I had just visited Uwayse cat, a dead fed & almost religious-leader- in the office I saw once in my dreams. The thin strips of varigated warm amber-toned wood, floor the ceiling. How the closet was open next to the entrance door. The three hanging kitty cat robes within, just the same as 2021, along with the violin on-stand on the well-carved maple desk. The windows reveal gardens of catnip and the white paneling over stone of other buildings nearby across lawns and countless planted flowers.
…And, truth be told, he looked even more an asshole cat in a Turban as he ever did dressed as Loki.
I examine the artistically cat scratched paneling and look out the windows – the same as it was prior – unrecognizable to any real-life place. (… except I am fairly certain the stone library likely houses the two cats from prior stories.)
“This isn’t the school I thought it was,” I tell the blond kitty in a Turban, “You misled me again, bro.”
“OH Ass-tag-furry-lah. I spend the entire time dressing down Biggie Leto and all you care about Is…THE ROOM. Hold on, let me pretend to be you…”
…and Uwayse unwrapped both ends of his turban to mimic longer hair as he cleared his throat & gestured dramatically, “ YOU ARE TEARING ME APART AZIZAM-…Wait,” he removed his turban entirely before collapsing into laughter.
I pretend offense.
“I thought you preferred sleeping in a tent and never watched shitty movies.”
“No sleep for the dead, and *you* watched shitty movies. So whaddya want so badly that you are willing to expose the greatest Shaykh of Catsylvania.”
“Love problems, clearly. My heart must be dead. Also, the greater Shaykh for this locale would either be a cheese – Shaykh or a milk-Shaykh, to be honest. Instead, we just have…”
“A buncha terrorists, a couple of Letos, you, that cute redhead transplant, and Rob buried deeper than a cicada. Fuck.” He sat on the corner of his own desk and removed the rest of the turban and fluffed his hair before promptly ruining it by jamming his grey Trilby it it’s place. “You haven’t figured it out yet, huh?”
“Oh, absolutely not if you are going to say it like that, Akhi… And what is it with you and gingers anyway…”
“First, why do you keep saying ‘a key’- Ich spreche kein Muslim, neither. nein. And I dont fucking know, I see redheads and think, “Oh, that’ll defend a distlefink “
“Well, that’s awkward, Uwayse- your choices haven’t *quite” worked, Akhi… Akhi means “brother” by the way. and you are the one dressed like a Muslim Disir, not me… Worse, so far, Duke Leto2 has remained the antidote to poisoned distlefink rather than the cause. The first dude you picked as “protection” was a bad egg.”
“It was an accident, the whole Uwayse thing…not the poison, and I apologize.”
“I accept … and Sure it was.”
“Seriously. Fully. Imagine a puzzlebox… There are just pieces that need to be pressed, then: violá: suddenly, instead of Valhalla, I am stuck as the force-ghost for a bunch of strangers chanting in a barn in Arabic. Lame.”
“Why no Valhalla? Why not just attend a sumbel or something instead? By the way, Hellraiser analogies are already proof of advanced knowledge of Tasawwuf… I approve.”
“Sush, you. Because there aren’t regular blót anymore, Valhalla is empty while everyone else is still living, and most of the barncat cultists actually talk to me like I’m alive when they see me. I just can’t tell them apart because they dress alike other than the Skyscraper, chaplain round glasses, and eyeliner Viking. Anyway, tassel-wolf, do you want to know why I keep bothering you like this…?” He asked
….as he removed the rest of his costume back to his normal standard of grey jeans and simple button-down shirt as the office dissolved into the computer line at the empty library where we shared the most time…
“Riddle me this, Alex the Cat-man: If you could have anything you wanted in the entire world, what would you choose?”
“Easy, I’d want my Pir, the living one, freed, safe, and with me… everyone knows that. My life is a hackneyed broken record, kiddo.”
“Exactly.”
“Exactly what…? I thought you hated Leto2, you want Him? You are going to have to arm wrestle more than a few handlers to earn his hand & affections. You wanna kiss his ring, Uwayse?”
…At this point, even I was laughing to the point of tears, “Dude. Even in my dreams, you insult him.”
“…Just like real life.”
“How did that work out for you?”
“I died. Now I get to haunt him through you.”
“He didn’t even kill you.”
“Wish he did. It would have hurt less, him I would completely expect. ‘It’s just tradecraft, nothing personal’…’Oh, that’s quite all right, no hard feelings.’”
“Okay. I give up. Why do you haunt me and keep throwing powerful redheads at me seemingly to ruin my life via dreams?”
“Maybe I just want to protect my own Shaykh.”
“…”
“Not you. If you could protect him you would, you can’t so I needed to find my replacement… the six man hive mind was a mistake, though.”
“And the idiot with the poison wasn’t?”
“Ha. Well, true. Anyway… I still like the taller one with the pierced ears, he kinda ‘gets’ me, you know?”
“I hate Fana al Shaykh,” I replied.
“No, you don’t. And maybe, just maybe, I did not mislead you- maybe my school is better than his & other his. I teach religious leaders how to not suck.”
…and a yellow kitty was seen in several dreams for months with a tiny hammer building his own school from scratch, but better than all the rest.
Just like everyone else said.
The Chronicals of Alaraf 