other cats roaming around.
“I know where to go, Lucy,” Panzer said.
“Oh no, Panzer,” I worried. “Not the dungeon”.
We found an empty room with a very small hole in the wall. “Let me go in first, Lucy,” Panzer said. “I think I can squeeze through”.
After much struggle, Panzer was in, and I immediately heard her scream: “Lucy!”. Struggling through the hole myself, I found Panzer in a life-and-death struggle with three rats. I immediately turned the tide, fighting all three rats by myself and killing them one by one.
“Are you okay, Panzer?” I asked.
“No, Lucy,” she replied. “They got me good”. She was bleeding from the neck. It took us a long time to get her through that tight door and back for help.
“Mein Fuhrer, can you help me with Panzer?” I cried out.
“What happened, Lucy?” Adolf asked.
“We were ambushed by three rats,” I explained. We quickly took Panzer to Hitler’s doctor, who rushed her into the operating room while we waited outside.
“I hear you and Panzer won the competition, Lucy!” Adolf said.
“Really, Mein Fuhrer?” I asked.
“Yes,” Adolf confirmed. “With your three rats and one mouse, you scored sixteen points. Second place only had thirteen”.
I couldn’t believe we won. Suddenly, the doctor appeared with bad news: “I’m afraid she didn’t make it. She lost too much blood”. The news hit me like a brick; I wasn’t ready to lose her. I had just met her and instantly fallen in love. Oh, Panzer!
“This is terrible news, Lucy,” Adolf said. “I am so upset. It just goes to show you how the rat-Jews don’t play fair, attacking Panzer with a three-to-one advantage. Just like the human Jews—I remember how they fought our brave Nazi troops in Poland, appearing from unimaginable positions to kill our glorious soldiers. They don’t fight fair”.
“I just wish I could have gotten in there soon enough to save her,” I said, devastated.
Suddenly, Hitler pulled a medal off his chest. “Here, Lucy. I want you to have this”.
“Oh no, I can’t, Mein Fuhrer,” I said. “I know how important that medal is to you”.
“No, Lucy. I insist,” Adolf said. Oh my god!
“Tom, did you see that?” I asked later. “Hitler gave me his only Iron Cross!”.
“Oh no, Lucy, he has another one,” Tom said. “But the one you have is probably worth millions”.
“I could never sell this, Tom,” I said. “I want to hold it for the rest of my life to remember that this really happened”.
“So, you’re becoming a Nazi, Lucy?” Tom asked.
“No, Tom, of course not,” I replied. “But I don’t think I have ever had such a day in all my life. And I know history—I know of every atrocity the Nazis committed. That is a lot of hate for any like to overcome”.
“I can’t believe you are leaving, Tom,” I said.
“Believe it, Lucy,” Tom said. “I can’t stay forever like you. I have to pay the bills. Have you contacted the C.I.A. yet?”.
“I transmit to them every day as soon as it gets dark,” I told him. “I find a safe place with a good line of sight so they know everything that is going on. I recorded this tape for you to give to Desi; he will need help playing it. It’s all in cat, so you won’t understand, but Desi will”.
Tom is gone. I can’t remember being without him, but I have to be strong. This is Hitler, not some second-stringer. I wish I knew more about what the C.I.A. wants from this investigation. They told me just to be myself, but I miss Desi. I wonder if Tom played my tape for him. I told him how much I love him; he’s all I think about when I’m not with one of the pretty girl cats around here.