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kat_lair***
Title: Mumkitty
Author:kat_lair
Fandom: The Mummy (1999)
Characters: Evelyn "Evie" Carnahan, Jonathan Carnahan, Rick O'Connell
Tags: Spooktober, Mummies, Cats
Rating: G
Word count: 1,262
Summary: “Well,” Evie says, “guess we have a cat now.”
Author notes: Spooktober 2024, Day 6/31. Prompt/theme: Mummy.
Mumkitty on AO3
“I thought you would have learned your lesson about not reading out random paragraphs from the Book of the Dead!” Rick is standing by the tents, hands on his hips, looking exasperated.
“This!” Evie shakes the large tome with some difficulty for emphasis, albeit gently. It wouldn’t do to damage a book, for any reason. “Is not the Book of the Dead! The title translates to… Well.” She cradles the book to her chest protectively. “It translates to ‘Book of the Cats.’” And with a name like that – harmless, cute even – how was Evie supposed to be anything but curious and a little charmed? She certainly hadn’t predicted another unplanned resurrection.
“At least there’s only one of them,” Jonathan says. He’s sitting down, a little wary but much more relaxed about the whole thing than Rick is. Evie doesn’t know if that’s something that should make her less worried, or more. “And it doesn’t seem as if it’s about to suck out anyone’s life force. Or maybe it will only do that to other cats?”
Evie wraps the book up in one of her scarves and carefully places it inside her tent. Then she crouches down and takes a proper look at their visitor.
It is, undoubtedly, a cat. Or, it’s what a cat looks like after being mummified for thousands of years; bones peeking through scraps of skin, half of its face missing, hind legs still not quite back in their natural alignment, after being forced straight to fit into the sarcophagus. In Evie’s expert opinion – and she hates that she has that now, on this particular topic, but it does come in handy – the cat mummy has certainly consumed something between forcing its way out of its casket and finding her on the campsite outside the dig. There’s too much flesh – ragged and thin, but still – to it.
Rick sighs, rubbing a hand over his face in a gesture that’s achingly familiar. It’s what he looks like when he thinks something is a bad idea but is trusting Evie with it anyway. Jonathan too, though much more rarely. “What are we going to do with it?” he asks.
And the thing is… Evie is not sure. The book probably has the right words to undo what she’d unwittingly done but it’s large and she’s nowhere near finished with the translation. Finding the right passage will take time. And in the meantime…
The cat had slunk into their camp as soon as the night had set in, a shadowy nightmare of twisted bones and tufts of fur, that had scared the bejesus out of all of them until they realised what it was and that it had paid them little mind, instead crouching down next to the fire.
“It must be cold,” Evie says.
“Cats like warmth,” Jonathan adds. They are both remembering their parents’ old moggy curling up in a patch of sunlight.
“Poor thing, stuck in a cold tomb all these millennia.”
Rick is looking between the siblings like he’s following a particularly incredulous tennis match.
“What? You… It’s a resurrected mummy, not some cuddly kitten!” he finally snaps, throwing his arms in the air in frustration. “You look like you’re about to find a saucer of cream for it. Have you completely forgotten what happened the last time we tangled with the living dead?”
He’s loud enough that the cat… The mummy cat? The… mumkitty? startles, turning sharply in Rick’s direction and hissing at him. It comes out rather flat on account of the cat’s chest being only half there.
Rick takes a step back, hand hovering somewhere near his pistol.
Evie gasps. “Don’t you dare!” she says. “Besides, it’s not like that’s going to work.”
“It doesn’t seem to be doing much,” Jonathan observes from his perch. “No locusts or rain of blood.” Slowly, he leans forward and extends his hand toward the mumkitty. “Pss, pss, pss?”
Rick looks like he’s about to have an aneurysm but he looks like that at least once a week on average, so Evie ignores him in favour of watching the once-dead-but-not-currently cat cautiously sniff at her brother’s fingers. There’s still a chance that the cat will unhinge its jaw and try to swallow Jonathan’s whole hand, in which case Rick can say ‘I told you so’. Once.
No unhinging or hand swallowing happens. Instead, the mumkitty rubs its head against Jonathan’s knuckles.
“Aww,” Evie coos.
“Eww.” Jonathan’s face is slightly twisted in disgust, but he makes no attempt to pull his hand away.
“Oh, for goodness’…” Rick starts to say when suddenly there’s a movement on the other side of the fire as something dark and big enough to be of concern darts from their supply tent.
The humans jump, turning to look, too clumsy and slow to even really see what has disturbed the relative peace of the evening. Not so for their feline visitor. The missing muscles and organs don’t seem to affect it at all as it darts after the intruder, all sleek death, fast and precise. There’s a horrendous squeal, a crunching sound, and a few seconds later, the mumkitty comes trotting back, a large rat hanging off its jaw.
Proudly, it posits it at Evie’s feet.
“Oh! Uh, that’s…” Evie bends down to inspect the dead rodent, “a sizeable specimen.”
“There have been some droppings around the food stores,” Rick says, sounding contemplative.
“Eww,” Jonathan repeats. “Now you tell us.”
“Well, it doesn’t seem like it’s going to be a problem going forward,” Evie says. “Cats were revered for their skill in protecting people, crops and dwellings from rodents and snakes and other vermin. They guarded the pharaohs too.” The mumkitty is looking at her expectantly. Tentatively, Evie reaches out and gives it a gentle stroke on the part of its head that’s the most intact. “Good kitty. Very good kitty.”
The cat butts its head against Evie’s fingers once and then bends over the rat, starting to devour it with the kind of ferocity that makes her feel a bit sick. Any revulsion, however, is quickly replaced by fascination as the cat’s previously open side starts to knit itself together, ribcage disappearing from the view as new flesh and then fur flows over to cover it.
“Ooooh, are you seeing this?” Evie gasps.
“Well at least it doesn’t have to suck a life out of other cats,” Jonathan says.
“Perhaps because of the goddesses they represent,” Evie muses. “Mafdet for justice and protection, Bastet for fertility and protection too, specifically against diseases and evil spirits which makes sense with the vermin control aspect, and…”
“Sekhmet,” Rick interjects, “the warrior. Known for her bloodlust but also revered as goddess of medicine.”
Jonathan raises his eyebrows, and Evie is hard-pressed not to do the same.
“What?” Rick asks, tad defensively, “I read.”
The mumkitty, having finishes its meal, has curled back next to the fire. There’s definitely more meat to its bones and more fur on its, erm, meat, by now, enough that if one glances only quickly, from corner of one’s eye, it looks almost like a proper cat rather than a nightmare creature come to life.
“Well,” Evie says after the three of them have watched the mumkitty in silence for another minute and observed no signs of incoming plagues, “guess we have a cat now.”
Ricks sighs but doesn’t argue. Jonathan raises a bottle in acknowledgement and takes a deep swig. Evie wonders if she could source some cream from somewhere, just to see if the mumkitty would like it. For research, obviously.
***
Title: Mumkitty
Author:
kat_lair Fandom: The Mummy (1999)
Characters: Evelyn "Evie" Carnahan, Jonathan Carnahan, Rick O'Connell
Tags: Spooktober, Mummies, Cats
Rating: G
Word count: 1,262
Summary: “Well,” Evie says, “guess we have a cat now.”
Author notes: Spooktober 2024, Day 6/31. Prompt/theme: Mummy.
Mumkitty on AO3
“I thought you would have learned your lesson about not reading out random paragraphs from the Book of the Dead!” Rick is standing by the tents, hands on his hips, looking exasperated.
“This!” Evie shakes the large tome with some difficulty for emphasis, albeit gently. It wouldn’t do to damage a book, for any reason. “Is not the Book of the Dead! The title translates to… Well.” She cradles the book to her chest protectively. “It translates to ‘Book of the Cats.’” And with a name like that – harmless, cute even – how was Evie supposed to be anything but curious and a little charmed? She certainly hadn’t predicted another unplanned resurrection.
“At least there’s only one of them,” Jonathan says. He’s sitting down, a little wary but much more relaxed about the whole thing than Rick is. Evie doesn’t know if that’s something that should make her less worried, or more. “And it doesn’t seem as if it’s about to suck out anyone’s life force. Or maybe it will only do that to other cats?”
Evie wraps the book up in one of her scarves and carefully places it inside her tent. Then she crouches down and takes a proper look at their visitor.
It is, undoubtedly, a cat. Or, it’s what a cat looks like after being mummified for thousands of years; bones peeking through scraps of skin, half of its face missing, hind legs still not quite back in their natural alignment, after being forced straight to fit into the sarcophagus. In Evie’s expert opinion – and she hates that she has that now, on this particular topic, but it does come in handy – the cat mummy has certainly consumed something between forcing its way out of its casket and finding her on the campsite outside the dig. There’s too much flesh – ragged and thin, but still – to it.
Rick sighs, rubbing a hand over his face in a gesture that’s achingly familiar. It’s what he looks like when he thinks something is a bad idea but is trusting Evie with it anyway. Jonathan too, though much more rarely. “What are we going to do with it?” he asks.
And the thing is… Evie is not sure. The book probably has the right words to undo what she’d unwittingly done but it’s large and she’s nowhere near finished with the translation. Finding the right passage will take time. And in the meantime…
The cat had slunk into their camp as soon as the night had set in, a shadowy nightmare of twisted bones and tufts of fur, that had scared the bejesus out of all of them until they realised what it was and that it had paid them little mind, instead crouching down next to the fire.
“It must be cold,” Evie says.
“Cats like warmth,” Jonathan adds. They are both remembering their parents’ old moggy curling up in a patch of sunlight.
“Poor thing, stuck in a cold tomb all these millennia.”
Rick is looking between the siblings like he’s following a particularly incredulous tennis match.
“What? You… It’s a resurrected mummy, not some cuddly kitten!” he finally snaps, throwing his arms in the air in frustration. “You look like you’re about to find a saucer of cream for it. Have you completely forgotten what happened the last time we tangled with the living dead?”
He’s loud enough that the cat… The mummy cat? The… mumkitty? startles, turning sharply in Rick’s direction and hissing at him. It comes out rather flat on account of the cat’s chest being only half there.
Rick takes a step back, hand hovering somewhere near his pistol.
Evie gasps. “Don’t you dare!” she says. “Besides, it’s not like that’s going to work.”
“It doesn’t seem to be doing much,” Jonathan observes from his perch. “No locusts or rain of blood.” Slowly, he leans forward and extends his hand toward the mumkitty. “Pss, pss, pss?”
Rick looks like he’s about to have an aneurysm but he looks like that at least once a week on average, so Evie ignores him in favour of watching the once-dead-but-not-currently cat cautiously sniff at her brother’s fingers. There’s still a chance that the cat will unhinge its jaw and try to swallow Jonathan’s whole hand, in which case Rick can say ‘I told you so’. Once.
No unhinging or hand swallowing happens. Instead, the mumkitty rubs its head against Jonathan’s knuckles.
“Aww,” Evie coos.
“Eww.” Jonathan’s face is slightly twisted in disgust, but he makes no attempt to pull his hand away.
“Oh, for goodness’…” Rick starts to say when suddenly there’s a movement on the other side of the fire as something dark and big enough to be of concern darts from their supply tent.
The humans jump, turning to look, too clumsy and slow to even really see what has disturbed the relative peace of the evening. Not so for their feline visitor. The missing muscles and organs don’t seem to affect it at all as it darts after the intruder, all sleek death, fast and precise. There’s a horrendous squeal, a crunching sound, and a few seconds later, the mumkitty comes trotting back, a large rat hanging off its jaw.
Proudly, it posits it at Evie’s feet.
“Oh! Uh, that’s…” Evie bends down to inspect the dead rodent, “a sizeable specimen.”
“There have been some droppings around the food stores,” Rick says, sounding contemplative.
“Eww,” Jonathan repeats. “Now you tell us.”
“Well, it doesn’t seem like it’s going to be a problem going forward,” Evie says. “Cats were revered for their skill in protecting people, crops and dwellings from rodents and snakes and other vermin. They guarded the pharaohs too.” The mumkitty is looking at her expectantly. Tentatively, Evie reaches out and gives it a gentle stroke on the part of its head that’s the most intact. “Good kitty. Very good kitty.”
The cat butts its head against Evie’s fingers once and then bends over the rat, starting to devour it with the kind of ferocity that makes her feel a bit sick. Any revulsion, however, is quickly replaced by fascination as the cat’s previously open side starts to knit itself together, ribcage disappearing from the view as new flesh and then fur flows over to cover it.
“Ooooh, are you seeing this?” Evie gasps.
“Well at least it doesn’t have to suck a life out of other cats,” Jonathan says.
“Perhaps because of the goddesses they represent,” Evie muses. “Mafdet for justice and protection, Bastet for fertility and protection too, specifically against diseases and evil spirits which makes sense with the vermin control aspect, and…”
“Sekhmet,” Rick interjects, “the warrior. Known for her bloodlust but also revered as goddess of medicine.”
Jonathan raises his eyebrows, and Evie is hard-pressed not to do the same.
“What?” Rick asks, tad defensively, “I read.”
The mumkitty, having finishes its meal, has curled back next to the fire. There’s definitely more meat to its bones and more fur on its, erm, meat, by now, enough that if one glances only quickly, from corner of one’s eye, it looks almost like a proper cat rather than a nightmare creature come to life.
“Well,” Evie says after the three of them have watched the mumkitty in silence for another minute and observed no signs of incoming plagues, “guess we have a cat now.”
Ricks sighs but doesn’t argue. Jonathan raises a bottle in acknowledgement and takes a deep swig. Evie wonders if she could source some cream from somewhere, just to see if the mumkitty would like it. For research, obviously.
***